Why do you need a coach? Athletes never think twice about hiring a coach, but entrepreneurs often miss the value of having a coach. Are you second guessing the value of a coach in your business?
A coach enables you to reach the highest level of performance. According to an ICF Global Coaching Client Study, “Most clients reported improved work performance, better business management, more efficient time management, increased team effectiveness, and more growth and opportunities. The same study found that coaching clients noted greater self-confidence, enhanced relationships, more effective communications skills, better work-and-life balance and an improvement in wellness. Nearly 70% of individuals indicated they had at least made back their initial investment.”
And you may be thinking, “I’m an author, not a business” or “I’m a business, not an author!” Let me be the first to break it to you—both of those thoughts are completely incorrect. Today, being an author requires becoming an entrepreneur. And the reverse is true too; being an entrepreneur requires some level of writing whether it is blogging, speech writing, and web content or publishing books. You are both or you are soon going to need to become both an author and an entrepreneur.
Ten Reasons to Hire a Business Coach
- Get Fresh Perspective on Your Business: It is easy to focus on the day to day minutiae of your business and lose track of your businesses potential. You may start out with your eye on the goal, but after working hard day in and day out you can shift your focus onto the work. A coach will help you see how to work on your business while you are working in your business. A coach will also help you identify when you are you clinging to an idea or direction a lot longer than you should. They will encourage you to stop beating a dead horse or grasp ahold of an overlooked treasure in your business.
- Get Unstuck: The greatest enemy to a business owner is themselves. You can easily get in the way of yourself. No one will hold you back more than you. Generally we hold ourselves back based on unfounded fear, lack of confidence or obstacles that become stop signs. A business coach will push you past your own junk, your stinking thinking and the funk it can put you into. Even the most self-motivated person can trip on themselves.
- Challenge You to Go Outside Your Comfort Zone: It is easy to get comfortable in business. A coach will push you past your comfort zone. There is little personal and business growth to be found inside the confines of our own comfort zones.
- Unlock Your Own Creativity: You will be surprised by the surge of creativity getting unstuck can inspire in you. A coach also creates a safe place for you to hash out ideas, test theories and be creative.
- Kick You in the Pants When You Need it: A coach should tell you the truth. They shouldn’t sugar coat things and pat you on the back when you aren’t doing your part. A good coach will help you set achievable goals and then hold you accountable to them.
- Identify Your Strengths and Weaknesses: Everyone has weaknesses. The sooner you identify yours the better. Finding yours strengths and building on them is the key to succeeding. A coach will help you identify how you should spend your time in your business and what you should contract others to do for you. You will be amazed at what you can accomplish when someone encourages you to be authentic to yourself and your strengths. Your strengths should be aligned with your goal. Trying to be something you are not is a sure path to failure. I’m not saying you can’t grow, conquer fears and become a better person. I am saying if you have absolutely no innate passion or mind for innovative technology than you aren’t going to become the next Bill Gates, but you might have an inner Martha Stewart itching to get out. A coach will help you identify and embrace your strengths.
- Help You Prioritize Your Business: When you set out in business you have a goal in mind. Did you remember to integrate that goal with the lifestyle choices that are important to you? Did you consider whether the sacrifices your business would require were in line with your family experience? Sometimes we find ourselves halfway down the road before we realize that the price of success in a particular field is higher than the one we were willing to pay. A business coach will help you prioritize your business to be successful, without sacrificing the other parts of your life, including your family, mental and physical health. A coach helps you zoom out the bigger picture and refocus to include what is important to you.
- Help Balance Your Creativity with Reality: Your creativity may outpace reality. You mind may come up with more ideas than you could possibly accomplish, or cause you to create more products than you can manage. The mind of an entrepreneur is an amazing thing—once unleashed it can create a thousand bunny trails to every one brilliant profitable path. A business coach helps you zero in on the bright ideas.
- Charge What You are Worth: The hardest thing for many entrepreneurs is charging what they or their product is worth. Often small business owners forget to include the cost of their labor into the cost of the product. What?! You can never replace yourself or grow past your own ability to create if you haven’t factored the coast of your own labor into your prices. A coach will point out the value in you, brag on you and teach you how to embrace your own accomplishments. A coach can help you get past insecurity to a vantage point to see your own worth.(So why do I charge $175 an hour for author and business coaching? The average business coach charges $200 to $350 per hour worldwide. So why do I charge below the low end? I don’t want there to be a barrier to entry, but it still should be an investment on your part. If you aren’t paying for it, and it doesn’t hurt a little bit, you won’t take the work assigned as seriously. I believe in the start-up, the dreamer, the little guy trying to get a start and my dream is to help those people. I know I am worth more than I charge. For right now I charge $200 per hour.)
- Accountability: Your coach becomes your built in accountability partner. Promising to do something that you don’t follow through on will not move your business forward one inch. Knowing you have someone you are paying to nag you is a great motivator. When you are accountable to someone else you won’t break the promises you make to yourself quite as easily as you will if you make those promises in a vacuum. If you want to accomplish big goals having someone to report to is a huge motivator.
Worth the Investment
According to the same ICF Global Coaching report, “The vast majority of companies (86%) say they at least made their investment back. In fact, almost one-fifth (19%) saw a ROI of 50 times their investment, while another 28% saw a ROI of 10 to 49 times the investment. Nearly all companies or individuals who hire a coach are satisfied. According to the ICF Global Coaching Client Study, a stunning 99% of people who were polled said they were somewhat or very satisfied with the overall coaching experience.”
If your business is stuck in neutral it is actually going backwards. The pace of business, technology and changes will leave you in the dust. If your business is taking one step forward, two steps back you are actually in reverse. Break the pattern and hire a coach.
I might not be the right coach for you. I’d love for you to consider me, but don’t chose me just because you read this post. Research me, research others and make the right choice for your business to move forward. Just move forward! When you find the right person you will know it. Trust your instincts and even if it seems like a big-scary investment realize that you are worth it and the potential of your business will more than pay for it.
