The Benefits of Coaching

Earlier in the week I wrote about the myths of coaching. Today I'd like to explore the benefits of coaching.

I could use words like: clarity, improving situations, realising goals, changing lives, inspiring action, and transformation. Which are all words used by coachees about the impact coaching has had on them. The challenge is, it doesn't help you much as they're not very tangible and generate more questions of the coachees than they provide answers e.g. how were you inspired, what did that mean you could do, what did you have more or less of in your life as a result and so on.

As I love using metaphors in my coaching I thought I'd use a journey as a metaphor for what coaching helps us to do.

When setting out on any journey there's some fundamentals.

• You have to know where you are (A)
• and where you want to get to (B)

Usually we at least know where we're starting - although not always - and if we don't know coaching can act a little like GPS helping us discover the coordinates of where we're starting from.

If needed, coaching can also help us to open our eyes and to be honest about the state of the current situation - positive or negative, helpful or not, and the inner and outer resources we have available to us.

Coaching can help us get clear about our end destination, making it more likely we'll get there.

Or perhaps that's just about the first stop. With the potential of an even bigger and further away destination as some point in the future that we need to consider now.

Coaching can help us be clear about why we want to get to B,

and even invite us to consider if C or D might be even better destinations that meet more of our needs, or that act as a bigger motivator.

Coaching can help us come up with a route to get from A to B/C or D - that action plan.

It can help us decide when we set out, and when not to.

Who we don't want to come along with us, and who we do.

Coaching can help us prepare for the journey - decide what we might need to do before setting off,

or what we need to consider during our journey.

Coaching can help take the first step,

Monitor progress along our journey, and help us to make corrections to our route, or deal with things that arise.

Of course there's always things that get in the way on a journey, and coaching helps us prepare for them and work around, under, over or through them. To face what might stop us getting there and prepare for success.

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Coaching also helps us take action to start covering those miles, and to celebrate when we reach each milestone.

People don't always need help for every aspect of the journey. And sometime they do - from planning, to leaving, to amending, to correcting, to arriving and celebrating.

If you know where you're headed, have an action plan to get there, have taken the first step, and are satisfied with the speed, direction, and progress you're making then you're most likely being your own coach, and may not need any additional support.

If you're: stuck, or unsure where to go, off track, wandering around, hesitant, lost, have no route map, and/or have done no preparation for the journey then coaching might be worth considering to get you on track and motoring along - or perhaps it's flying along that makes more sense.

If coaching is something you'd like to explore the first step is finding and choosing a coach. If that coach might be me then do give me a call +44 (0)7770 538159 or email alison@alisonsmith.eu

Also see the myths about coaching for a more logical explanation about what coaching is. My first book Can't see the wood for the trees is published tomorrow and provides questions from nature who is acting as our coach - particularly helpful for situations when we're in any of the situations below. See Landscaping your Life for more about this coaching tool I've used for the last 20 years:

"Alison is one of the best coaches I have ever had the pleasure of working with (and I've worked with a few!) She has a highly practical nature and combines it with strong intuition and unconventional tools to guide you to find insights and answers to specific challenges. 

She asks powerful thought provoking questions, but it's not just about coming up with answers in your mind; in my session she used various unconventional tools including something called The Transformation Game to help me connect with my intuition to gain new insights and awareness about my situation. Not only that, due to Alison's skill and patience I was able to experience a profound shift in relation to an ongoing challenge that had been holding me back in my life and I left the session with action steps to enable me to progress further.

As with any transformational coaching, you need to be prepared to take responsibility for personal change and get out of your comfort zone to find the answers you need, but Alison makes this easy with her approach.

Whether you're looking for a personal coach or you're looking for a highly skilled executive coach in the workplace for insights, awareness and more importantly a clear idea of the next action to take, if you're ready to try a powerful alternative, I highly recommend you get in touch with Alison."

Mel Sherwood, author of The AuthorityGuide to Pitching Your Business