WHO SHOULD BE YOUR COACH?
A Coach is many people in one. They are someone who will champion your success as much as you do, even when you do not. They will ask powerful question, redirect you to tap into your own resources and find solutions that you did not think you were capable of. They will challenge you to expand your horizons and see things from multiple perspectives and viewpoints. They are neutral yet compassionate, non-judgmental, and active listeners.
You look through a telescope to chart your path across the stars of your life and the coach is merely an accessory on the lens, presenting observations and pointing out constellations that you may not have noticed before. It is important to find a coach that is compatible for your needs.
There are many kinds of coaches. If you scroll through LinkedIn or even attempt a quick google search you will find many different kinds of coaches, Life coaches, Career coaches, Executive coaches, Leadership coaches, Small business coaches, Health and Wellness coaches, ADHD coaches and even Parent coaches! The list is endless!
Each coach occupies and caters to a specific niche. My training and experience with the ICF Business development series allows me to outline a few important ways that you, as a client, can identify the key characteristics of a niche and use that information to find a good coach.
In this context, a niche is the intersectionality between 3 things, specifically the answers to 3 questions:
1. What is the Coach’s passion?
2. What are the Coach’s personal experiences (i.e., background)?
3. What are the challenges normally faced by clients in that field?
When looking for a coach, it is important that you ask all these questions.
Perhaps you’d like a Career coach, but you talk to a coach who is passionate about the subject of parenting. Whilst they might still be useful to you, if they are not passionate about the problems you’re facing, you might burn out and get exhausted.
If you hire a coach who knows the challenges you are facing and is passionate to help you but lacks experience in the field, they might come across as misinformed and lack credibility, their meetings with you might lack the nuance you require.
Lastly, if a coach has the passion and the experience but is ignorant of the challenges that people might be facing in the field, you might come out of the meeting feeling disillusioned with yourself as there will be a disconnect between the challenges you’re facing and the image that the coach is reacting to.
The responsibility of choosing the right coach falls upon the client. It is understood amongst coaches that we can coach almost anyone as the less we know about the client and their context, the more unbiased and purer our coaching can be.
Therefore, when choosing your coach, it is important to look for passion and experience.
Lastly, it helps greatly for the coach to have reliable credentials. We have briefly mentioned the different paths of coaching training: ACSTH and ACTP. It is important that you read up about these paths as coaches specializing in one path over the other will be able to help you in distinctly different ways.
Most trained coach will have reliable ICF credentials, but some will have been trained and certified to deal with a variety of different niches along with a specific credential in the relevant niche. It is important that you make note of the path and the relevant training that the coach has taken to reach their credentials.
The challenges you are facing might seem obscure and insurmountable, but the coach is a valuable resource to help you realise that you can be bigger than your problems.
Hopefully, these modules have done a fair job introducing you to the world of coaching, the intricacies of the craft and set you on the journey of choosing your own coach.
