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Open House Call: Changes in Coaching Certification

Join Andrea and Certified Mentor Coach Barbara Sundquist as they discuss and clarify the whole question of Coaching Certification. 

Have you ever wondered

• if certification is really useful?
• what are the differences between ICF and IAC certifications?
• how does the process work?
• is the process really hard?
• will it put money in my coaching pocket?

If you said yes, this call is for you.

TIME: 12 Noon Eastern/9 AM Pacific for 50 minutes.

You’ll also catch Andrea’s own plans for pursuit of coaching certification in 2008 (you might be surprised!) and an invitation to peruse the ‘Coaching By Example 9-CD Series’ that’s being released that day as well.

Use the player below to listen to the audio now or use the MP3 link below the player to download the audio to your favorite player or computer:

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Yoga for the Mind | Lynne Sees the Benefit of Sideways

The other day I saw a truck and trailer on the highway. The trailer was strange. Instead of the traditional long rectangle with a door on the back, it had canvas sides. The sides could be removed for easy unloading.

Since I’ve loaded a truck or two during several cross country moves, I was struck by the elegance of this solution. It would be much easier to load and unload a trailer if you could go in sideways.

Can you do this with clients?

• Is there a way to cut through the traditional ways of communicating and get to the heart of the issue easily and quickly?
• What would ‘going in sideways’ look like in your coaching practice?
• Could you take a process that you’ve always used and tweak it?
• How would it feel to be innovative and fresh, both for you and your clients?

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‘Little Miracle’ R&D Tool | Ask500People.com Beta

What if you could ask 100 random people any single question and within just a few hours, get the answers?

What would you ask?

Could your business benefit from 100 quick opinions on something you are testing? Might you be curious about what 100 people would say to a coaching question about their life?

If you remember the Thomas Leonard R&D days, you might be sitting up a little straighter at this point. 

Ask500People.com is a website that allows anyone to submit a single question, and within hours or just a day or so, receive 100 answers from around the world. Along with a map that shows where in the world the votes came from.

Tip: Ask good questions, as not all public questions ‘make the cut’ – a tip most coaches can thrive too, I think.

Or, pay just a little (US$100-500) to have 500 opinions gathered for you using much the same technology, also within days. Need to choose a new domain name? Testing a concept for a product or book? Just ask the willing public. (Hey, no more bribing your email lists! LOL.)

On the other hand – maybe you prefer to answer, and leave the asking to others? Well you can do that too, all at www.Ask500People.com. It’s in beta, and promises to be a really fabulous little miracle tool for all manner of things. 

You already askin’? Share the scoop here…

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A Maverick View on Coaching from the Information Marketing World

Lynne skips the ICF Conference this year and learns…

Last month, I attended a conference of information marketers instead of attending the ICF conference. While feeling a bit disloyal, I wanted to learn how non-trained coaches were making bundles of money with coaching programs while many wonderfully trained and accredited coaches were leaving the profession.

It was an eye-opening experience.

In fact, I learned more there than I can fit into one article. I’ll be sharing my insights in the next few issues of ‘Creating What Matters.’

But be forewarned. Some of this information may make you mad. It is not intended to rattle your cage. Okay, maybe just a little.

I share this information to encourage us to expand our vision.. Since some of these folks are running multi-million dollar coaching programs, they might know a thing or two.

One of the most controversial speakers, at least in my opinion, was a lovely woman named Lee Milteer. She was a highly successful motivational speaker for many years but re-invented herself and her business after 9-11. Now, Lee is a coach with a client list and income that made me drool.

Lee’s premise is that people are in search of a leader. She said, “Most of the people who come to you for coaching are not fully grown up. They come to a coach wanting you to be the alpha and lead them.”

At this point in her presentation, I thought a coaching swat team would storm the hall. Her words seemed like treason after my thousands of hours in coach training programs stressing that the client is perfect and holds all the answers.

Next, Lee listed several things a successful coach did NOT need:

• Credentials
• Expertise
• Results
• Services

Instead, she said, a successful coach sells:

• Confidence
• Certainty
• Control – people want someone to make order out of chaos

The biggest threat to being a successful coach, according to Lee, is self-sabotage. If clients smell fear, they think the coach is a fraud.

I had a flashback of some of my early sample coaching sessions where I unsuccessfully tried to convert an interested person into a coaching client and started to wonder if Lee was right.

Do our clients really want us to lead them?

Is it wrong to be an alpha coach?

Is there a way to marry the idea of a certain, confident coach with the traditional coaching belief in the power of the coaching question to draw out the brilliance from our clients?

Hmmmm. Sounds like a worthy discussion.

Here’s one more quote from Lee Milteer to chew on:

“A coach must sell certainty. Clients need a stern but loving parent.”

What do you think? Are the Lee Milteers of the world right, even partly?

• When you contrast your beliefs about coaching with Lees ideas, what comes up?
• What do your happiest, most successful clients receive from you?
• When you work with your own coach, are you ‘buying’ what Lee describes?
• Even if you are vehemently opposed to Lee’s ideas, is it worth considering what’s actually useful?

Let’s talk about this on the blog. Share your ideas and impressions here. I’ll pick a winner for ‘Best Post-Stirring Comment’ after 5 days and get Andrea to pick a prize. Go!

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New Editor of the Creating What Matters Newsletter

I’m delighted to introduce to you the newly-minted Editor of the Creating What Matters Newsletter, our own beloved Lynne Klippel who will join me in bringing you ‘Creating What Matters’ starting in this issue. 

Why the addition of an Editor? There’re just too many opportunities and kick-butt questions that matter to ask – for me alone to keep up with, and Lynne will be the perfect foil for my sometimes convoluted meanderings. 

Straight to the point, AND (despite her sweet demeanor) rather pointed (see ‘A Maverick View on Coaching’) please help me welcome Lynne by posting a comment under one of her articles.

It’s my privilege to welcome you to the team Lynne, and I am beaming from ear to ear that you said ‘yes’ to stirring the pot with me. 

Who Is This Lynne Klippel, Anyway?

Read more

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It’s not what you do but how | Lessons from a Seagull

I was working with a client today and needed something ‘more’ to bring home the idea that -

“It’s not what you do so much that counts, but how…”

This was in the context of marketing from the stage – in an effort to create greater results, the client was asking “what else can I do?” The answer as is so often the case, was something along the lines of – “you don’t need more things to do, focus instead of how you do what you already know.”

Which not so coincidentally is a good suggestion for his entire life, not just selling from the stage. More information is usually not the right answer, I’m finding, more and more, as I wax nostalgic over all the coaching done this year. I love it.

So befitting the ‘not what you do, but how’ I remembered this little “seagull act”…a perfect illustration of the theme. Not that I condone the behavior itself or anything…

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Ginger Cockerham’s New Coaching Column in The London Times

Big congratulations to Ginger Cockerham as the new author of a coaching column for the London Times. Years ago Thomas Leonard had a column in the London Times and then David Goldsmith took it over. How splendid that Ginger now takes the helm.

According to Ginger this article is about her. It’s a three page layout with pictures and the Clean Sweep assessment highlighted. Jennifer Corbin, president CoachInc generously approved the use of the Clean Sweep.

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