What do I do now?
Would it surprise you to hear the question-of-the-month in suddenly-more-intense (“I have more on the line”) business coaching sessions? It’s five small words:
What do I do now?
“Now” meaning “these times” “these chaotic times” “these economic times” or…you get the drill. As a coach yourself, if your clients aren’t asking YOU this, perhaps it’s something to ask them.
“Okay, Andrea, what’s your answer then?” you say. When you’re at the tip of the spear for clients, sometimes the only thing between them, and them doing something hasty, it pays to have more than another coaching question to ask, valuable as that may be.
So here are my crib notes. Hint: the order is somewhat important.
(1) Maximize what’s working.
If there is a revenue stream in your business that’s doing well now, grab it with both hands and make that hay in the sun. You know when in football or hockey the player realizes they are a full stride out of reach of the other team? It’s called a breakaway for reason.
Right now, healthy revenue streams can be said to be ‘breaking away’ from the rest of the pack. The rest of the pack may be losing momentum, so your forward motion is more significant than you think.
If you have a breakaway on your hands, channel that pent-up energy and go for it.
(2) Diversify income streams.
In my experience, a great deal of financial stress comes from putting all your eggs in one basket. That’s what people with jobs are dealing with, right? Yet having no choice is one of the top reasons a business owner can feel trapped too. So if you’re feeling heavy these days, release that pressure by (quickly, and with low-risk) creating or dusting off an income stream.
For the same reasons, stay away from projects that have front-loaded expenditures. Because things are changing lots, there’s just no way of knowing if today’s great idea will be tomorrow’s ‘what were we thinking.’ Keep investments low. Make money first, spend money second.
(3) Raise the grain on your personal value.
If it’s true that in the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king, what happens to that king if all of a sudden the land regains its sight?
When the landscape shifts, it’s natural and common for us (being human) to lose some confidence. The best confidence-building exercise is to clearly reaffirm our value, or even, bolster the value we identify ourselves with.
Accordingly, here are some of the most common ways we add value to our clients and the planet:
- Expertise, or what you know about a given subject, or subjects
- Synthesis, or how you think
- Productivity, or what you can get done
- Experience, or what you’ve been through
- Relationships, or who you know
- Communication, or how you make meaning
- Persuasion, or the influence you have on others
- Leadership, or what you see that others may not
- Skills, or the nuts and bolts of things you do
- Attention, or the time you spend focusing on something
- Pleasure, or the enjoyment you bring
- Accountability, or how things get done
- Status, or the credibility you lend
And, of course, in the case of coaches, the ability not just to provide this value directly to clients, but to elicit the ability in clients to do so themselves.
How, and where are you already adding value, and in what other ways? What new ways can you add to your toolbox? Comment below to add to this list, and I’ll have it produced in a worksheet for common use. Hint: there are a lot of ways coaches add value that may seem unconventional at first.
Having trouble with this idea? Think of some of the relationships in your work and ask “how would I describe the value this person adds to my life?”
I would add:
1…being authentic and transparent as a consultant and coach is very liberating to the client and garners a tremendous amount of respect and trust.
Blessings,
Dawn
Andrea – I always enjoy (lap up) your thought stream. You are so right on in a unique, quirky, eminently practical yet poetic way. You are a great example of asking questions and framing the tried and true from an angle that maybe I haven’t looked from before and the landscape is just fine and I see things that I didn’t notice or hadn’t thought to describe. Thank you.
Hi Anne, It’s so good to know the thoughts are quirky-good versus quirky-odd or even quirky-back-away-slowly, especially since it seems to be the only way my brain knows how to work.
Thanks for the encouragement!
Dee, it certainly is a LOT about how open we can be, now more than ever, and that is worth celebrating. Thanks for the addition.
Creativity, in ideas and solutions
Energy, your own & and what’s co-created
Clarity, your own & facilitating others
Excellent article, concise and to the point.
I think good quality questions are the answer to a lot of dilemma’s in our lives … if we’re asking good quality questions we tend on the whole to get better quality answers.
Love life and live it creatively,
Leanne
http://www.YourSuccessfulMind.com
Empathy, Truth seeking and Perception
Hi, Andrea. Thank you for this list. What I would like to add is to develop your own intuition and the trust in it and so make clients more comfortable with their own power of intuition.
Connected & Supportive with clients through tough times. Send them notes–the kind that either would be helpful in their situation, or a supportive note of encouragement.
I provide a safe space for clients to vent/clear/complain and then to move on and create more successful strategies and action plans for overcoming obstacles. Jerri Udelson, MCC
Great topic. Convergence, experimentation, soul searching and returning anew to core values. Then outreaching your clients and associates to incorporate their thinking into your authorship of unwritten tomorrows. Think brain trust, noodle fest and context. We have become the road and the drivers. Individually arriving together at today. And I might add – making it up as we go along – just as the government is making it up as THEY go along. But that’s how we grow – which is miraculous in itself. Seeing it, feeling it, allowing it, reaching up for hands that have climbed higher and out for hands as fellow adventurers – relying on foundations that still serve as a foothold, and stepping beyond them because we must. Oy!
Listening. at times, what someone needs most (or first) is to know that they are heard. if this is done well itwill be a foundation for many of the skills/ideas already listed.
Great post and I love the list. I would add “ongoing belief that your clients CAN achieve their goals.” Sometimes this is all the client has to hang on to. It can be likened to what we call in psychotherapy the “holding environment.”
Also, and I don’t know how to state this succinctly, “just-in-time” information and advice. Often people know the tricks and tips that I remind them of, but they needed to hear it just at that time for it to make sense and for them to implement it at the right time (I coach grad students and professors on long-term writing project productivity, so there is much discussion of techniques that work). I guess this comes under the heading of skills, but it goes way beyond the client reading about the skills in a book.
Providing space for the client with an open heart, honoring their wisdom and knowledge, and being their champion through acknowledging their greatness and contribution. Appreciation and value are the keys to human endeavor.