What is coaching?
What is coaching?
Imagine a coach pulled by horses transporting someone to their destination. Your coach meets you where you are now and travels with you, supporting you on your journey. Coaching can help you reach and exceed your goals and dreams in your work and personal life.
Coaching helps you to understand and overcome the things that hold you back from achieving your goals. Timothy Gallwey in his books on The Inner Game describes performance as equalling potential minus interference.
Performance = Potential – Interference
What does your performance equation look like?
A coach achieves this by:
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Helping to raise your awareness through questions and challenge.
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Reframing your situation to help bring new insights.
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Helping you to create practical action plans to reach your goals.
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Providing you with tools, techniques and strategies to create lasting change and success.
What sort of things do people use coaching for?
People find great benefit from a coach for various reasons. Some examples are:
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boosting resilience
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setting life goals and planning for success
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dealing with significant change such as redundancy
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stepping up into a leadership role
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experiencing overwhelm
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increasing self-awareness and harnessing personal power
What is it liked to be coached?
Coaching takes many forms and it is important that you choose a coach that understands your needs and suits your style. When you have your first conversation with your coach, they will listen to you and find out where you are now and talk with you about where you want to get to. You may have a clear idea of your destination or you may have no idea at all (in truth you are probably somewhere in between!). In any case, what you will have is a desire to move and develop from your current position.
Coaching usually happens over the internet and, if circumstances allow, face to face – telephone coaching is also an option. Your coach will help you set goals, listen to you and ask questions, often reframing your assumptions and challenging any limiting beliefs you might hold. Your coach will not give you answers; coaching works on the basis that you have the answers and through a series of prompts and questions, the answers emerge. You know yourself best. Your coach will bring expertise in coaching techniques and will draw on their professional and personal experiences to support your development.
Coaching is a whole lot more than a friendly chat over a cup of coffee. While ultimately energising, many coachees feel like they have done a lot of hard work at the end of a session. Sheduling time in your diary before and after a session to prepare and reflect is recommended.
How long does coaching last?
A one to one coaching session is usually between one and two hours depending on your needs, energy levels, and time. People typically have six sessions over a period of six to nine months. Everyone is unique and we will work with you to create a bespoke package that is personal to you.
How much does coaching cost?
A coaching session costs £240 + vat, £288. Some people fund their coaching themselves, others ask for support from their employer to pay some or all of the costs. Prices vary depending on where you go. Coaching experience, level reached in the coach's career, qualifications, supervision, and continuing professional development all influence how much a coach charges. Life coaching can cost as little as £50 per session, executive coaching can cost thousands of pounds per session.
What happens if I change my mind?
Your coach will help you set expectations and goals for the coaching journey. If you change your mind or your needs change, the first thing to do is to discuss this with your coach. Some people prefer a linear journey, others prefer to explore in a less structured way – your coach will ask for feedback and will help you get the most from your coaching experience.
We send an invoice after each session. Payment terms are 15 days. You will only be charged for sessions you use. If you decide to not continue with a programme, do discuss this with your coach as they may be able to advise on other types of support available that are more appropriate for your situation.
Are there any ‘hidden’ costs?
There are no additional costs with an online coaching session.
For face-to-face sessions, the coach will usually invoice for their travel and costs of room hire for the session. Costs can be kept down by using free venues and your coach may be able to see you in their home or office if you are able to travel.
What if I need to cancel or postpone a session?
That’s fine. All we ask is that you give us at least 48 hours’ notice before cancelling a session. If you cancel with shorter notice you will be charged 50% of the session cost and any travel that has been booked by your coach. If you cancel on the day we will charge you the full amount.
Do you do Myers-Briggs?
Yes! We offer a range of psychometric assessments including Myers Briggs Type Indicator, Hogan, and Emotional Intelligence. All of these are designed to help you understand yourself better. If you would like to use one of these tools during your coaching journey, your coach will be able to help you decide which would be most useful to you. The tool will be offered to you on a cost basis and the feedback will be delivered as part of a coaching session. The feedback session may be provided by a different coach - this is to ensure that you receive feedback from a coach trained in the use of that particular tool. The cost of each tool varies, as a rule of thumb, they are about £150 each including vat.
Do you do group coaching?
We do that too. We coach, facilitate, train, and mentor. Group coaching is usually about team development. If you are thinking about this, do get in touch and we can help you think through what you want to achieve and how you might go about achieving it.