Our founder, Lisa Wight, shares the secrets she’s learnt of how to be an effective business coach while maximising revenue. Read on to find out all…
Anyone can become a business coach. I’ve met people from all different backgrounds. But I’ve noticed that the ones who are really successful do something special. There’s far more to being a business coach than just offering advice. After years of working as and with business coaches, here are the top five secrets I’ve uncovered to being the best coach you can be.
1. Be objective
When you care about the people you work with, it can be hard not to become too involved. But you need to remember that it’s not your business. It’s the business owner’s baby, and therefore it’s for them to feel emotional about it, not you. You need to always be objective.
When your clients share gripes and problems and things that seem terribly unfair, don’t get sucked into that emotional whirlwind. If you fall into the trap of becoming emotional alongside them, you run the risk of making it worse. You’ll feed that whirlwind rather than help to calm it down.
Instead, have a clear and objective focus on the facts of the situation. When you listen to what your client has to say, consider all the options that are available to them. It’s best to look at all the angles. With your objective head on, you will then be able to review each of them critically and come up with an action plan. If you don’t stay objective, things could easily get missed.
2. Take a blended business and client led approach
It’s vital that you know when to provide your client with what they need and when to step back and look at what the business needs. Certain things might not be on your client’s radar, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t important.
A blended approach always works best. Remember: you are the business coach, not business owner coach. You are there for the business. Look at it from the perspective of what is right for the business. You are the one standing up for that. To find out more about this approach, read our recent blog.
3. Understand what role you play
You have to wear many different hats as a business coach. From therapist to mentor, listener to strategist, any one meeting could require a lot of different angles being explored. The one thing that doesn’t change, however, is the reason you’re there. You’re there to create a safe space for the business owner. Yes, you’ll need to talk about the business stuff, but you can also be there to talk through personal things as well. Be vulnerable and protect that space for them.
4. Understand where your limitations are
As business coaches, we are often expected to know everything about everything. But this simply isn’t possible. No one can know everything about business. It can be tempting, however, to bluff our way through things. It can feel shameful to not have the answer when a client asks a question. But that actually shouldn’t be the case.
The flipside is actually more accurate. People will respect you more when you say that it’s not my area of expertise, but I can introduce you to someone who is an expert in that area – whether it’s an accountant, a financial adviser or a lawyer etc. If you’re tempted to lie your way through, your advice will become weak and your clients will see through it. They may even end up dropping you. They will have far more respect if the advice you give is always strong, even if it’s that you need to speak to an expert in that area to get more detail.
5. Leverage relationships
Be very generous with your relationships. Introduce people as much as you can. Obviously, this will help with point 4, if you have trusted experts in every area that you can send your clients to. But there are many other advantages to this as well. We all like to meet someone who is well connected. Connect your clients as much as you can with people you know – from events to industry experts to specific skills.
Remember the law of reciprocity. The more you connect, the more people will see and hear you, and the more they’ll value you as an experienced and effective networker. Then the more they will connect with you in return. Widening your net will give you and your clients far more value.
Last Thoughts
One final way to be a good business coach is to run very streamlined client sessions. hubbix is set up to help with just that. It’s already saving business coaches 40% of their time. If you’d like to explore how hubbix could help you, get in touch to see a demo, or start your free trial to explore the system yourself.