There are certain coaches out there that are just so much more effective than others. As a coach yourself, you want to be in the category of those that are most effective. The only problem is, maybe you don’t feel that you are naturally in this category. You might have some ways to go before you can be labeled as highly effective.
Think about it for a moment. What do those “highly effective” coaches have that you don’t have? Are they any smarter or better than you? Are they truly, naturally a better coach than you?
I think you’ll find that they aren’t naturally better than you. There are certain things they do that make them highly effective. But, you can adopt these traits—and it’s easier than you think. You just have to put a focus on effective coaching traits and adopt them into what you do as a coach. Put these at the forefront of what you do and your students/coaching clients will benefit and you will be more highly effective.
As a result, you could decide to charge your students more. At the very least, you should have an easier time attracting clients because you’ll gain a reputation for being so effective.
As you are well aware, coaches are so important for so many people—and you matter. Whether you’re a business coach, life coach, or coach for whatever it is, you are truly helping people become their best selves. You’re helping them get out of a rut, do better, be better, and finally see the results they haven’t been able to see on their own.
Becoming a coach is admirable. You’re in it to help people. Sure, you can also earn a great income because it’s a premium and valuable service. With that said, one of the top traits of the most highly effective coaches is that they actually want to help people—they get great joy and satisfaction from it. I have no doubt that you fit into that category. You have a drive and a motivation to help people. You want to help them see their problems in a new way so that they can move past them.
If you don’t actually care about helping and if you’re just in it for the money, then this is not the right line of work for you. You’ll get burned out and the money won’t be enough to keep you going.
You have to care about people to make it work. Not so much that you take on their burdens as your own – but enough that you are willing to push your clients past the limits they’ve set for themselves. You have to care enough to go out of your way to dig deep into what’s going on. I know you’re willing to do that – and you are going to help people get great results.
More Traits of Highly Effective Coaches
We talked about the top trait of highly effective coaches – and that you really want to help people and you’re going to do what it takes to make that happen. That’s not all there is to it. Let’s go through some more traits of highly effective coaches so you can work on strengthening these traits.
A Clear Understanding of Who You Are and What You’re Doing
One thing you have to realize is who you are and what you’re doing as a coach. You have to understand your place in things. Why do you want to help people? Why are you in your specific line of coaching?
What is it about you that makes you think you will be an effective coach?
It can be helpful to develop a mission statement for yourself as a coach. This can help you wrap your mind around exactly what you’re doing and what your goal is for those you work with. This something that can grow and evolve over time.
A Clear Understanding of Who You’re Helping
As a coach, you’re helping a certain type of person. You’re a certain type of coach and there is a certain type of person that’s going to hire you for your services. Just as with anything you do in business, you have to have an understanding of your customer. Dive deep to understand the psychology of your customer, why they are likely to hire you, and what you can do to help them the most.
Ineffective coaches have no understanding or very little understanding of the people they’re trying to help. You have to be able to exit your own worldview. People don’t think the same way that you think. People don’t have the same life experiences that you’ve had. You have to be able to exit the worldview from your own eyes and enter the worldview from the eyes of your coaching clients. This is a trait of a good coach.
A Plan to Help People
Not all coaches are super organized or super good at planning. But I would say that one trait of a good coach is that they have the ability to plan. I’m not saying that you have to be super organized or naturally really good at planning. But you must be able to go from start to finish and take your clients along with you.
You must be able to take people from where they are and get them to where they want and need to go. This means you must have a long-term view. The people you’re coaching might not be able to see beyond where they are right now. So, as a coach, it’s part of your job to be their eyes for the time being as you guide them along the path until they can see it for themselves.
It will always be up to them to take action – but it is your job as a coach to be effective at drawing them in with a carefully laid plan. Even if you’re not naturally good at this, you may be very good at it when it comes to other people. This is something many coaches surprise themselves with.
The Ability to Be Firm, Yet Caring
This is very important. As a coach, there are times when you’ll need to be firm. The people you’re coaching are struggling for one reason or another. They are not able to achieve their goals or even set goals by themselves – or at least they haven’t been able to at this point, which is why they’ve come to you as a coach.
If they are falling short of their goals, even while working with you, then you will need to guide them in the right direction. Remind them of why they are on this journey and why they’ve set goals with you. It is not your job to do their work for them. It is their job to work hard to achieve their goals.
If they are consistently not keeping up with you and not following through, then you need to be firm. Show tough love, as they say.
Yet as a coach, there’s a psychology to it. There’s a reason that people are not wildly successful just because they decide to be. People have ups and downs. People deal with the fear of failure and the fear of success. Life gets in the way. It’s your job as a coach to understand psychology and why people fail and why people succeed and what you can do as a coach to help them when they can’t help themselves.
It’s a delicate balancing act and you’ll be a more effective coach if you dedicate your time to studying and becoming well read on the topics of mindset, success, psychology, and so on.
You Can Become a Highly Effective Coach
If you want to become a highly effective coach, there’s absolutely nothing holding you back. Think about the traits we’ve talked about—the traits highly effective coaches tend to share. Think about who is going to hire you, what they need, and what you can do to help drive people to success.
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