Last week at an event, I met several new people. One gentleman asked me, “What do you do for a living?” I told him, “I am a coach.” He responded, “Interesting. Who do you coach?” I let him know that most of my clients are business professionals, just like him, but I have also coached CEO’s, VP’s, doctors, business owners, pastors, volunteers, engineers, writers, managers, and students.
“Wow!” he said. “Coaching people with all those backgrounds, how do you know what advice to give?”
I smiled. The most common misconception about coaching just revealed itself again. “That’s where most people miss the point of coaching. A coach doesn’t give advice, a coach asks questions. Powerful questions have the ability to raise your consciousness. Raised consciousness produces new thoughts, new ideas, new options. It allows thinking on a new level and new opportunities for success.”
I then started asking him questions about his profession. I was searching for his boundaries and his roadblocks. “Why did you come to this event today? How effective do you find these events? How else could you achieve this purpose? Who is more successful than you in achieving this? What could you learn from them?”
After only five or ten minutes, he was excited because he had some new ideas about how to reach one of his goals. The power of coaching is in the questions that unlock potential. I added, “A coach also provides a level of accountability to follow through on those ideas.” He learned how a coach can really help people. Every one has the opportunity to benefit from having a coach.