1. Understand Their Perspective
Who are you working with? While it may be impossible to truly understand another person’s unique perspective, it’s important to try. Getting to know your client is a key part of being able to effectively coach them. Find out about their personal and professional background, including their goals and any perceived hindrances to reaching them. The more you can know your client, the more you can understand their perspective, making you better able to tailor coaching for their specific needs.
2. Listen and Empower
Check-in frequently. Professional coaching is all about relationships, and relationships flourish when we seek to listen and understand. You want to make sure your client is feeling like they have agency in the relationship because it will increase buy-in, causing them to have increased success, and thereby, you will also have increased success as a coach. When your client succeeds, so do you. A big part of being a professional coach is empowering your clients to overcome the mental and physical roadblocks standing in the way of their success. These could be simply limiting self-beliefs that the client could easily overcome by experiencing some small wins in that area.
3. Create Clear Objectives and Goals
A key part of being a successful professional coach is identifying a clear path to success for your clients. Focused objectives and attainable goals are the meat of a coaching plan. Once you’ve gotten to know your client’s perspective, identified their goals, and understood where they may have some mental hang-ups, setting clear, achievable goals for your client will help them take the actions needed to move toward their idea of success.
4. Celebrate Success
When a client meets an objective or accomplishes a goal, it’s imperative to celebrate! Celebrating wins, big or small, leads to increased internal motivation to meet other goals, boosts self-confidence, and helps empower your client to see themselves in a new light…as an achiever. You don’t have to throw a party each time your client succeeds (although that may be appropriate in some cases!), but do take intentional time to acknowledge and celebrate the win.
5. Provide Feedback and Ask for it Yourself
Much of the magic in professional coaching can be found in nuance. Beyond your client achieving or not achieving a set goal, there are endless opportunities to provide feedback and constructive criticism. Small micro-adjustments along the path to success are essential to reaching the end. Make sure you’re providing them, as well as asking for feedback from your clients about your own success as a coach. It’s part of the listening and empowering strategy, to make sure you are providing what your clients need.
6. Commit to Continuous Learning
The best way to help your clients grow is to continue growing yourself. Commit to continuously learning new techniques, ways of relating to people, psychological concepts, business leadership strategies, or whatever your niche is. You can certainly be a coach who is an expert in a certain part of the field, but be sure you understand the rest of the game and keep up to date with changing regulations. (These are all coach puns, btw).
Implementing these 6 strategies can help make your professional coaching more impactful. For more insights into professional success strategies, check out the rest of our blogs!
