A good friend of mine, who does a fair share of networking, recently told me that it feels like every third person he meets at an event is a Life Coach. I am inclined to agree; on Instagram, on Facebook, in fact on most platforms where one can advertise one’s services, there seems to be an array of Life Coaches calling themselves anything from Success Coaches, Empowerment Coaches to Happiness Coaches. Only recently the media in the UK reported that Life Coaching is one of the best earning careers where no qualifications are needed. So how do you know when a Life Coach is the real deal, or just someone out to make a quick buck and how do you know if a Life Coach is the right one for you?
Life Coaching is still not officially regulated or recognised as a profession, although it is thankfully becoming increasingly professionalised. We’ve all heard of people calling themselves a Life Coach when they have no accreditations whatsoever, as well as of “non-coaching” courses giving out certificates to say that the attendee is a now a Coach or even a Master Coach and even of coaching courses that concentrate on teaching the prospective coach on “how to market and sell your services” rather than on how to actually coach.
Recently I discovered the perils of a session which such a Coach. The person had their marketing down to a T, looked successful, genuine and sought after on all their platforms. I thought it might be someone I could collaborate with, so to test the waters I decided to book a session. My first red flag was during the initial phone call when they would not commit to giving me a pricing structure, instead inviting me to an initial free session to try it out. My second was when they couldn’t tell me an overview of how they worked and what the processes might be, again telling me to come to a free trial. My third was when I arrived in a coaching space that did not make me feel comfortable, safe or at ease. It seemed to me that very little attention, time or money had been spent on this space. My fourth was when I asked to see the Coaching Contract before we started only to be told “let’s just get on with it and we can talk later”. My fifth red flag came when I was just thrown into random exercises with no prior explanation of what was going to happen or even permission asked to proceed before each exercise. This Coach had sought no prior knowledge to examine if these exercises could or would be triggering for me. My sixth red flag was when at the end I was given the hard sell to commit to spending a huge sum of money for a Coaching Package Offer that would take place over a vague number of months, each session being a vague amount of minutes to hours – the explanation for which was that I, as a client, may be sometimes too tired to take up the whole number of hours or we may even be finished early – and the whole thing would unroll organically. Had I been someone else, having had a few exercises that would have made anyone feel vulnerable, I would probably have fallen for spending that money in order to feel better about myself. My final red flag came a few days later when, not having taken the “Package offer”, I received the follow up hard sell email trying to persuade me that if I committed to spending that money, I would be showing myself that I was “worth it”.
As an experienced Life Coach, like many other genuine experienced Life Coaches, I am passionate about doing my bit to help Life Coaching become a recognised, regulated profession. I’m not worried in this regard as when I received my first undergraduate degree in International Marketing, back in the day marketing was also not a recognised profession. We were encouraged to join the Guild of Marketeers in order to be regulated by a governing body and indeed the day did come where Marketing became recognised. And so it is for Life Coaching.
The good news is that there are several governing bodies, such as the ICF (International Coaching Federation) and the The Association for Coaching® (AC) that Life Coaches can be trained by, adhere to and be governed by, with strict rules and regulations. The Association for Coaching® (AC), for example, is a leading independent, not-for-profit professional body “dedicated to promoting best practice and raising the awareness and standards of coaching worldwide”. Their “purpose is to inspire and champion coaching excellence”.
I chose to be trained by and be a member of the The Association for Coaching® (AC) as they champion Coaching in the Wellness and Mental Health arena, the latter being one of my points of interest. They have very set prerequisites on how to progress from a Foundation Coach to a Professional Coach to a Master Coach, all of which require accountable number of coaching hours, professional development hours and accounted for supervision hours. For example, I am currently near to gaining my Master level, all of which is no mean fete as it involves:
- 1,500 hours of coaching clients
- 80+ hours of coach training
- Minimum of 12 months supervision
- 42+ hours for 3 years of continuous coaching development
As accredited and regulated Coaches, we are obliged to follow a set of Core Competencies and here in lies:
6 simple steps to finding a qualified Life Coach that is right for you
1) Make sure the Life Coach you choose is the one you are after.
Many Coaches specialize in one niche or another such as Careers, Well-being, Relationships and so forth. Equally though some coaches are multi-disciplinary, more than capable of specializing in all these areas and more, all of which are part of the bigger picture of LIFE. Both are perfectly acceptable, but the latter often comes with a greater breadth and depth of experience. Ask your Coach what their areas of specialty are and what experience and successes they have had and see if it matches with your expectations for the areas in which you want to see real changes in your life. My clients often have complex challenges in many parts of their lives, all interwoven like spaghetti in their head, and so they choose me as a coach with a wealth of experience in may areas of life.
2) Make sure the Life Coach you choose is properly trained and accredited.
Granted there are some globally famous Life Coaches where you wouldn’t necessarily have to ask that question, however the likelihood of you being Coached on a 1:1 level with them is quite frankly, minimal, in which case it is wise to ask your chosen Life Coach which Coaching professional body they are accredited to and regulated by and to what level. Depending on your current challenge you may be suited to a less experienced coach, which may be a more cost-effective option, or you may need a coach that has the experience to work on more complex, demanding and ambiguous issues.
3) Make sure the Life Coach you choose is happy to outline the tools and processes they will use.
This may seem like asking a car mechanic to outline what they are going to do to your engine, in the knowledge that you may not understand a word said but just as you can normally tell in a broader sense when a mechanic is evasive or talking sense, the same applies to your Coach. Coaching is based on scientific research and evidence based coaching models and other tools from other disciplines such as Cognitive Behavioral Therapy and Acceptance Therapy, which have recently been proven to be of equal value when applied to the Coaching journey too. You want your coach to apply techniques and methods that will help you reach your goals and your coach should be happy to explain this in layman terms. At One Life Coaching ME we use a variety of techniques based on clients’ needs as well as adhering to a broad structure that looks like this:
- Discovery: using an array of tools to assess the client’s current situation and where they may want to be in say 6 months or a years’ time, as well as how the partnership alliance will work between Coach and client moving forwards.
- Untangling: in-depth self-discovery to help eliminate negative thought patterns and limiting beliefs that may be holding the client back.
- Values based work: discovering the values that the client lives by and how these serve or don’t serve the clients current life to discover where the gaps are.
- Goal setting and planning: setting short-term, medium-term and long-term goals to move the client forward into action
- Accountability: Long term planning to ensure that the client remains on track.
4) Make sure the Life Coach you choose is happy to outline pricing structure.
All regulated Coaches are bound by their profession to be able to explain the pricing structure before you sign up with them. Some Coaches choose to structure their fees in a package – a total fee to be paid for x no of sessions up front – and some Coaches, like at One Life Coaching ME, will charge per session. Both structures are perfectly valid. We choose the latter as we want our clients to return because they see the benefit and positive effects the sessions are having on their lives and not because they have committed financially. Figure out if the Coaching sessions will fit your budget. At One Life Coaching ME we are not the cheapest, but we do deliver life changing results, as can be seen by our many testimonials on our website, Facebook page and LinkedIn.
5) Make sure the Life Coach you choose has a Coaching Contract ready for you to agree to and sign, before you start.
A Coaching Contract outlines such things as confidentiality, punctuality, payment and minimum number of sessions to see lasting results. As a client you are entitled to see this before you commit. Feel free to question any anomalies and only sign if you are happy to proceed.
6) Make sure the Life Coach you are choosing has regular supervision by an accepted supervisor.
Supervision is when a Coach brings their coaching experiences to a supervisor in order to be reflective in their own learning. This provides a safe space for the Coach to process the experiences they have had with their clients as well as to develop skills and understanding and it helps keep the Coach accountable for quality, work standards and ethical integrity. It also helps the Coach stay on top of their own well-being by being supported themselves. We cannot give the best of ourselves to others if we are not first taking caring of ourselves. At the AC a supervisor can be another Coach trained in supervision, a Therapist or a Psychologist. I chose a Dr of Psychology as the Life Coaching I regularly undertake with my clients is based around complex life issues. Feel free to ask your chosen Life Coach if they are supervised.
Finally use your first discovery session to see if you gel with your Life Coach, if you feel supported and understood in a nonjudgmental fashion and if you feel safe and at ease. You need to be able to take all your masks off to discover the real authentic you in order to become the best version of yourself.
Ready to Start?
Book your first discovery session by emailing me at anne@onelifecoachingme.com Here’s to a happy and productive coaching journey.
