AwacanMe coaching is all about creating results you want by making decisions based on integrity. As a coach, I facilitate the client’s movement towards a life that’s aligned with their values, and is a true expression of who they are. This process is rarely linear or rigid, but we do follow a structure that consists of the following steps: Discovery, Goal Setting, Learning, Action/Accountability, and Completion.

 

DISCOVERY

We co-create our coaching relationship. We figure out how we are going to work together, when, where and how long, what we can expect of each other, what’s OK, and what’s not. This is where I explain that I will get to make requests or give challenges to my clients, and they get to say “yes,” “no,” or counteroffer.  This phase is a foundation for our work together. Clients develop their personal mission statements; they identify their top values, and assess how these values are being honored (or not) in their lives. They reconnect with the parts of themselves that have been neglected for a while, and rediscover more joy in their lives.

 

GOAL-SETTING

Goals are an integral part of coaching. If there are no goals, we are not coaching. My clients come to coaching with a great variety of goals, including:

• Overcoming procrastination

• Improving self-care/losing weight

• Improving relationships, time management, productivity, organization

• Choosing career direction/Earning more money

• Getting unstuck on a project

• Finding the right balance between career and parenthood

• Getting out of dead end situations

I encourage clients to set resonant and thrilling goals – goals that align with their values, and that seem a bit out of reach. Ultimately what matters is not whether or not the client achieves the goal; it is the growth and learning that occur as the result.

 

LEARNING

Any situation – good or bad – is an opportunity to learn. I listen to what the client is saying, and also to what they are not saying. Sometimes I see a very clear disconnect. I share this information with my client, and the client assigns meaning to it. This is how they move to the new level of learning about themselves. Clients become more aware of their feelings, thoughts, drivers, and reactions. This new level of awareness allows them to approach their situations from an entirely new perspective.

 

ACTION AND ACCOUNTABILITY

If there is no action, we are not coaching.

Clients commit to taking certain actions based on what they learn during the coaching session. This new course of action provides new learning, and that’s how forward movement happens. What makes coaching work is accountability. As human beings, we are very good at honoring external deadlines, and we tend to put our own last. Coaching creates external accountability for something that the clients want for themselves.

At the end of each session I may give a client a request or a challenge, or simply ask, “What would you like to get done before we meet again?” Once the client makes a commitment, I will hold them accountable. Regardless of whether or not they were able to follow through, we extract the lessons they learn from the experience.

 

COMPLETION

Closure is a very important part of a coaching engagement. We spend 1-2 sessions at the end of the engagement talking about the client’s breakthroughs and breakdowns, major shifts, beliefs and ways of being in the world they are leaving behind, and new supportive beliefs they will be taking with them. We talk about the way forward – new thrilling and inspiring goals, the habits and structures that the client will put in place to continue the forward motion after the coaching engagement has been completed.