Browse these Frequently Asked Questions. If you have any questions at all that aren’t answered here, please don’t hesitate to contact Rich.
- What is business & personal coaching and how does it differ from consulting?
- Why do people hire a coach?
- What are your fees?
- Who are your typical clients?
- Why does coaching work so well?
- How long do your individual clients work with you?
- What do you see as the most powerful aspect of your coaching?
- How do you help people overcome fear and stay focused?
- You mentioned that you have developed tools for staying focused, tell me more about that?
- Tell me more about the “Extreme Adventure Days” you offer your clients.
- How do you help people create support and better results in their lives?
- How does someone find the right coach?
- You are the past president of the Professional & Personal Coaches Association (PPCA) and you served on the Executive Committee of the International Coach Federation (ICF). Tell me more about the PPCA and the ICF.
Q.What is business & personal coaching and how does it differ from consulting?
A. Coaching and consulting are often put into the same category but they are actually quiet different.
Coaching is an interactive process that helps individuals and organizations to develop more rapidly and produce more satisfying results. Coaches work with clients in areas including business, career, finances, health, and relationships. As a result of coaching, clients set better goals, take action, make better decisions, and more fully use their natural strengths.
Coaching is a method of questioning and strategizing that assists another person to think more clearly, gain better perspective and focus more effectively on their goals. It provides the tools to enhance the process of accomplishment and offers the client accountability for their actions.
Professional coaches are trained to listen and observe, to customize their approach to the individual client’s needs, and to elicit solutions and strategies from the client. They believe that the client is naturally creative and resourceful and that the coach’s job is to provide support to enhance the skills, resources, and creativity that the client already has. While the coach provides feedback and an objective perspective, the client is responsible for taking the steps to produce the results he or she wants.
Consulting is more about having an specialized area of expertise and then sharing knowledge, strategies, and tactics with their clients. A consultant should have hands-on, real-world experience and often save their clients time and money by sharing right-to-the-point ideas, resources and clear steps while helping them avoid mistakes and problems.
Most of the time I operate as a coach with my clients. However, when needed or requested, I’m able to shift to “consulting mode” where I offer strategic business advice on scaling, culture, branding, marketing, sales, compensation structuring and leadership. I also strive to be a resource for my clients. I have an extensive database of experts whom I can refer to my clients as needed.
Q. Why do people hire a coach or a consultant?
A. People hire a coach when they are starting a new business, want to grow their business, making a career transition, reevaluating their life choices, or simply feeling ready for a personal or professional breakthrough.
My specialty is working with people who want to take action and stay focused on achieving a big goal. I work with people who want to attract more business and with people who want to get more out any area of their life; more growth, more money, more time, more quality relationships, more satisfaction and more fulfillment.
As a consultant, my focus is on helping entrepreneurs effectively scale their businesses, develop a positive, conscious, growth-focused culture, and improve their profitability by optimizing how they run their business.
Q. What are your coaching fees?
A. My individual coaching & consulting fee ranges from $2,000 to $8,000 per month. It all depends on the scope of work and how much time we work together during the month.
Most of my coaching is done by phone. I work with no more than three individual clients each month to ensure that each client gets the most value from our coaching.
We begin with an initial one hour intake session. During this first session we will design our alliance together, clarify your intentions and goals, and create a coaching strategy plus an action plan.
After our initial session we will have weekly or bi-weekly 55-minute calls to strategize, implement your action plan, assess what’s working, what is most important, and clarify what is next for the coming week.
We will work together to design your business and your life in the most effective, enjoyable and profitable way.
Q. Who are your typical clients?
A. My clients are high-achievers who have an strong desire to take their businesses and their lives to the next level.
My clients:
- Want to achieve a big vision.
- Seek focus, strategy and motivation.
- Are eager to move to a higher level of functioning.
- Wish to move through challenging times with more ease.
- Want to create momentum in reaching their goals.
- Have a desire to be more focused, effective and on track.
- Want to set better goals and reach those goals.
- Wish to design their future, learn new skills, and seek more balance in life.
I specialize in working with small business owners, investors, leaders, and with people who are responsible for their own business development within a larger firm.
Q. Why does coaching work so well?
A. Because good coaches listen to their clients with intention and ask critical questions that move their client’s thinking forward towards the solution. In addition to pure coaching, I also provide business strategy and design for better results and effectiveness. This process helps my clients stay focused and they are much more likely to:
- Set goals that guide them toward the goal, not move them away from it.
- Act on their choices or decisions.
- Develop new skills that translate into more success.
- Tune into their intuition and remain true to themselves and their values.
- Accomplish things that seemed unattainable.
- Acquire a sense of satisfaction in their experiences.
Q. How long do your individual clients work with you?
A. I recommend (but do not require) that my clients make a three-month commitment to the process. Our coaching relationship develops over time. My clients sometimes hire me for a specific project or for unlimited periods of time.
Most of my clients work with me once a week for about 3-4 months. After that, many of my clients have their sessions once or twice a month as a check-in and for on-going improvement. I do not use contracts and a client may discontinue our relationship at any time.
Q. What do you see as the most powerful aspect of your coaching?
A. The three main areas that I’ve seen my clients benefit from is our coaching on developing courage, taking action, and staying focused on what really matters.
I believe that fear and lack of focus are the two biggest obstacles that hold people back from getting what they really want…in business and in life. I’ve developed several methods to help clients overcome fear, take action and stay focused as they move towards their most important goals.
Clients who work with me develop a new level of awareness, deeper learning, new tools for success, and more personal responsibility. Helping people develop their courage and their focus excites me! I am continuously studying, interviewing, and researching the areas of courage, focus and partnering for success. I believe that anyone who applies a concentrated focus on any area will become an expert over time.
Q. How do you help people overcome fear and stay focused?
A. I believe that courage is not the lack of fear, it is moving through the fear and going after what you really want. A major fear that holds people and organizations back from success is the resistance to change. Once a person moves through their fear of doing something new or different a new challenge arises: Staying focused and committed.
People often start to take action towards a goal and then before they accomplish it, other things come up in their life and the take their focus of what they really want. I have a process that includes the tools, the structure, and the feedback to help people stay focused on what matters most.
Q. You mentioned that you have tools for staying focused, tell me more about that?
A. I coach people through the process of designing their own personal strategic plan. I provide a simple structure to help people create and maintain new positive habits in many areas of their lives. Small, positive habits done a regular basis can have an awesome effect on one’s success over time. The challenge has been how to create and maintain those habits, that is the foundation of this process.
Q. Tell me more about the “Extreme Adventure Days” you offer your clients.?
A. An Extreme Adventure Day is an option for my coaching clients who want to have a powerful experience that they will never forget. It’s really for those clients who want to take their success to the next level and who want to develop their courage, their focus and their ability to stay in the Zone.
Here’s how it works: I arrange a half-day or a full-day to meet with my client. We begin the day with a coaching session on clarifying the vision of what they want their life to “look like” in the future — both personally and professionally. We work together to create clear goals and a focused strategy that will help them turn their vision into reality. Then, we take it to the extreme!
I bring my client on an extreme adventure that “locks in” their commitment to their intention and deepens their learning. They have the option of one or more adrenaline-producing activities such as:
- Rappelling (off of a 90-foot cliff)
- Rock climbing
- Tandem skydives (connected to an experienced jumpmaster)
- Ropes courses
- Surfing
- Slacklining
- Mountain Biking
- Skiing or Snowboarding
Several of these exciting adventures are achievable by anyone with just modest physical ability. Long after the experience itself, my clients remember both the excitement and the lessons learned. That’s the impact of adrenaline! You enter into a new environment where break-through experiences create new perspectives and greater courage. Courage is like a muscle: the more you work it the stronger it becomes. And the courage that is developed in these activities will carry over to any other challenging goals in your life.
No worries — our motto with these Extreme Adventures is “safety first, fun second.” Each adventure day is custom designed for each client and we also offer this to business partners and companies. Not only is it a huge growth experience…it’s also a whole lot of fun! Please contact us for more information.
Q. How do you help people create support and better results in their lives?
A. Coaching is based on support. It is based on the concept that one plus one equals three. When two people put their minds together and focus on an outcome, new ideas arise that neither person would have thought of alone.
One of the ways I help people get better results in their lives is to show them how to use coaching as a tool for support. They learn how to best work with their own coach and how to create supportive partnerships with their co- workers, families and friends. I also show people how they operate with themselves. This allows them to take a “meta-view” of their life. They can step back and say things like, “ahh, now I can see how I could do this with less struggle”.
Q. How does someone find the right coach?
A. I recommend that people interview several coaches before choosing their coach. The ICF hosts a searchable directory of its coach members called the Coach Referral Service (CRS). The CRS makes it possible to match up the appropriate coach with the client, depending on the client’s needs. Since coaches often specialize in various areas, it’s a good idea for the prospective client to shop around for the coach with the most experience and combination of qualities they seek. In the CRS, one can find business coaches, financial coaches, relationship coaches, spiritual coaches, life planning coaches, and hundreds more.
You can find a coach on the Coach Referral Service on the website at: www.coachfederation.org
I suggest following these Coach Selection Recommendations, as well:
- Educate yourself on coaching. Hundreds of articles have been written about it in the last decade.
- Know your objectives for working with a coach.
- Interview 2-3 coaches before you decide on one. Ask them about their experience, qualifications, skills, and ask for references.
- Remember, coaching is an important relationship. There should be a connection between you and the coach that “feels” right to you.
Q. You are the past president of the Professional & Personal Coaches Association (PPCA) and the past vice president of the International Coaching Federation (ICF). Tell me more about the PPCA and the ICF.
A. The PPCA and the ICF, both founded in 1992, were separate organizations representing business and personal coaches. In 1998 we brought all of the talents and resources of the PPCA over to the ICF. This win-win collaboration has created a stronger, more unified organization. Now, the ICF is the largest, non-profit professional association worldwide of personal and business coaches.
The ICF has several purposes:
- To build, support and preserve the integrity of the coaching profession;
- To foster the development of the community of coaches worldwide;
- To maintain and upgrade the standards and practices of the coaching profession; and
- To support members in creating a high quality life and a successful coaching practice. With over 25,000 members, the ICF is a non-profit organization with board members, staff, volunteers and members located all over the world.
- The ICF is actively involved in researching and developing programs in the legal, regulatory, and credentialing areas that will serve coaches and their clients.
- The ICF has an informative website at: http://www.coachfederation.org
See Also: How to Hire Rich, Testimonials, and Articles by Rich.