Stop Chasing Quick Fixes: Transformative Coaching for Lasting Impact
sent by Siddharth Anantharam | March 09, 2023
March 09, 2023
Stop focusing on quick fixes – here’s why transformational coaching is the key to your long-term success as a coach.
Do you know what separates the world’s most successful coaches from the rest? They consistently look at their coaching conversations as a space for TRANSFORMATION, and not a TRANSACTION.
In this newsletter, I’m going to share the 3 key SHIFTS that will help you make your coaching more TRANSFORMATIONAL instead of transactional.
As a coach, creating long-lasting transformation and not just quick fix changes for your clients helps you drive exponential value and charge exponentially higher than most others.
It lowers your client’s frustrations, and disappointments and creates a higher number of referrals for you as a coach.
Unfortunately, the word transformation is too loosely used and understood in coaching circles today. And the words “change” and “transformation” are often used interchangeably, but here’s the truth,
All transformation is change but NOT all change is transformation.
We make changes all the time to the way we look, think, feel and act, often intentionally to communicate better, manage our emotions or be a better friend or partner. We might have grown and changed, but the question is have we necessarily transformed?
So, the key question to explore here is, “In transformation, what is really transforming?”
The simple answer is the concept of SELF – the mental image of who your client believes they are in terms of their values, beliefs, strengths and experiences. It’s their inner operating system that you shine a light on and help shift.
- Transactional coaching is an an OUTSIDE-IN approach that scratches the surface to create short term change.
- Transformational Coaching is an INSIDE-OUT approach that digs deeper to spark long term transformation.
As a coach, focusing on these 3 SHIFTS helps you drive consistent transformation for your clients.
Coach for IDENTITY shifts
Identity is all about your client’s way of BEING.
When your client shares a goal they wish to achieve, as a coach you can use:
The Transactional Approach: Focus on what they need to DO to reach that goal
vs
The Transformational Approach: Focus on WHO they seek to BECOME in order to reach that goal.
Identity shifts focus on the words, emotions and body language of your clients. These things often fall in your client’s blind spot and only a coach can help them notice and draw their attention to these areas.
Coach for MINDSET shifts
Mindset is about helping your client not just what they WANT but what they truly NEED.
When your client shares a problem or challenge that is getting in their way, as a coach you can use:
The Transactional Approach: Focus on what the PROBLEM and how they can resolve it.
vs
The Transformational Approach: Focus on the PERSON and their hidden BELIEFS, FEARS and BIASES around that problem and the VALUES that solving the problem will help them live.
Mindset shifts focus on reframing your client’s approach to any problem – are they looking at it as a permanent problem or a temporary situation? Are they viewing it as something that holds them back or something they can GROW through? Are they viewing it as a failure or an opportunity?
Coach for BEHAVIOUR shifts
Behaviour shifts is about helping your client engineer a new pathway to do something.
When your client shares a new habit they wish to build, as a coach you can use:
The Transactional Approach: Focus on the options and strategies available for them to build that habit.
vs
The Transformational Approach: Focus on how they can engineer their environment to build that habit and how building the habit is aligned with their overall identity.
Transformational coaches can and will coach transactionally at times.
However, they will continuously seek to focus on shifting their client’s way of BEING in the world before exploring what they can DO.
How are you engineering your coaching for transformation?
Share it with me in the comments below:
See you next Thursday!
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