How to Vet and Choose the Right Business Coach
After spending years working as business coaches, we know what to look for and what to avoid in a coach and we want to share it all with you.
Congratulations!
It’s a big deal moment when you realize that you need to hire a business coach. I say big deal because it means something distinct has shifted. Perhaps you’ve overcome the false belief that you have to do everything yourself in a harried frenzy. Or maybe you’ve reached the point in your business where you simply need guidance to truly take it to the next level.
Whatever your reason, I want to take a moment with you to celebrate that you’re making a big leap.
Now I know it can feel daunting to look for the right coach, but don’t worry, I’ve got your back. We’ll do this together. After spending years of working as a business coach, I know a lot about what to look for and what to avoid in a coach and I want to share it all with you.
I’ve organized this article by the different phases of searching for a business coach that you’ll find yourself in. Let’s rock and roll.
Phase 1: The important prep-work to start with
Most people start by hopping onto Google and searching for a coach right away. But don’t get ahead of yourself! The place to start is in your notebook or on a piece of paper. The first phase of searching for a business coach is all about sitting down for 20 minutes and crafting guiding questions and preferences about what you’d like in a coach.
Guiding questions
Finding the right business coach is like starting a relationship. In fact it is starting a relationship. You wouldn’t ask someone to marry you on the first date would you (arranged marriages aside)? With a romantic relationship it might seem obvious: if you jump in blind, you’ll have no idea how things will turn out. If you ask questions, discover what you really want, and get to know someone, you’re much more likely to end up in a good relationship.
The magic begins with creating a set of guiding questions you’ll use to tell which coach(es) fit you well.
I want you to stop for a moment and take out a piece of paper. In a moment I’m going to ask you to write a list of questions that you’ll ask yourself throughout the search for a business coach — sometimes as you look at their website, other times after you’ve talked to them on the phone. Having these questions laid out ahead of time will help you make a grounded decision based on what really matters to you, not who has the slickest sales pitch.
Here are a few sample questions you might want to steal and write down at the beginning of your list:
- Do this coach’s values align with my and my business’s values?
- Does their coaching format work for me? (ex. session-by-session, over a 3 or 6 month time period, etc.)
- How much access will I have to them?
- Are they skilled at understanding different phases of business?
- Are they knowledgeable about my industry or similar industries?
- Do I get a good intuitive “vibe” from them?
Set a 3 minute timer and write down as many questions as you can. You’re not trying to answer them yet, just come up with great questions to guide you along your journey. When you run out of ideas, just wait. Sometimes a good one comes right as your timer dings the 3 minute bell.
Preferences
Now that your left brain has written down all the “smart” questions to ask, open up your right brain’s creative desires. I want you to have the best coaching experience ever, and I suspect you’d like that too. So make a separate section to list out all of your preferences in a coach.
Write down everything you can think of that you’d love to find in a dream business coach. Be as specific as you like (ex. “I want them to have a background in social justice”, “I’d prefer it if they had a musical hobby”, etc.). It doesn’t mean that you’re going to get excruciatingly nit-picky, but it does mean that you’re opening yourself to the possibility of forming a surprisingly great relationship with a business coach with whom you highly resonate.
Phase 2: Searching for a business coach
Now that you’ve got your questions and preferences ready, it’s time to gather potential coaches.
Use your community
We always recommend starting by asking members of your community. There’s a reason word of mouth is the most coveted of marketing avenues — because it’s the most trusted AND most trustworthy. There are two main ways to take advantage of these kinds of recommendations.
First, ask business owners you know and respect for business coach recommendations. It’s important to ask people who you admire for the way they run their business, how their business is growing, and how they are balancing building a business with other values like self-care and social justice. All of these factors play into finding someone who will be the best fit for you.
The second approach is to ask potential business coaches for client referrals (when you get to the stage of interviewing coaches that is!). When you talk to their clients, see if they are the kind of people who share your outlook on life and business, have similar goals and similar obstacles, and hold similar values. If so, their recommendation holds a lot of credibility.
Get online
Now if you didn’t find any solid potential coaches from your community, it’s time to hop online and mount a search. Google will give you a lot of options. I recommend starting with folks who have high reviews. Be wary of Yelp, they hide lots of reviews based on questionable business practices. We trust Google’s reviews much more than Yelp’s.
Once you come across potential business coaches, take your list of questions and start by going through their website to see if you find any immediate matches. Once you find one or more coaches you’d like to reach out to, you’re ready for Phase 3.
Phase 3: How to meet and interview coaches
You’ve done the prep work, you’ve found business coaches to reach out to, and now you’re ready to start meeting them. Here’s some guidance on how to make the most of it.
Schedule and prep for an intro call
Usually you can schedule an intro or discovery session right from the coach’s website. Once you’ve done that, and you’re getting ready for your call, grab the guiding questions you created in Phase 1, and take a look at the list of things to communicate below.
Here are a few things you need to communicate on your call:
- Your specific goals
- Your deadlines
- Their pricing structure
- Their time boundaries & when they’re off the clock
- The format of their coaching (ex. our typical coaching packages include access to us on Slack in addition to 50 minute sessions twice a month)
If you can’t get clear answers about their pricing, format, or time boundaries, they’re not the coach for you.
If they don’t listen and acknowledge your goals, deadlines, and desires, they’re not the coach for you.
If they try to pressure you into a sale, you guessed it, they’re not the coach for you.
Observe and feel
As you go through the intro call, every now and then glance down at your guiding questions from Phase 1. Do they align with most of the qualities you want? Do they fit the requirements you have?
In addition to those questions and qualities, consider that your potential coaching relationship with this person starts now. Are you interested in building a long term relationship with them?
Don’t let sales tactics, uncomfortable pressure, or fancy lingo throw you off center. If this person is going to be a guide for you, you should feel comfortable talking to them, and you should both feel excited to work together. Trust your gut.
If possible, observe them at an event
Often business coaches will host events that support their community of entrepreneurs. Go to an event! It’s not only a chance to meet them in-person or online, but it’s also a chance to meet other entrepreneurs who like them or have worked with them. Go and ask questions, see if you like the vibe they create as leaders.
As an example, we host a free monthly event for small business owners called Homebase. We make a big effort to create a relaxing and fun atmosphere for entrepreneurs to get to know us and each other, make connections and avoid sleazy business-card passing encounters. We always come back to genuine connection as a core value, and I think the same goes when you’re scoping out business coaches — go for genuine connection.
Phase 4: Making your final selection of a coach
Way to go! You’ve made it all the way to the final phase. Now it’s time to make your decision. This can be the hardest part because it’s time to make the leap and try something new.
Give yourself enough time to feel good about your decision, but not so long that you avoid taking action. As an entrepreneur, you know how important it is to make important decisions, and you’ll never know every little detail about how things will go.
Consider starting with a single session
Once you find the right coach, test out your new relationship with a single session before committing to a long term process. One way to find the right coach is to start building trust in progressive steps.
Here’s a good example of when it’s time to take a bigger leap:
A regular client of ours came to me last year saying she was buying a small business and wanted our help to make it really successful. She wanted us to do a complete overhaul of the brand and website. She also wanted to start meeting for business coaching every week or two for the next 6 months to make sure the business took off properly after changing ownership.
Now if I had just met her I would have recommended we start with a single business coaching session to get to know each other, take a deeper look at what she had planned, and then take the next step. But, because the trust was already there from years of work, she knew we’d help her take her business in the right direction, and she was right to jump into work with us. We made a big difference for her.
The bottom line is: it’s all about trust.
That’s why we want you to meet your potential coaches, go to their events, talk to people they work with, and start small with a plan to grow into a long term supportive relationship.
Commit to 3 months of work
If the first session goes well, then it’s a green light for you to make the next level of commitment. Good business coaches will account for this by giving you a selection of ramping up options rather than locking you in to a giant year-long contract right off the bat.
For example, in our business, after a first coffee session with a client, we often move to the next step of a 3 month package. It takes about 3 months to start to make any real lasting progress happen in a business, so if the coaches you’re considering have an option around that time length, we recommend starting there.
Make a bigger commitment
Finally, if you’re seeing results it might be time to make a longer-term commitment to your business and go all in. With the right coach you can take your business light years farther than where you can go by yourself.
A good business coach or team of coaches will make you feel like you have a business partner who has your back at every turn, who’s has been through the ups and downs of business before, and can guide you through the tricky situations you’ll face.
Trust your coach
Once you find the right person, commit to them and let them influence you. If you spend the whole time fighting against their advice, either you have the wrong coach or you’ve got some authority issues to work out.
There’s a balance — it’s your business, and your money. But, the world’s best leaders know that when they empower others and let themselves be influenced they create things much larger than themselves. Let your business coach properly coach you. Let them guide you. You’ll gain more than just money.
In conclusion
Now get out there and find yourself a coach. I hope this post was helpful. If you have any comments, questions, or want us to write on a specific topic let us know in the comments below. We love hearing your voice, getting to know you, and connecting you with other genius entrepreneurs like you.
Originally published at https://worththejourney.com on May 22, 2020.
