Coaching can be a very rewarding profession, especially if your work yields good results for your clients. But no matter how great your results, no one is immune to becoming a bit lost in their career. In fact, feeling as if you’ve been settling into complacency isn’t that unusual. Studies show that career stagnation can be attributed to self-efficacy issues, unmet goals, as well as organizational conditions, like your support systems. Thankfully, ruts are temporary — as long as you’re willing to find new ways to excite yourself in your profession. In this article, we’ll look at five ways you can break out of your shell and further your coaching career.
1. Think About Your Unique Selling Proposition
A unique selling proposition (USP) simply refers to whatever makes your business distinct. If this is something you’re having trouble identifying, then try pondering on the following questions:
- Who do you market to?
- What do you offer that clients won’t be able to find elsewhere, and what sets your personal niche apart from others? Narrowing your target market to working moms or single parents is one example.
If you have no differentiator, don’t be afraid to invent one. – it’s an important part of the evolution of your business, especially as the competition grows fiercer. Lastly, weave this all together to create a “headline” that can help clients understand your goals and what they can expect from you.
2. Ask for Honest Feedback
To determine what you need to improve on, you must be open to feedback and suggestions, especially from those you wish to serve better. Consider reading conversations on social media and searching for reviews on Amazon, Udemy, or other platforms on which your audience may be active. With 47% of clients often turning to social media to voice complaints, try to use this to your advantage. In tandem with that research, you can also release surveys or questionnaires to get a good grasp of how your clients feel about your business. To succeed as a coach, you must be aware of any troubles and desires in order to provide better solutions and improve your services.
3. Pursue an Online Degree
If your career is at a standstill, it could be a good time to look into an online business administration degree that is made up of 100% course work. Because these programs are online you can create a schedule that allows you to study and gain experience at the same time. Business coaches will always benefit from increasing their knowledge when it comes to economics, finance, management marketing and operations, and an online business degree is one of the best ways to achieve this. For instance, specializing in business data analytics will significantly allow you to advance your skills in analyzing raw data which is a highly sought-after skill in the coaching industry.
4. Find a Mentor or Mentor Coach
Coaching businesses can be complex, and you must learn how to seek help from time to time. You’ll need to find yourself a mentor, someone that will be able to hold you accountable and keep you in check. Contact someone who has had similar work experience as you, or someone reputable that you can trust. Often, we get stuck in our careers because we are too caught up in the routines we have set for ourselves — a mentor is there to help you formulate new, bold ideas, and to be the first one to provide constructive feedback for your business decisions.
If you are in pursuit of a Credential from the International Coaching Federation (ICF), Mentor Coaching is a requirement, which gives you a great opportunity to receive professional assistance in achieving and demonstrating the required competencies for each level of credential (ACC, PCC or MCC).
5. Hire New Employees to Help You Run the Business
In line with seeking help, hiring enough employees to help you run your business will also prove to be beneficial in the long run. This will free you from the burden of accomplishing conventional tasks and give you the time and energy to devote yourself to business improvement. Do take note that this is a give-and-take relationship, and satisfied employees are more likely to be productive and therefore support you as you bounce back from your stagnation.
These five ways will help you form actionable goals. Hopefully you’ll be able to take a step forward and realign your personal and business goals for the benefit of your coaching career.
