Life Coaching and Responsibility. A Case Study
“I need help!”
These three words, strategically placed in the subject line of one of a raft of hundreds of emails that typically greet me on a Monday morning, cleverly attracted my attention.
Haylee, a trainee life coach with New Insights, already being quite advanced in her study of the theory, had chosen the weekend to get started with the practical part of the training programme.
Dan, AI, and cryptocurrency
A good friend of Haylee’s, through family connections, had met an ambitious young man, we’ll call him Dan, with a fascination for AI and the idea of using it to build his own successful cryptocurrency trading business.
Thinking that life coaching might help Dan in realising his vision, the friend introduced him to Haylee who was delighted to invite him to become the first of her volunteer coaching clients.
Dan jumped at the chance of getting assistance and the two agreed to meet on the Saturday morning, for Haylee’s first practice coaching session.
After briefly sharing some basic information on life coaching and what Dan could expect, Haylee remembered her pledge to be client-centric and quickly moved on to invite Dan to share details of his situation.
Haylee ‘out of her depth’
Dan, with no previous experience of life coaching, relished the opportunity to give Haylee a crash course in AI and cryptocurrency. He then shared his desire to get urgent help to secure seed capital from an ‘angel’ investor to enable him to take his business concept to launch.
To cut a long story short, the practice session proved too much for Haylee, formerly a school teacher, who quickly began to feel out of her depth.
Losing sight of her responsibility as a life coach
Her email to me, calling for help, listed several questions. These signalled to me that the experience had caused her to lose sight of her real role and responsibility as a life coach.
“His goal is to launch an AI based cryptocurrency trading platform within three months. I don’t know the first thing about AI or crypto so how would I know if that is even possible?”
“Given I lack any technical experience in this area, how can I possibly advise him what to do?”
“He explained that he would not be doing any of the homework exercises that I proposed because this will take away from the time he needs to achieve his goal.” How on earth do I deal with this?
“Our second session is coming up in 10 days’ time and he’s expecting me to provide him with a plan for how he should take things forward.”
“Should I just decline coaching on the basis that I am not experienced enough in his field?”
Given the state of affairs, I realised that responding to Haylee on email wasn’t going to cut it, so I picked up the phone.
My discussion with Haylee
Here’s the gist of my conversation with Haylee. Her comments are shown in italics to differentiate them from mine.
“Haylee, I want you to take a few deep breaths and try to relax. It may not feel like it to you but you have just had the most wonderful lesson to start your practicals.”
“I’m not sure I know what you mean?”
“Well, this session has presented you with a brilliant opportunity to step back and reflect on exactly what life coaching is and is not so you never feel uncomfortable again when a similar situation arises.”
“I just felt like I was in an impossible place, lacking the expertise I needed to help this guy.”
“That’s because you felt a responsibility to know his business, when your training has taught you that that’s not your role.”
“But I have a responsibility to help him achieve his goal and I don’t know how to do that without understanding what he is talking about.”
“Haylee, you are not a business coach or an adviser, you are a life coach. Your role is not to understand his business and advise him on it. Your role is to empower him to come up with his own solutions.”
Remember, your expertise lies in helping people unlock their true potential. You have all the tools and techniques you need to do this, no matter whether your client is a janitor or a rocket scientist.”
“Well, he thinks that because I am a coach, I ought to have insights into his business if I am to guide him.”
“Yes and that’s because you omitted to explain upfront what life coaching is and how you operate. You were in too much of a hurry to let him talk about himself so you forgot to set the groundrules and expectations.”
“Well I am where I am now, so I’m not sure what to do.”
“Haylee, you’re a trainee life coach. Practice sessions are never meant to be perfect. They are intended as opportunities to learn and make course corrections, so that when you start coaching professionally, you’ll have the confidence of knowing what you are doing.”
“Are you saying I should start again?”
“I’m saying that there is nothing wrong in explaining that you got caught up in all the excitement of your first session and that you would like to wind things back a bit so that he has a clearer understanding of your true role.”
“OK, that makes sense but I still think I will struggle when he starts going on about AI and crypto. It really confuses me and that leaves me struggling to think straight.”
“That’s because you are trying to understand it, when you don’t need to. Your interest should be firmly on your client and his mindset. What makes him tick? What drives his actions and behaviours? What does he value in life? Is there anything about his belief system that is holding him back from achieving what he is setting out to.”
“Oh yes, of course. But then what about his goal? If he has set out to do something in three months and he fails, he’s not going to be very happy with me!”
“Well, it strikes me that you just accepted what he claimed to be his goal without even questioning it. Your role is to probe, through questioning him, to find out what he is truly trying to achieve at a deeper, more personal level. Why does he want to launch this business? What does he want to get from that? How does he want to feel? What value is he trying to meet?”
“OK. And by doing that I put an emphasis on the person rather than the business?”
“Yes. Help him to reconfigure the goal so that it becomes about him, his feelings and his personal growth. Then you can get him to consider his aim to launch a new business and where that fits in to the overall scheme of things. Perhaps it becomes a milestone en route to his goal. Or perhaps it is an outcome of achieving his goal.
“Mmm… That makes sense. I didn’t think about it that way.”
“As for the plan of action required to achieve his goal, remember that this is his responsibility to develop. He knows his business much better than you, so he must come up with the plan. And the plan will inform the timings, not the other way around.
“OK, so what’s the best way that I can help with this?”
Your job is to facilitate this. As a life coach you do that by asking questions that get your client to reflect deeply on what resources he will require and what milestones and action steps need to be incorporated into an overall plan of action. Then your job becomes one of challenging, motivating and inspiring him to stick to his plan. Your client has to do the work, not you.
“OK. Um, I suppose I just feel a responsibility to come up with ideas and suggestions to help him.”
“But that implies you have to be an adviser or consultant and that you have to understand his business. You are not that, you are a life coach. You don’t need to know anything much about his business. You just need to know about him, what drives him and how best to challenge him.”
“Aah, I guess I fell into a bit of a trap.”
“Don’t worry. It’s quite normal for inexperienced life coaches. They easily forget to double down on being clear about what their real role and responsibility as a coach is.
How do you feel now?”
“I’m feeling a lot better, thank you. As you say, I’ve learnt an important lesson about responsibility.”
“Yes, and what a great point at which to learn it. I’m quite sure you’ll look back on this experience in time to come and realise its importance in helping make you a great life coach.”
