choice Magazine

Beyond the Page ~ UNTAPPED - Taking team and group coaching to the next level

February 13, 2023 Garry Schleifer
choice Magazine
Beyond the Page ~ UNTAPPED - Taking team and group coaching to the next level
Show Notes Transcript

In this interview, we talk with Sandra Hill about her article, "UNTAPPED - Taking team and group coaching to the next level".

Coaching allows you to come across individuals from all walks of life, who each have their own opinions but are synergized by some commonality – either their overall effort or a common goal – which tends to lead you to coach them as a group or team. Now, let’s take this coaching to the next level by facilitating the practice of becoming U.N.T.A.P.P.E.D. This acronym stands for the coaching of:

  • Unlimited
  • Needs of the group/team (that allows them to)
  • Trust themselves and others to be
  • Attentive, while the coach
  • Pays attention to
  • People’s
  • Engagement and the
  • Diversity of the group or team.

Many reports indicate that the benefits of coaching are tremendous, and that the benefits of group and team coaching can be extraordinary. So, imagine what the benefits of U.N.T.A.P.P.E.D. coaching can be.

As a coach, you are in the driver’s seat, so set your expectations early. Don’t drive distracted, and don’t drive aimlessly. Just stay in your lane by coaching untapped, and watch how much further you will get in less time.

Sandra Hill founded New Horizon Coaching and Professional Growth Development, taking a three-pronged approach to helping those who seek to build their confidence while facilitating transitions in their personal and professional lives. During the pandemic, Sandra morphed into a writing coach. Thank you for us. A bestselling author herself, Sandra also hosts a podcast, Grow Your Voice, Overcome Your Fears, and writes career coaching articles for important international journals such as choice Magazine, Forbes, that little one, and other industry magazines.

Join us as we learn more from Sandra on how to we can become an UNTAPPED coach, eventually creating a better YOU and an amazing group/team.

Watch the full interview by clicking here.

Find the full article here: https://bit.ly/btp-Hill

Learn more about Sandra here.

To get schedule your FREE 1-hour session with Sandra, click here.

Grab your free issue of choice Magazine here - https://choice-online.com/
In this episode, I talk with Sandra about her article published in our December 2022  issue.

Speaker 1:

Hi, I am Garry Schleifer, and this is Beyond The Page brought to you by choice, the magazine of Professional Coaching. choice is more than a magazine. It's a community of people who use and share coaching tools, tips, and techniques to add value to their businesses, and of course, impact their clients. It's an institution of learning built over the course of 20 years. Yes, we've been publishing for over 20 years, thank you. And dedicated, improving the lives of coaches and their clients. In today's episode, I'm speaking with professional growth coach Sandra Hill, who's the author of yet another article in choice, I want to say thank you, but in our latest issue entitled Untapped: Taking Team and Group Coaching to the Next Level, because of course, the issues about team and group coaching. I had to say to Sandra, before we got on the call, this one had me laughing. Before she knew what coaching really was, Sandra found herself coaching family and friends. However, it wasn't until her son started loaning her out that she realized that she tapped into something. So after 36- 1/2 years as a government employee, you know, not 36 and three quarters, but 36-1/2, who's counting? Who counts as a government employee? Sander Hill founded New Horizon Coaching and Professional Growth Development, taking a three-pronged approach to helping those who seek to build their confidence while facilitating transitions in their personal and professional lives. During the pandemic, Sandra morphed into a writing coach. Thank you for us. A bestselling author herself, Sandra also hosts a podcast, Grow Your Voice, Overcome Your Fears, and writes career coaching articles for important international journals such as choice Magazine, Forbes, that little one, and other industry magazines. Welcome, Sandra, thank you so much for joining me today. Thank you so much for writing for us again and again, and hopefully more in the future. I know you're working on one for an upcoming theme, so thank you, thank you.

Speaker 2:

Well, you're quite welcome, Garfy, and thank you so much for having me on this awesome podcast, Beyond the Page. If you're not following it, guys, you gotta follow it.

Speaker 1:

They got it. We're on Apple and Spotify, which by the way and I think you probably know this as a fellow podcaster, are the top downloading sources. They represent about 75 to 80% of all downloads so look for choice, look for Beyond the Page and you got us. So oh my goodness, can I tell you how well received your untapped model is? So, Sandra, in your article, not only did you write about untapped, but you actually made it into a, what would you call it? I guess a model would be the best way to say it. So we've been posting it on social media as a warmup to this issue, and it's so well received. What do they call those things where they make a, oh my gosh.

Speaker 2:

I know what you mean. You take the word and you make something of it. I know what you mean.

Speaker 1:

Make a diagram.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I do it all the time. But I need to look up what that term is so I can sound intelligent here.

Speaker 1:

I just met with my social media person yesterday and I don't remember either, but he does. So that's what's important. But it's important to note, and the reason I bring it up is because that's the core of your article UNTAPPED and for those of us that don't yet have the article in our hands, UNTAPPED stands for unlimited needs of the group or team that allows them to trust themselves and others to be a, oh, you know what? It needs to be re read all, I forgot. It needs to be read altogether. So you'll hear the letters, but they'll, and I'll pause on the words. So here we go. Unlimited needs of the group and team that allows them to trust themselves and others to be attentive while the coach pays attention to people's engagement and the diversity of the group or team. How did I do?

Speaker 2:

Awesome, awesome. UNTAPPED.

:

UNTAPPED. I had to talk to you because it was just so unusual why I chose the article for the podcast today. So how did you get to that? Like, tell us a little bit more about that.

Speaker 2:

I can't say anything except it came to me. It's what I do. We were talking prior to the podcast about the bio and like my son started loaning me out. I got that aha moment. You know, people were tapping into me and I didn't even know why they were tapping into me and so the untapped method is basically what I do. So I said, why don't I write, because when I saw the information request about team and group coaching, I said, Hmm, I do this all the time, let me just share what I do.

Speaker 1:

Yeah. No, greatly appreciate it.

:

And that's basically what I do.

Speaker 1:

Yeah. I love when things just, and I mean, I don't want to say just, but when they come to you, you have one of these moments and you're a receptacle like you were being loaned out by your son and sometimes we don't know what it is or what to do with it, but you truly knew what to do with it. How's it impacting your coaching business? Tell me some stories.

Speaker 2:

Wow. I can can tell you stories for days, Garry.

Speaker 1:

Well, we don't have days.

Speaker 2:

I know.

Speaker 1:

Pick one of your top five.

:

I will tell you when I first, at the beginning, I don't want to take away from the article because guys, you have to read the article. Yeah, but this is beyond the page so they can read the article. What is it they can't read in the article?

Speaker 2:

Right, right, right. So I started out writing about me and how I became overwhelmed with all these clients. I wanted to help everybody. I'm this super coach, that's my hero in me, my superpower and I was like, golly, I am so drained. What am I doing wrong? That's the way I thought, what am I doing wrong? And I said, you know what? I always told my kids what? That saying about making it easier for yourself.

Speaker 1:

Work smarter, not harder.

:

Yeah. Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2:

Think smarter work harder. So I said, how do I do what I do? And just like you, some other people started asking me, 95 plus percent of my business is from referrals. I started asking people, so how did you find me to contact me. And they said, it's because of what you do and what you did for so-and-so. I had someone come back to me, Garry, they didn't need anything. They really didn't, but they wanted to run things by me.

Speaker 1:

Oh, okay.

Speaker 2:

They said, you are so engaging and I am very, very introverted. My husband is very, very extroverted. So I think I pick up on some of those extrovert tendencies.

:

To me, you've got enough.

Speaker 2:

He can make a brick talk. So I was working with this one client who lets me share her story, if you will. This one client who said, Sandra, I've got this problem and this is going on and this is going on and this is going on. I listened to her and I said, so who says it's a problem? And without knowing it, I started going through my UNTAPPED and the next thing you know we solved her issue, but she referred me to an organization to do a presentation of over a thousand people in the audience.

Speaker 1:

Wow.

Speaker 2:

I was very humbled by that experience. I was humbled because I got a topic, we agreed on the topic, and I did a presentation for about an hour but what I did was I didn't talk. I was not a talking pit. I involved the audience. I'm introverted, so I have to take all the attention off me. I use my hands as you see, I maneuver around the stage. I told them ahead of time, put me on one of those walking mics, don't have me at a podium. I can do a podium, but I'm not going to do a podium. I had a naysayer and a heckler in the audience. I walked over and just talked directly to him. He was not a naysayer for long.

Speaker 1:

I would talk to people who looked like they were sleeping, not into it, but before you know it, I was getting everybody together. They did not want to leave at the end. That's awesome.

Speaker 2:

I said, Hmm and I kind of filed that experience away. But I used a lot of what I did, and someone said, you need to be a facilitator.

Speaker 1:

I said, okay and I thought about it. I'd facilitated meetings throughout my whole career. In factbI was one of those people who could take over the room.

:

You go into a conference room and you see chairs. I wrote this article in Forbes. There is a head of the conference room, but if you don't know the culture of the organization you could sit in the wrong space. And so as I got to knowing my superpower, facilitating, I would reorganize meetings with executives, those above me just because.

Speaker 1:

They would say, whose meeting is this? I'd say, well, it's not mine and they'd say, well, why are you doing this? I would say, just because, but you're following my instructions, so obviously there's something to it. Right.

Speaker 2:

It got to the point the executives would have me facilitate all their meetings and I said, Hmm, maybe there is something to it. So I took professional facilitation training. I did facilitations, both paid and non-paid, but what that led to was when the pandemic hit another friend tapped me and said, Sandra, you're the only person I know who could make a Skype and a Zoom meeting not boring. You have fun.

Speaker 1:

There's this course out there. And I'd never heard of being a certified virtual facilitator. Oh, I haven't heard of that one either.

Speaker 2:

They said you need to do this and you need to raise your hand and do certified virtual facilitation. We were segued, some of us were used to being online and some of us weren't. I took that virtual facilitation course, got certified. Next thing you know, this was funny, but it was irritating at the time. I have a relative who's a college professor and they were having an enormous headache as far as how to transition their courses to being virtual.

Speaker 1:

Right.

Speaker 2:

This person volunteered me to train the university professors without asking me

Speaker 1:

Annoying. Got it.

Speaker 2:

I got calls and I'm like, where are these calls coming from? So I backtracked and this person said, well, you trained me and I just figured you could train others. It was like that telephone game. They kept passing around my name.

Speaker 1:

Yeah. But at least with broken telephone, they got the number right.

Speaker 2:

They did. They got the number right but because I had helped this person free of charge, they wanted free of charge, free of charge, free of charge. So anyway, we worked through that. But it was fun.

Speaker 1:

It was fun. So I UNTAPPED to make the long story short.

:

I'm saying bring it, bring it home, Sandra, bring it home.

Speaker 2:

I UNTAPPED my own superpowers.

Speaker 1:

Right.

Speaker 2:

I wrote about untapping them as far as doing your coaching.

Speaker 1:

Right.

Speaker 2:

So everything kind of fell into place.

Speaker 1:

Yeah. Well kind of. Talk about a long way around, but it probably seemed like a short time at the time and with your story of being overwhelmed and then COVID and the need. Oh my gosh.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And you know what helped? I keep a tickler file. I was one of these people, if you could see my desk. I keep notes in my phone. I have notebooks for different things so as ideas strike me, I jot them down. I even have one at my bedside because a lot of times that is where things hit me.

Speaker 1:

Oh yeah.

Speaker 2:

I found that when I woke up, I couldn't remember.

Speaker 1:

Yep.

Speaker 2:

So I jotted down about untapped coaching eons ago, or it seemed like eons ago.

Speaker 1:

So it was just a matter of putting it all together. I probably could write a book on untapped this, untapped that wit a lot more examples and things of that nature.

:

Yeah. Based on the article, I think there is a lot behind all of that to express the use and stuff like that. Does it matter what kind of coach?

Speaker 2:

No, it does not, because way back when, when my son was loaning me out, I was a life coach so that's the way I branded myself. As a life coach, I was helping individuals and children starting with middle school transition. Middle school to high school, high school to college or technical school, people transitioning f rom one job to another, helping them with resumes and things of that nature. Well, as I started doing this, I was approached by a member of my Chamber of Commerce to come help and be supportive in their technical vocational school. So I became a mentor and started helping individuals with starting businesses, being entrepreneurs and everything like that. So I segued into being a" b usiness coach". For my job, my nine t o five, I was t heir career coach. So I was still untapping everywhere I went and then with Covid, I have to tell you this story, I had 13 people contact me in September of 2019.

:

Wow. One person had promised to write a, write a book. Another person had it in them. Everybody had a reason for writing. Some had journaled and wanted to put it in the book. And I said, Hmm, there's something to this. Somewhere in the universe, I'm getting this message. I need to tighten up on my niche. I need to segue little bit further. And so I tested the water and did, via LinkedIn, I said, I'm gonna do a writing course. I gave the parameters. I had 49 people sign up.

Speaker 1:

Wow.

Speaker 2:

I said, okay, I'm now a writing coach

Speaker 1:

Exactly. I'm onto something here. The universe is supporting me.

Speaker 2:

Yeah. So I did a workshop and now some of those individuals, we are working on a collaborative book, which will be out like the end of December, early January. And one thing led to another. I became a ghost writer for some other individuals. So UNTAPPED.

Speaker 1:

Wow. So, what I'm really getting from this that takes it beyond the page is connecting the untapped to your conversation about a superpower or in some other words, it might be your niche, your core competency, that sort of thing. That's untapped wealth or untapped intelligence or untapped focus. Like you can use that word all kinds of ways.

Speaker 2:

Untapped potential.

Speaker 1:

There's the best one. I like that one.

Speaker 2:

Untapped potential.

Speaker 1:

Yeah. An untapped purpose.

Speaker 2:

Yeah. Wow. Obviously you can do this in a virtual environment, doesn't matter.

:

Oh, yes.

Speaker 2:

You d id i t all during C ovid and all that sort o f s tuff.

:

I did.

Speaker 1:

I understand you have a little gift for our listeners.

Speaker 2:

I do.

Speaker 1:

What might that be?

Speaker 2:

So, I'm glad you said prior to the article you were testing out social media and a lot of people were inquiring. For those of you who have inquiry minds or you want a little hand holding or some reassurance, there is a form. I guess you can put it in the show notes or whatever.

:

We're going to put it in there.

Speaker 2:

You can get a free one hour session with me to help you along, to run things by me, or I can facilitate for you for an hour. Whatever suits your fancy. That is my gift to you. I'm a coach. I like to share, I like to help people help themselves.

Speaker 1:

That's so generous of you.

:

Thank you. Now, how would somebody get ready to make the best use of the time with you?

Speaker 2:

Well, it's just like any other coaching session. I'm going to ask them what would they like to see as the end result.

Speaker 1:

Oh, wow. That sounds very familiar. What would be a successful outcome of our time together today?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Everybody is different.

:

Yeah. Everybody is different. There will be some people who, when they fill out the form, might give me extra information, or when we connect, they might talk my ears off. Tthen there's some who will be very, very quiet. So I'll have to ask more probing questions, but it's basically like a typical coaching session. So come with a purpose in mind and, to give our listeners an example, I would come with, I'm at, I'd say a potential change in the direction of my life. I'm of a certain age where legacy is important and what am I going to do with the rest of my life? So, kind of a purpose question. And it's not that unanswerable, but I'm guessing that the untapped conversation could probably peel away and dig deeper into what do I know that I don't know in a way.

Speaker 2:

You know, that kinda thing.

Speaker 1:

Just to give an example. Okay. That's good. Yeah. Awesome.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, you're on top of it.

Speaker 1:

Thank you. I'll be signing up on when we post this. I'd love to spend time with you like we did today. Anything else you would like our audience to do as a result of this article and this conversation? I mean, that's huge already.

Speaker 2:

I'd like to hear from them. I like feedback.

Speaker 1:

Okay.

Speaker 2:

Just because I do something and it works for me, it might not work for the next person. Or they might say, well, what about this? Can I try this? So I'd like feedback from people. I'd like for them to connect with me. They can comment from this podcast, or they can contact me directly. Can I share my email?

Speaker 1:

You know, I was going to ask you, Sandra, what's the best way for people to reach you?

Speaker 2:

Okay. So the best way is via my email. It's very simple.

:

Hold on. Let me guess. I betcha there's a hill in there.

Speaker 2:

shillcplc@gmail.com.

Speaker 1:

Awesome. Oh my goodness. I have to say, I read the article and I am so glad I'm doing this podcast because having a conversation to untap the untapped conversation. That's funny. I just realized that we basically untapped the UNTAPPED article.

Speaker 2:

We went deeper. We learned more. We heard success stories. We heard about the evolution. We heard about your request for feedback. So please repeat that email and we'll put it in the bottom of this as well. shillcplc@gmail.com

Speaker 1:

CPLC. Certified Professional Life Coach. Thank you. See? Need some context.

Speaker 2:

I find myself doing that. I am a visual learner, hands on visual. You tell me the stoves hot, I'm that child that's going to touch it and say, oh yeah, it is hot.

Speaker 1:

Yeah. Yeah. Okay, I got it.

:

That is me. So when I learn things, in another book, I tell the story of being labeled as an infant. And labels can carry messages.

Speaker 1:

Yeah.

Speaker 2:

Unknowingly, I tried to undo that, but in the process, I guess create shortcuts. So when I do things, I make it an acronym, like this untapped. There's a message but it's message acronym for me. That's the way I do a lot of things in my life.

:

That's how I remember people's names.

Speaker 2:

Oh, okay.

Speaker 1:

So there's a couple at the gym. Her name is May, his name is Mike and they're really sweet couple, so I call them M&M's, like the candy.

Speaker 2:

Do they answer? That's great.

Speaker 1:

Well, no, it's how I remember their name.

:

You don't verbally say that to them.

Speaker 1:

Well, I have actually, I have actually.

:

Oh, have You? I have to leave now. I need a dentist. They're so cute together and it was really good. I have to try that. I haven't tried that. I'm bad with names and faces cause I moved around so much.

Speaker 1:

So stop right there.

Speaker 2:

Yes. Yes.

Speaker 1:

That's the first change that needs to be made is your conversation.

Speaker 2:

Yes. With yourself.

Speaker 1:

For over 20 years. I said, I'm going to do my best to remember names.

Speaker 2:

You know, you're right. You're right. I gotta start with me. Wow. Yes.

Speaker 1:

Yeah. Yeah. Coaching begins at home, coach.

Speaker 2:

It does, it does. It begins at home. And I have been saying that over and over, but you know, we say that to our clients so often and we don't look internal and say, wait a minute, what did I just do here?

Speaker 1:

Yeah. So I make up things about their names. One guy helped me, so M&M Mike, he helped me. He said, just remember Mike Tyson and he did this stance. So now every time I see him, we kind of go, Hey, Mike. I have a journal book at the gym and I write somebody's name on there and I pride myself on pronouncing the difficult names and this is a cultural conversation. I don't know about the states, but in Canada a lot of people will nickname themselves to make it easier for us white folk to say it. And I say, no, that's not the idea here. We need to do the work to say your name and understand you and what's the background? No, I don't want to know your abbreviated name because you did it to make me feel more comfortable. Be uncomfortable.

Speaker 2:

Well, I'm laughing because there are a lot of names that you don't know where they originated. Sometimes it's a combination of multiple names and the child growing up has difficulty and they give themselves a nickname to help themselves out.

Speaker 1:

That fine. That's fine. But when they tell me they did it to make my life easier.

Speaker 2:

Pronounce their name. It's helpful.

:

It's respectful.

Speaker 2:

It's builds trust. For us, comradery, connecting with people. I always ask my podcast guests before we get started, can you pronounce your first name? Can you pronounce your last name? So I won't botch their name on air

Speaker 1:

Exactly. Nothing worse than an interviewer botching a name.

Speaker 2:

Yeah.

Speaker 1:

Sandra, we've taken this a whole different path, but I think our listeners will be very entertained. I want to thank you so much for writing and writing and writing and planning on writing. So we welcome your wise words. Thank you fro writing from your heart, your mind through your heart, I like to say. You're a delight to have as a guest. I hope we have you on again after your next article. We weren't doing podcasts back when you first wrote, but now we are so. I love having repeats too because it's fun. We can just pick up and go.

Speaker 2:

Good. Good.

Speaker 1:

Thank you again. Tthat's it for this episode of Beyond the Page by choice Magazine. For more episodes, subscribe via your favorite podcast app. Remember that Apple and Spotify are the number one choice for most listeners. Don't forget to sign up for your free digital issue of choice Magazine by going to choice-online.com and clicking the signup now button. I'm Gafry Schleifer. Enjoy your journey to mastery.