You are putting a lot into your coaching, and I know you will want to get the most out of it. A strong starting point is to take a little time before our session, to get clear on what you want to work on in your session.

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The structure of my sessions are set up to help you prioritise what to work on and create space for those things you prioritise.

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That’s not always as easy as it sounds, so here are some prompts to help.

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1)  Keep a running list of potential topics

 

It can be helpful to keep a running list between sessions of the challenges you're facing, or the questions you're asking yourself. That way, when you prepare for a session, you can quickly and easily refer to that list.

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Here are a few questions that can help:

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• What's been bothering me? 

• What is the one problem that, if we were to solve it, would make all other problems easier or irrelevant to solve?

• Look back at your goals. Where would you like to get to? What components does this break down into? What component could be a place to focus first?

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2) Pick your highest priority topic

 

Often the most useful topics have the following components:

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• They are strategic challenges more than tactical ones (for example, strategic is: deciding which skills you'd really like to build, and tactical is: which training course will help you build those skills.) Tactics are easy to research. Strategy is specific to you.

• They involve creating a positive inner story, with coaching being used to clear out any fear or negative belief that’s blocking you.

• They are topics that really matter to you and not what you feel you ‘should’ use your coaching time for.

 

3) Stick with the challenge of defining a good outcome

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In each session we'll clarify not just the topic but what a good outcome on that topic looks like. This isn't always easy to name but is a great way of zero-ing in on what the real issue is, which sometimes the topic itself is too broad to tell us.  

 

For example, if the topic is ‘a proposal I have to present’, the outcome could be ‘feeling confident to present it’. That would tell us that our session is about building your confidence in presenting, not getting clear on what is going to go into the strategy paper.

 

This focuses your coaching session straight away on what matters most.

Outcomes can come in a few formats:

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• An action plan - I want to know what I'm going to 'do' after the session.

• A decision - I want to make a key decision that will inform my actions from here on out. 

• A feeling - I want to have a more helpful feeling about a specific situation, more clarity or capability for example.

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4) It's OK not to know

 

Sometimes our topic for the session is a mini-topic - figuring out the topic for the session!

 

It's OK when that's the case, this is a space to clarify your priorities and naming that you don't know is a useful part of getting clear about what your priority is - to find out!

 

I find clients are often amazed at the value they get from spending time on getting clear on this so don't hold back. 

 

Explain where you are and we'll work out how to get you to a place where you're crystal clear on what you want to focus on and confident in the actions you need to take as a result.​

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