How to Choose the Best Business Coach to Boost Your Success

Today I would like to share some of my experience with you to help you when you are choosing a personal business coach. As there are many professionals offering their services to varying degrees and levels of suitability, choosing the best business coach for your particular needs will take some care full consideration.

When deciding to hire a business coach to help you with your business, there are a few questions that you need to ask yourself and answer honestly. There is no one else at stake at this point, it is entirely your own responsibility to yourself and your business. The honesty or not with which you approach these basic but crucial motivations for wanting to hire a business coach will affect you and your business, it could be the most life changing event that you will ever take. It is up to you as an adult and responsible business owner to be honest and truthful and you will be the one to either benefit or on the other hand waste your time and money.

Questions that may come up during your decision-making process should be things such as:

• Will this business development coach be able to guide me in a professional manner to achieve my objectives and help my business to grow in the way I desire?
• To what extend is the business coach result and goal orientated?
• How well does my business coach understand the principles and organizational dynamics of my business?
• What do you want to gain from hiring a business coach? What are your expectations?

Thinking that hiring a business coach is going to make running your business easier or somehow less work and responsibility is the biggest mistake that you can make. If you are contemplating hiring a business coach because you think that you will be given straightforward answers that will quickly and easily double your turnover and bring you more customers, then think again.

Lastly, if you are under the impression that a business coach is someone who is there to pamper you and make you feel better about why your business is suffering, then you should rather make an appointment with a professional who deals with emotional problems. Because a professional business coach will not solve your problems but give you extensive, inspirational, life and business transforming guidance, that will help you achieve anything in your life, if you are ready to work hard.

Entrepreneurial experience is a key

Looking at the question again and if you are honest about it and you have the courage to do whatever it may take to build your business and you understand that you are going to make sacrifices and work really hard to succeed, then you need to look for a business coach.

You should do your homework and be aware that choosing a business coach is not something that you can take on lightly. You are not looking at employing someone, you are investing in the future of yourself and your company. The person who is going to help you make a success from your business should have the credentials to back up any lofty claims he or she may have.

Look for someone who has proven themselves as successful entrepreneurs. You ideally want to receive guidance from a business person who has gained experience and insight in the world of entrepreneurship and has excelled in his or her own business as a result of their own knowledge and expertise.

I was fortunate in my own life to have benefitted from working with just such a person and as such I am proof of the value that choosing the right business coach can do for you.

At the time I was looking for someone who had the kind of experience and who has achieved the sort of success that I was personally lacking in myself and my business. I felt that I needed to learn from someone who had lived through the same kind of challenges that I was then facing in my business.

There were two reasons for that:

• It is my belief that by living through a situation, you gain a better understanding of it and that this experience is the most valued form of learning. My business at that time was stagnant and I was losing my enthusiasm for it as I could no longer see how I was going to take it to the next level.
• I had a dream of establishing my business and making it attractive for investors to want to buy it in order for me. With my business not growing organically and me not being able to come up with a solution on my own to boost its growth, I realised that I need the help of a professional business coach.

Friends and colleagues are NOT your coaches

Well-meaning advice from your friends and colleagues may be comforting, but for all the good in the world it is meaningless as a formula on which you can expect to build your business on.

Make no mistake thinking that a good business coach is your loving friend or caring relative. That is not why you have made the investment in your coach. Your business coach is there to challenge you and to force you out of your comfort zone and into action. Choosing a business coach that is in all ways as far as business is concerned your superior, means that you have to listen to and heed the advice that you are paying for.

You and only you had the final say in who you chose to mentor you and having decided to get the best person available to work with means that it is your business coaches duty to be ruthless in getting your business up to its full potential.

Carrot or stick – you choose

Think of your business coach in the same way as if he or she was a doctor, tasked with saving your life. What do you want, a nice kind doctor, telling you that you are fine and that everything is good even though the reality is that you are desperately ill and in need of a heart transplant or you will die.

The business coach is the specialist that you have called in to look after the health of your business. Yes, it would be nice to sit and chat over a cup of tea about your business and pretend that everything is OK and that there is nothing to worry about. But clearly that is not the truth because if it were then you would not have hired a professional business coach in the first place.

The discussions that you will be having with your business coach are going to be based on honesty. It will not always be what you want to hear and you may even feel hurt, but you must take the personal feelings out of this equation. What is expected is openness and goal oriented business planning.

The challenges that you are facing in your business are real and they need to be dealt with in a professional manner that will resolve the issues that are hampering the growth of your business. The relationship that you have with your business coach is and should at all times be professional. Neither you or the very best business coach in the universe will be able to achieve anything if you for one moment forget that what you are dealing with is the life of your business. It really is that serious.

Good business coaches are in high demand and as professionals they have certain criteria that needs to be met in order for them to consider taking you (and your business) on as a client.

The following will increase your chances of being taken seriously:

• Show a genuine willingness to be tutored and a desire to learn. No one wants to waste their time and energy teaching someone who does not want to be taught.
• Be 100% committed to your business and show your commitment through accepting that there are going to be changes that won’t be easy to endure but are necessary. Commit yourself to the process of growth.
• Focus and perseverance are essential qualities and without the willpower to follow the process through to the end, you will not succeed in your business aspirations.
• Be sincere. Everything that you are doing with the help of your business coach is going to have an impact on your business and you should show regard for your business. After all you do care about your business.

“The man who removes a mountain begins by carrying away small stones” Chinese Proverb. Don’t wait forever! Reach out today to find the best business coach that is right for you!

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Reach out to Kamelia Allow, an ICF Certified Business Coach, via email coach@kameliaallow.com or visit www.kameliaallow.com to book your free discovery session with Kamelia.