Archive for coachingcommonsadmin
Bangkok Post: When A Coach Needs A Coach, Who Does He Call?
March 8, 2010 – Bangkok Post – Thailand
“Khun Kriengsak, how was your business last year?” Khun Aree asks me.
“It was good,” I reply. “I had more new business than the year before, but I wasn’t happy with my performance.”
“What happened?”
“My new clients were ‘castoffs’ from the economic crisis. But I approached them with the same coaching style I always use. That got me thinking, I need to find a coach for myself. Khun Aree, I know your company uses another executive coach. How would you rate him?”
“He’s good. We use Dr David T. Binnion from Indigo Consulting Group Co. He coaches our CEO and two senior executives. I’ve received positive feedback from his clients. One of his strengths is that he is quite disciplined with them.”
“Perhaps he could improve my coaching performance. I’m not good at disciplining my students.”
“But he’s expensive,” Khun Aree chuckled.
“Could you connect him to me?”
“I’ll e-mail him this afternoon.”
The week after, I had lunch with Dr Binnion. After the strong reference from Khun Aree, he did not disappoint me. He was calm, demonstrated very good listening skills and, most importantly, asked several good questions.
After we chatted, he told me more about his background. He is a seasoned executive after being regional manager of Johnson & Johnson (Ethicon), founder of Johnson & Johnson Medical in Korea, director of Hay Group Thailand and now co-founder and managing director of Indigo Consulting.
Three days after the lunch, he sent me his proposal. I was impressed with his quick response. Lesson No. 1: work quickly.
He proposed to coach me for a year – two sessions a month for the first three months and monthly sessions after that. As expected, his fee was high.
7Mar2010 | coachingcommonsadmin | 0 comments | Continued
Hartford Business: Business ‘Doctor’ Finds Rewards In Helping Firms Make Right Hires
March 8, 2010 – Hartford Business – USA
John Birch says he can sit down with an employee for just a few minutes and know whether they’re cut out for a job in a cubicle or on the open road. He says he can spot a narcissist or a sociopath from a mile away.
Birch is what one might call a small business doctor. About 30 companies throughout the state — ranging from nonprofits to manufacturing firms — have hired him to repair the inner workings of their operations. Since 1997, he has operated The Birch Group in New Britain. He employs 10 part-time staffers to assist in efforts to restructure businesses with 5 to 500 employees. And he says he will soon be looking for a partner so he can eventually “retire to working a 40 hour week.”
Even with the sinking economy, he says businesses want his services and his revenues have grown by at least 10-15 percent each year since he started out.
What makes Birch different from many others consultants, he says, is his ability to deeply read the people he works with using not only behavioral and personality mapping tools, but his instincts. Though he holds degrees in finance and economics, he is also a certified professional business coach who understands, first hand, what it feels like to work in the wrong job.
7Mar2010 | coachingcommonsadmin | 0 comments | Continued
Detroit Free Press: Wellness Coaches Target Women’s Heart Health – They Champion Lifestyle Changes
March 7, 2010 – Detroit Free Press – USA
Grief and stress can be vicious, sneaking up and pressing in on you when you least expect it.
Lori Uyttebroeck went from joking — “I tell everyone I’m a 46-year-old jobless widow with no income” — to tearful in the time it took her to try to apologize for it.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to. … It’s just that I once thought nothing could be worse than losing my job. Then my husband, he was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer.”
Francisco Salazar — a man who faxed her poetry at work and was forever trying to concoct the best chili and soup recipes — was diagnosed just before Christmas 2008. He was gone by July.
For Uyttebroeck, a former administrative assistant with a rental car company, eating became mindless and exercise dwindled.
She credits a personal cardiac coach, Peggy Manchester, for helping her drop more than 30 pounds and, just as importantly, find a bit of tranquility in a life that had careened off-course. Read story.
7Mar2010 | coachingcommonsadmin | 0 comments | Continued
The Province: How To Keep Business Up
March 7, 2010 – The Province – Canada
I run a family-owned company in Vancouver. During the Olympics sales were up and revenue is higher than expected. I am concerned about a possible slump in business with the end of the Olympics. How do I steer our business through this uncertain period?
There are a number of lessons learned from the Olympics that will guide you through this period of uncertainty. They are as follows:
Vision. Make sure that you review the vision or dream for your business. Revise your vision, if necessary. Ensure that you are taking into consideration new opportunities and markets. Set a clear challenging vision for your business. Revise your business, marketing and strategic action plans to reflect the vision/dream for the business. Read more.
7Mar2010 | coachingcommonsadmin | 0 comments | Continued
Times LIVE: The Coaching Moment: Significance And Depth Are Better Ways To Go
March 7, 2010 – Times LIVE – South Africa
The Coaching Moment: Many managers and leaders have a finish line somewhere in their heads that describes what success looks like, feels like and sounds like.
To the exceptional ones, this picture is a vivid one. Unfortunately, when they get to that picture in real life, they are [...]
Boston Globe: Overworked? Here’s How To Deal (Work-Life Coach)
March 7, 2010 – Boston Globe – USA
The good news is you still have a paycheck. The bad news is, as staffing ranks have shrunk, your workday is lengthening and your in-box is bursting at the seams. What’s an overwhelmed employee to do? Try these eight tips from career counselors.
Nearly 10 percent of Massachusetts workers are out of a job, and the other 90 percent may be counting their lucky stars. But a recently released University of Puget Sound study, which followed thousands of workers at Boeing over a decade, suggests that people who get laid off may fare better over time — be healthier, less depressed, and less prone to substance abuse — than those people still at their posts. After all, while unemployed job seekers face a difficult path, layoff “survivors” sometimes find themselves on an impossible road: a doubling or a tripling of their workload. “People left behind are forced into overwork,” says Cambridge career counselor Phyllis R. Stein. “Some of my clients are trying to absorb three different jobs.”
If you suffer from overwork, you may feel you have no choice but to grin and bear it; when layoffs still loom, who wants to be the one whining about working weekends? But local career counselors say there are steps you can take. First, you need to make sure you’re overworked, and not just driven to work a lot. “Some people define themselves by saying, ‘Look at me, I work 16 hours a day,’ ” says Stein. “They wear it as a badge of pride.” But if that isn’t you — if you’re just scrambling to get all your assigned duties done in a day — then see if you can find a little time to check out our eight tips for the chronically overworked.
1. GET HELP First, you have to recognize that your situation is untenable, or nearing it. Maybe it’s when your family stops setting a place for you at dinner. Maybe it’s realizing you haven’t been outdoors in daylight since Scott Brown was still a little-known state senator. Maybe it’s finding you’re gaining weight, drinking more, sleeping less. Whatever your moment of recognition, says Sharon Teitelbaum, a work-life coach in Watertown, your first step should be asking for help. Read more.
7Mar2010 | coachingcommonsadmin | 0 comments | Continued
The National: Taking The Entrepreneurial Plunge In The UAE (Executive Coaching)
March 6, 2010 – The National – UAE
When Stacy Waite moved to Abu Dhabi last year, the opportunities for a budding entrepreneur seemed to jump from every corner of the growing city.
Experienced in working with digital media start-ups back home in the US, Ms Waite, 49, who arrived in Abu Dhabi from Los Angeles, saw a market whose surface was yet to be scratched by online businesses.
Why not launch a multilingual online training portal for hospitality workers, she wondered, or a site covering the elderly care market?
“It has been a huge learning curve,” she said. “What I have learnt is that there are so many opportunities here – but this is not an easy place to start a business.”
Ms Waite is no stranger to launching an original enterprise. When she was 19, and studying communications at the University of Albany in New York State, she started a travel business focusing on ski trips, using the student body as her first clients. In 1989, she became, at 28, the youngest woman ever to launch a hedge fund on Wall Street.
But her Abu Dhabi venture has presented a unique challenge. And to meet her goals, she’s starting a networking group for digital entrepreneurs in the capital.
Read story.
India Journal: OC Uncovered – Maka Marketing’s Career Coaching Helping Students
March 5, 2010 – India Journal – CA, USA
Maka Marketing was launched by Monica “Maka” Shukla, in August of 2009.
Just six months into business, it has made inroads in achieving its goal of providing career coaching and educational services to high school and college-age students.
Speaking with India Journal Shukla says within this short period, Maka Marketing has been able to help dozens of individuals restructure their lives and save years of tuition costs. As a motivational speaker, Maka sees the potential within students today and helps guide them through their higher education goals and into the workforce. Through her personalized coaching program students work with Maka to visualize a timeline for success, and gain access to a network of vital resources.
Surprisingly, due to the downturn, many individuals are returning to school to pursue further educational opportunities. Thus, Maka has actually expanded to assist a larger number of students during this time. Maka’s client base has grown immensely. While the organization was initially structured to focus on a local target group working face to face, due to international demand for the educational services , over half of Maka’s current clients are international students working in a virtual environment. Read story.
6Mar2010 | coachingcommonsadmin | 0 comments | Continued
Hattiesburg American: Small Business Challenge – Financial Stress Can Manifest In Many Ways
February 28, 2010 – Hattiesburg American – USA
Financial stress for small business owners abounds: mental exhaustion that comes when completing a lengthy bank loan application; uncertainty that rises from discussing outside investors; and anxiety that goes hand-in-hand with asking a friend and business partner to pony up more dough to get the business started.
Entrepreneur Michael Matthews is wrangling with all these financial stressors – and more – as he tries to establish a wine bar in Gainesville, Va. Yet, if he wants to get The Virginia Wine Factory open this year as he plans, he must successfully confront each issue, small business coach Rhonda Abrams says. Read Story
1Mar2010 | coachingcommonsadmin | 0 comments | Continued
Liverpool Echo: Liverpool International Coaching Academy To Open Australian Operation
March 1, 2010 – Liverpool Echo – UK
The Liverpool International Coaching Academy is expanding ‘down under’ with an office opening in Perth later this month, followed by a presence in Sydney.
Business coach and founder John Haynes set up an operation in Kenya six years ago and a second overseas office in Malaysia in 2008.
He said research has identified a need for the service in Australia.
UK Trade and Investment has helped with the expansion, including a deal for the company to offer seminars in the British Embassy overlooking Sydney Harbour. Read Story.
1Mar2010 | coachingcommonsadmin | 0 comments | Continued
MSNBC: Revamping Your Job-Search Strategy (If You’re Not Landing Interviews, It’s Time To Try Something New)
February 28, 2010 – MSNBC.com – USA
Stephen Cobain was laid off from his executive position at a major Pittsburgh financial services company in December of 2008 and spent nearly a year looking for a job with little to show for it.
“I was doing all the things everyone tells you to do,” he said. “I prepared my résumé, wrote letters, contacted recruiters, looked on all the job boards, responded to 400 positions and maybe sent out 1,500 résumés.”
It all led to no job, just frustration.
Until this past Thanksgiving, when his always-supportive wife stunned him by saying: “You must accept the fact that you’re doing something wrong.”
“My reaction was to say, ‘I think I’m doing everything right. The right thing will come along,’ ” Cobain recalled. “And her response to me was, ‘It hasn’t come along yet.’ ”
It’s hard to hear this type of criticism, especially when you feel you’re doing everything in your power to land a job. And clearly, most job seekers have a great excuse right now — a crummy economy.
But if you’ve been job searching for months with few tangible results, it may be time to take a hard look at yourself in the job-hunter’s mirror. Read More.
1Mar2010 | coachingcommonsadmin | 0 comments | Continued
Stockton Record: New Group Reaching Out To Parolees-Nonprofit Gives Coaching To Aid Positive Transition
March 1, 2010 – Stockton Record – USA
Steve Smith’s first reaction to seeing a stickup man come at him four years ago came with the thought: Why don’t I carry a gun?
But instead of going out and arming himself, Smith and a group of friends from his church decided instead to turn that unpleasant experience into good.
They launched InSync Interventions, a nonprofit organization that tries to provide coaching to parolees leaving prison so they can become productive citizens rather than returning to crime and prison.
“Really what we’re doing, we’re trying to change Stockton,” Smith said. “We asked ourselves: ‘How can we make it a better community and safer, a place where people want to come?’ ”
Still in its infancy, InSync’s timing is ideal, said Smith, noting the state’s massive plans for Stockton, which include opening a 500-bed re-entry facility for inmates leaving prison.
So far, Smith’s team of about 15 volunteers has completed a business plan, formed a nonprofit group, put up a Web site and printed glossy pamphlets explaining InSync’s mission.
While they’re associated with Quail Lakes Baptist Church, the organization is not faith-based because such groups are not eligible for state grants, Smith said.
InSync’s organizers aim to mentor parolees in their first year of freedom, linking them with a life coach, counseling services and, ideally, a job. For employers who hire one of their clients, there are huge tax incentives, Smith said. Read Story.
1Mar2010 | coachingcommonsadmin | 0 comments | Continued
Times LIVE: The Coaching Moment – Learn To Learn From Your Mistakes
February 28, 2010 – Times LIVE – South Africa
Errors can be great teachers if you avoid the ‘failure’ trap. Regular readers of this column are by now familiar with the phrase, “Failure is only feedback.”
Very often the team and I are called to coach managers and leaders who are somehow missing the plot, making sad and obvious mistakes for a variety of reasons.
Our role is to help them come up with winning strategies to become resilient once again.
To be effective, they need to bounce back and, above all, learn from their mistakes.
Not everyone who is coached is failing. By the way, in coaching we never allow the person to click and drag a specific failure into their identity by saying: “I am a failure.”
We see this all too often when people turn an experience into an identity: “I am a divorcée” or “I am an alcoholic”. The situation is not the person.
Armand Kruger, a master executive business coach, says: “From my modelling and coaching experiences I am becoming more aware of the vital importance of two recurring themes: firstly, ‘contextual intelligence’, that is, the reading of the situation or circumstances and, within the unique demands of the context, making decisions about achieving outcomes against designated standards, and then rolling out the actions ensuring that the outcomes happen; secondly, a ‘balancing act’, that is, given the sensitivity to context, how to balance the priorities of the context and the longer term or bigger picture outcomes and standards.”
The labels “success” and “failure” can sometimes get in the way of useful understanding, because they cause us to feel good or bad, rather than curious. Read story.
28Feb2010 | coachingcommonsadmin | 0 comments | Continued
NewsOK.com: (Business Coach) Customer Relationship Is More Than Service
February 28, 2010 – NewsOK.com – USA
On the new reality television series “Undercover Boss,” CEOs from major U.S. companies literally go “undercover” for a week inside their own organization to learn what really happens on the front lines.
Donning a fake name, they work entry-level positions in various capacities in their organization over the course of a week. A recent episode had a great “Eureka!” moment that so many companies have yet to recognize.
Featuring the CEO of a leading convenience store chain, the show focused on his work at various stores and distribution centers, and on a delivery truck. He noted that one store where he went undercover was their No. 1 seller of coffee — far outpacing the other stores. His desire was to “understand what it was about the coffee at this store that made it so popular.”
As he worked his shift, he quickly learned that the coffee was only a small reason why customers flocked to the location in droves.
The reason wasn’t the coffee. It was the store worker that knew each of her customers by name, by story, even so far as coming across motherly to some.
Morning commuters came for hugs and conversation just as much as they came for the coffee. She had worked at that store for 18 years, and it showed. The CEO walked away with a huge lesson: It isn’t just about customer service — it’s about customer relationships. Read story.
28Feb2010 | coachingcommonsadmin | 0 comments | Continued
Vanguard: What Prophets Are You Listening To?
February 28, 2010 – Vanguard – Nigeria
How often do you buy into what other people tell you about yourself and your possibilities rather than deciding for yourself? We have many “prophets” around us. They try to foretell our future, judging our capabilities and potentials for us.
Recently, I met Joseph Jaiyeola, a motivational speaker and life coach based in Lagos. Joseph has a passion for making a difference in Nigeria. He shared with me a short essay he wrote called, “Who Told You?”
I thought you would enjoy a few excerpts:
….A prophet is meant to give a helping hand in the fulfillment of your Divine destiny. Unfortunately, many self-ordained prophets offer condemnation, when Heaven would declare hope.
Who told you that you are unworthy?
Who told you that you are a “NO-DO-WELL”?
Who told you that you are limited, and must remain limited?
Who told you that you cannot improve yourself and your lot in life?
Who told you that you cannot experience great success?
Prophecies like these tend to come from close friends, relatives and fellow countrymen who have experienced limitation and are projecting it onto others.Do not sell your mind and heart to unsolicited prophecies, commentaries and pronouncements. You are what you think. “As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he.” Read more.
28Feb2010 | coachingcommonsadmin | 0 comments | Continued
Vaughan Today: Don’t Let Vacation Get You Off Track
February 27, 2010 – Vaughan Today – Canada
Keeping a spring break body over spring break can be challenging. Whether staying near home or travelling abroad, an influx of unhealthy foods and times of relaxation are always in the itinerary.
Professional life coach and director of Thornhill Health and Wellness, Dr. Brian Kleinberg gives some tips on how to stay or get in shape. Read story.
28Feb2010 | coachingcommonsadmin | 0 comments | Continued
BusinessWeek: Management Lessons from a Triumphant Olympics
February 26, 2010 – BusinessWeek – USA
Members of the U.S. Nordic Combined Ski Team won gold and silver yesterday in the sport’s final Olympic event. It was the culmination of an amazing winter games for the team, which won medals in all three of the sports’ competitions. It was also one of the more amazing turnaround stories of the Olympics.
How Nordic Combined went from dead last in the world in 1988 to regular trips to the podium is a lesson in slow, deliberate growth managers at struggling US companies like General Motors, Delta, or even the New York Times Co., might take a page from.
Tom Steitz, who we first wrote up on the blog last week, took over as Head Coach for the team in those dark days of 1988, inheriting little money or athletic talent to work with. But he set a methodical approach to turning the team around, and set ambitious goals that put it on the path that would lead to Vancouver. Read Story
27Feb2010 | coachingcommonsadmin | 0 comments | Continued
Toronto Star: Conquer Clutter, Keep What You Love
February 26, 2010 – Toronto Star – Canada
Hellen Buttigieg is an Oakville, Ontario-based professional organizer, life coach and TV host, whose book Organizing Outside the Box: Conquer Your Clutter Using Your Natural Learning Style, just received an award in Los Angeles.
The Star caught up with her for a 10-minute interview. Here’s an edited version. Read Here.
27Feb2010 | coachingcommonsadmin | 0 comments | Continued
Reason Online: Friday Fun Link-I’m Just A Life Coach With A Dream
February 26, 2010 – Reason Online – USA
Need to put some pep back in your step? Sit down for a session with Liza, the manic personal motivator played by Cheri Oteri in Life Coach, a series of shorts that run as interstitials on AMC and on the innertubes at LizaLifeCoach.com.
Caveat: Cheri Oteri could pretty much read the phone book and I would find it fall-down funny. Her performance here contains the expected elements of neediness, barely suppressed rage and hideous cutesiness, but the stroke of genius is that she takes her character of a life coach — a certified life coach — seriously. While she pays due tribute to the trade’s air of overcaffeinated quackery, uses vaporous buzz words, generally makes a fool of herself and usually ends up getting implicated in her clients’ problems, Oteri is hip to the fact that life coaching is a strenuously unflaky profession, powered by toughen-up rhetoric and impatient with airy-fairy self-absorption. After all, America’s original life coach was Ben Franklin. The best joke may be that Liza is actually a pretty good life coach. Read Story.
27Feb2010 | coachingcommonsadmin | 0 comments | Continued
Kelowna.com: Leading Through Ambiguity
February 25th, 2010 – Kelowna.com – Canada
Managing through uncertainty is a regular occurrence in business today. It is challenging to lead others when you are not clear on where you are going yourself or have little information you can rely upon. Organizations and cultural norms continue to expect leaders to have a proven plan which will lead to a successful end result. That very expectation can promote inaction due to fear of failure.
Both leaders and organizations need to adapt their approach to dealing with ambiguity. As a leader it calls for openness, creativity and courage rather than simply waiting for the fog to fade. The following steps can serve as a compass to navigate the way. Read Story.
26Feb2010 | coachingcommonsadmin | 0 comments | Continued
Haaretz.Com: Let Me Count The Ways To Help You
February 26, 2010 – Ha’aretz – Israel
Not only are more and more people changing careers to become personal coaches of some kind or another, the craze has reached the umbrella organizations too. The local arm of the U.S.-based International Coach Federation recently celebrated its recognition as a nonprofit organization by Israeli authorities – and with that, it joined three other existing organizations, each of which serves as an umbrella organization for personal coaches of some sort. Read Story.
26Feb2010 | coachingcommonsadmin | 0 comments | Continued
Entrepreneur: It’s About Time (Management) Time Really Is Money, So Treat It That Way.
February 25, 2010 – Entrepreneur – USA
Having recently had another birthday click over on the odometer, coupled with the new year–and the new decade–time is on my mind. Actually, time’s never far from my mind in my work-cave because I have strategically placed more than a dozen clocks around the room and can’t look in any direction without seeing one.
As I describe in my book, No B.S. Time Management for Entrepreneurs, I organize everything with predetermined start and end times; if someone has a phone appointment with me, they know in advance when it will end, not just when it will start–and the call does end as scheduled, even if in midsentence. I have trained and conditioned myself to be hypersensitive to time, and I train my clients to respect my hypersensitivity about it. Why? Read Story.
26Feb2010 | coachingcommonsadmin | 0 comments | Continued
