Coaching with accountability transcription
Wait, What? Really? Really? OK with your host Loren Weisman. This is a fully licensed theme song for the show about stuff that makes you say Wait, What? Really? Ok. This is Loren Weisman. This is the Wait What? Really? Ok Brand messaging podcast. And today I’m diving into the idea of coaching with accountability and finding honorable coaches in the world of coaching. It continues to increase and since we’ve gone through this whole Covid thing, people that said, well, I don’t have a job, I can sign up and go through a certification course and now I’m a coach. Now there are some great coaches out there. There are people with the authenticity, the validity, the ability to help you. But this field has become over saturated with people that don’t know what they’re doing. They figured out a way to promote themselves as a coach. They know how to use all the right quotes, they know how to use all the right words, they know how to use all the right guarantees and promises. And this has come from some other coaches that have looked to low hanging fruit individuals of stating, okay, all you need to do is market this way. Buy my product and you’ll immediately become a coach. Do you think from a transparency standpoint you would feel really good about hiring a coach to help you with your dream, your vision or your business if you knew that they went through a 30 day or a 40 hour course and were handed a series of templates and explained. This is how you talk to someone inside of some of these subscription download. You buy these courses, they even explain how you can blame your client for what they didn’t do to clear you of liability. That to me is unethical. Unethical, it’s immoral and it’s just off. But it also brings up the problem. Each of us out there looking for help from strategists, consultants, coaches, whoever, it is our responsibility to do the due diligence, to do the double checking, to look a little bit deeper than the hype and the promotion that’s out there. And don’t get me wrong, some of these authentic, authoritative coaches, they do do that hype. But oftentimes and most times they have the validity, the authority and the authenticity to back it up. So I’m going to hit on the idea of the problem with coaches. I’m going to hit on from the idea of the problem from a client standpoint and kind of mix this together because this is as much for the valid, authentic, authoritative coaches as it is for those that are searching for them. This isn’t an entire bashing of coaches. There are some good coaches out there. However, the biggest problem I have, and diving right in, the biggest problem I have is, and even for the ones that have been successful, they claim a level of success and then they have immediately transferred that success into them knowing how to coach. I know many people that don’t know how to teach, that don’t know how to coach, that are incredible experts and authorities in their field. But that transition, to be able to share, to be able to teach, to be able to steward, it isn’t there. That’s not a bad thing. But you’ll see with some of these coaches, there’s this thing of, okay, money has gone shy because of Corona, because of whatever else. And so now I’m going to coach and now I’m going to sit here and explain, look, I did this, I made this, I created this, and I can now help you do it too, which oftentimes just is not true, it’s not a fact. And it can put you into a problem situation where, yes, this person was successful and yes, what they did worked for them, but it might not necessarily work for you. I tie it back and I circle it back around to the music industry. There’s certain individuals inside of the music industry that I would just rather see them state, this was my experience, this is what happened and this is how it happened. Or at least even from a more humble standpoint, this is what I saw going on around me and this is what I understood was happening. Because a lot of times these people, I don’t know yet, you have these people that were in bands, you have these people stating, okay, this is how you do it. And they didn’t even know the money that was behind them. The other aspects of marketing, the music business plan, what the label was doing again, and not trying to knock Dave Grohl, I think the guy’s amazing. I think he’s an incredible talent. I think he’s an amazing musician, songwriter, drummer, and just an all around cool dude at the same time. I’d love it if he would stop explaining how the music business works, maybe currently how it works and how it works for someone that was not completely fully in on what brought his first band to the success that it reached. One view standpoint of what we were doing this, and then we did this and this happened. There was a lot of strategy, there was a lot of money behind it. It’s the same thing with David Byrne from Talking Heads when he goes out and explains, this is how you do Twitter. I’m sorry, David. Before Twitter was even alive. You were a celebrity, you were a musician, you were able to pop on and automatically makes certain things happen. So in your experiences, that’s great that it’s worked that well for you. But for the person that hasn’t been around music that long, that hasn’t had that range of success, that popularity, that celebrity, it’s a different path. And that brings it back to coaching. Looking into the coaching and looking for these core points, are you getting a quarter truth, half truth or expired truths? Are they putting out things where their entire coaching platform is showcasing the authority and authenticity of other people, but not them? There are certain coaching platforms where they explain, put up a picture of yourself, make sure you have money, stand in front of a nice car, even if it’s not yours. Then in between those, put up the Zig Ziglar quote, put up the Tony Robbins quote, put up the Gary Vee quote, mix these together. They’re playing to a certain extent, certain mind games to play off the authority of other people and then take it to you. That’s dangerous and it works. A lot of people benefit from it, but it can be a harmful thing. It can be just. I really would love to see more people go the moral route to take responsibility for whatever business that they’re growing to steward the wealth. You want money coming in, that’s great. And you want to get a whole bunch of clients, that’s great. But are you serving those clients or are you just cherry picking out there and trying to get the next doll and hustle, as they say? I really, I can’t stand that term. You gotta hustle more. And that’s where it comes to the blaming the next part. You didn’t hustle hard enough. You. Well, this didn’t work. I tried this. Well, you didn’t do it right. Well, I did it exactly the way that you told me to, but it didn’t work. Well, you didn’t want it hard enough or you didn’t try hard enough, or look at all these other people that did this or I did this. Here comes in the accountability to ask a coach to clearly define the parameters of what they’re going to do. It’s not saying that a coach has to write down, you know, you will be successful if you do that. And when they put that kind of thing out there, that’s a very dangerous claim to make. I wish on the standpoint of coaches, consultants and strategists that they were held as accountable as doctors. And wouldn’t that be a wonderful thing? Because a Lot of them would have to shut their mouths really quickly or change the tone, the messaging and the text of what they’re sharing. Now in that is a coach that you’re getting involved with. Have they offered you a non disclosure agreement or have they asked if you want one? Do you have something that’s proprietary? Because if you’re talking to a business coach or a success coach and they get wind of all that you’re about, what is stopping them legally from taking that anywhere else? Now, an NDA is, it’s a step. It’s not complete security, but at least it’s a step. And on that same level, what are you going through? Is there an out clause? Do you have a consulting services agreement or a strategic services agreement with any kind of consultant that you work with? That’s why I really like and what I do with people is I usually say, let’s do one, two, maybe three sessions. These are what the sessions cost. You’ll get a sense of me and you’ll get a sense of fsg. And from there you can make a decision and from there we can create an agreement, a statement of work, a sense of how I work, a sense of what I expect from you. There is the ability that, yes, of course, the person that’s being coached, they might not do it, they might not get it done, they might not follow through, they might not complete the work that they should be completing. But at least if you have it on paper and you showcase what the expectations are, what the responsibilities are from both sides, you’re coming into a better relationship, you’re coming into a better agreement, you’re coming into a better understanding that in turn can create better results. It’s looking into that and asking, okay, what happens if this thing’s really going downhill? Where is the commitment? Where can this contract be broken? If X number of payments are required, where does it stop? Where are the refund policies? Where are the, okay, this didn’t work out or a certain invoice was there? If it’s a no refund policy, is there something there where you get a certain amount of credit? What rights does everybody have and why isn’t that written out with most coaches? There’s a magazine out there, six figure coach, and to me it’s a little bit dangerous. It’s coaches going in there and they’re reading off of the Gary Vee’s and they’re reading off of these big coaches and here’s this and here’s how to present and boom, boom, boom. A lot of it in the few that I’ve scrolled through, it’s so much about marketing and to me a negative approach of almost psychological operations to continue to draw more people to you. These ideas of no, this is what you want to tweet today and this is what you want to market and this is how you want to interact with this. And here’s how you stay hot on the topics that are trending. What if what you know inside of your authority and your authenticity has nothing to do with what’s trending right now? So do you go to that false place to then begin to try to be cool and be out there? Or is it a shift to share something about your view? What you have so many of these coaches, the bulk of their content is all based in solely marketing. I will do, I can get you. Don’t you wish you were making this amount? And then what’s worse, these are the ones I find the most immoral personally. The direct sales, the MLM coaches, the ones that say, first off you’re going to pay me, then you’re going to get under my funnel. Now you’re not trying hard enough. Now you’ve got to do this, now you’ve got to prove yourself to me. Why do you need to prove yourself to any coach? It’s about proving yourself to you and then understanding maybe a particular person that they’re not the best person to work with. So then inside of a statement of work, inside of a release from a situation, can you get out or are you locked in? I’ve had people send me coaching contracts and oftentimes the agreement it really is solely in the favor of the coach and not really respecting the individual. And because they signed it, there’s not much that they can do about it. There was one particular person they sent me, it was a three page consulting agreement. I said, you know, I think this looks good. I, I look, I’m looking forward to reading it. The entire consulting agreement only protected, it wasn’t really an agreement, it was a statement that kept the coach out of any kind of liability, out of any kind of responsibility for following through. And this particular coach, all they did was say, go back and read this. You want to know about this? Go back and read this. I mean the hourly rate was through the roof. And then you have these coaches going, you’re not, if you’re not being paid this or you’re not asking for this much, you’re not showing your worth. What if you’re not worth that amount? What if it’s time to humbly Prove your worth by giving, by reducing. Let’s get out of the arrogance, let’s get out of this warrior belligerence level. Let’s go to a level of humility where you can help and where you can stand out in this field. And at the same time, for the individuals looking for the coach, look for a consulting agreement that protects you. What happens if you need a break? What happens if money is tight? Is there something where it’s okay, there’s a window for this time to be taken off, or if you state that you’re not able to make a payment at this point for this long, that you’re still in the clear. An agreement is a two way situation and it should protect both sides. So I, for me personally, and I really advise with coaches and I advise for people looking for coaches. Get that invoice, have that clearly stated out. Make sure you get a receipt, not just the transaction, get that services agreement or consult, you know, consulting or strategic, whatever you want to call it. At fsg, we call it Strategic Services agreement. It lays down everything of all the expectations of how we work, of where we work, of what is done and what we’re about. Then the statement of work. Now statements of work, they can be a little bit broad. And some people, I’ve had certain people ask me while I was talking to this coach and they said they couldn’t give me a statement of work because all of it’s conceptual, that’s fine. And a lot of consultants, there are elements that are conceptual, they are strategic. It’s more time than it is necessarily the statement of work you get from a home builder, but it can be listed out the topics that they’re going to hit. It doesn’t mean that they have to make sure that you are a master in any of these topics. And no one’s a master anymore. That’s another conversation and another podcast for another day. But that these things were gone over. These were the elements that we hit. We went across these things, we discussed these things and it’s following up that in this session this was discussed or this documentation to allow you to do this or this video or this audio. When that’s brought forth, you as the coach have served your client and as the client you have received service from your coach. And that’s fair and that’s moral. The last parts come down to. So I said before, we said invoice, we said the non disclosure agreements, so things kept private. We said the services agreement and the statement of work of what’s going on in there. And in that documentation, there is clarity, there is authority. Also asking, doing in the last part here, doing the due diligence, who has this person coached? Or even if it’s not necessarily who they’ve coached, because maybe they’ll come out in full honor and say, I haven’t coached anybody like you. So you can go call this guy that spent 10 times the amount and be thrilled with his response, or you can look through the items and the pieces and the content, which I believe more coaches should have up than just marketing about what they’re about. It comes back to that element of getting someone to understand what path you would take. Someone on. FSG has a particular client, they said, who you know, who else have you worked with like us? And who can we look at? Well, no one for this particular client, never done anything in this area. But under the overarching themes, the umbrella of what’s happening inside a business, this is the approach we take. This is why we take it. This is what we’ve seen in competitive, in comparative, in the contrasting, and this is why we do that. But had we sent them to someone and said, go talk to so and so, they love us, that ends up being a selfish testimony because this individual did something that costs so much more and it really didn’t relate. So asking your coaches, I don’t want your best testimonies. I want to understand your authority. I want to understand your authenticity. Let them share through podcasts, through videos, through blogs, what they’re about, what their take on things are. And does that resonate with you? Because anybody can sit there and put out and state, hey, this is great, this is great, this is great. But is that a situation that can resonate or relate to you financially, theoretically, from a methodology standpoint? Because if it isn’t, now you’ve dialed into a coach that is bragging about things that have nothing with no similarity to what you’re doing, and it’s probably going to set you up for failure. So in the end here, the accountability, it’s not going to happen. We can’t make coaches accountable like we do doctors or like we do lawyers. That’s unfortunate. Let’s be realistic. But we can seek out that accountability and look for that authority and that experience beyond their marketing, beyond their hype, beyond their promises. And we can put up the red flags. When it seems too good to be true, because it usually is. When it seems like it’s all hype and no substance, then maybe they’ll end up coaching you with all hype and no substance. Is there a foundation of liability, of shared understanding, of responsibility? Are they putting a consulting services agreement in front of you? Are they putting an NDA to protect you? Are they explaining ways that if this doesn’t work, this is how it ends, or if it does work, this is how it can continue? Are the expectations and responsibilities there for all sides? Because then you have a good working relationship, it’s moral, it’s authentic, and it allows you to grow. If it’s not there, be careful. Try with some of these coaches. If someone feels really good and it’s not there, maybe do one session, two sessions, three sessions. If that’s. If it’s really feeling strong to you, and if they won’t allow for that or they’ll only do a package, watch out. To those looking for coaches, honor yourself, your dream, your business, your vision that you want to grow and protect it. As you bring someone in to help you, are you protecting that business? Are you protecting your finances? Are you protecting your time? Treat it like that and vet that person or that individual or that company. Vet them. Look across their content. Look across what they say, how they say it. Look across their marketing. Is it all regurgitated from somebody else’s authority or is it them and inside of it? Does it make sense to you? Are those foundational documents in place to protect all parties? Is there a way out? Is all of those things? Have a look before you look to sign, or you look to subscribe to those methods, or you look to buy in, get away from the popularity and seek out the authority in it, because that authority will help your business and to the coaches. Lastly, the authentic ones, the authoritative ones, stand out by stepping up and setting up your authenticity, your experience and your validity to shine. Showcase through videos, audios, blogs. Don’t make it all about marketing. Show that you care and you have the experience and the authority to help. Not just hype. Because in the end, when we, as those that want to be coached or we that are coaching others, hold ourselves and the other party accountable, we can account for a lot more progress and process than just falling into the template hype that so many are practicing and so many are harming others with today. Wait, What? Really? Okay.
Coaching with accountability transcription