Making a Great Decision in Hiring a Coach

If you are considering hiring a coach for your personal or business growth do your homework and be sure you make a considered and well thought out decision. A major issue in the market today deals with the quality of coaching. It just seems that everyone and their uncle can and do call themselves a coach without regard to what it takes to be one. The end result is that many individuals and business owners alike are being taken advantage of and it hurts the entire industry.

You cannot set your mind to just go and hire a COACH. The coaching industry is like any other specialized industry. You should hire a coach based upon someone that can specifically help you based upon your individual needs. If you have personal and life issues, find a great Life coach. If you have business issues, then hire a business coach. But please, promise me that you won’t just go out and hire a coach without asking some questions. Look, if your heart is failing and you need a triple bypass surgery to stay alive do you go to your General Practitioner or do you go to the best Cardiothoracic surgeon in the market? Or in a more caustic example do you go to that top Cardiothoracic surgeon or do you go to your local veterinary? Now remember the Vet is a doctor.

Ridiculous right? But many people hire coaches without doing any research or thinking. And, this can be a very serious issue with very serious consequences. Let’s say you’re having business issues and really must have some help and advice. You ask a friend and he suggests a friend that is a coach. You hire them without finding out that this person is a Career Coach with no real basic business experience. You hire them, the process fails and you spend precious budget and you’re mad. By the time a qualified coach gets to this person, they say, “I’ve tried coaching, it doesn’t work.”

Here’s what I’ve done about it. I welcome the fact that a prospect wants to review their coaching options and interview several “coaches”. I will however ask them to do one thing. I have created a check list of the appropriate and necessary questions that must be asked of every prospective “coach” in order to get all the information needed to make a good decision. The checklist will help evaluate coaches on an old fashioned “apples to apples” basis. After this happens, I ask to be the last person that they interview. Usually by the time they use the checklist for two or three, they give up and call me.

Two starting questions you must know:

1. What exactly is your need?
2. What kind of coach might fit that need?

The COACHING EVALUATION CHECKLIST:

1. What kind of coach are you? If they can’t answer that question, leave. Leave quickly!
2. What kind of certification do you have? What actions did you take to become a coach?
3. What classes or training were you required to do to become a coach?
4. What is your background that qualifies you to be a coach?
5. What kind of curriculum to you offer?
6. Do you use a proven system or do you just “wing” it?
7. What kind of training did you do to become a coach?
8. What kind of ongoing training to you do or is required of you to do to maintain your title?
9. What kind of support to you have or do you offer? Do they have a “team” of experts supporting their work with you? Do they have teammates, consultants, experts that they have access to for additional opinions or strategies?
10. Do you have your own coach?
11. What is your average ROI (Return on Investment)?
12. Tell me about your best coaching success story? They should have some that immediately come to mind.

Remember, your business or your job, or your life are important. Be careful who you turn them over to for help!