Creating Structures

Structure is the process of creating boundaries and standards around what we are doing. It is important because it creates a pattern for us to follow and allows other people to know what is expected within that structure.

Decisions to make about the structure of my coaching service are:

• how long are my sessions?
• how regular?
• face to face or phone?
• how do clients pay?
• how much do they pay?
• what do I expect of my clients?
• what can they expect of me?

I have set up a policies & procedures document, covering the following:

• the logistics of the coaching process
• what a client can expect of me:
• confidentiality
• availability
• communication
• integrity
• nonjudgmental attitude
• persistency about the client's progres
• what I ask of the client:
• timeliness
• session preparation
• completion of fieldwork
• feedback
• fees
• testimonial
• referrals
• understanding of disclaimer

Creating structures is also about setting up a client administration.

Creating Confidence - in the role of coach

We have ownership of our confidence as a coach. We don't have to be confident to show it.
What supports us to create confidence:

• the preparation of a session
• listening to our client
• using our coaching model
• asking testimonials --> a testimonial can be a recommendation, or a specific experience the client went through.
  
• learning from past experiences
• asking for immediate feedback
• evidence that you have the skills (biography)

A Biography includes passion, our unique coaching model, relation to our target market - the words we choose are extremely important - , our values and our history.

A Biography is short, sweet and personal. It is not a dry resume and boring. It must be honest and authentic, showing our human side.

By getting out and doing it we'll get confidence as well!

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My Biography:

The business owner of Tall Tree Coaching, Evelijn Bos, has a background in Educational Science & Technology (Msc). I have worked for over 10 years in the Higher Education sector in the roles of e-learning consultant and staff development advisor. These roles have given me valuable experience in supporting adults gaining new competencies by establishing a non-threatening learning environment as well as experience in training design and delivery, working in complex organisations, working with new technologies, project management, project coordination and much more.

After immigrating to New Zealand in 2006 I started a career as a real estate salesperson, something completely different for me! I absolutely enjoyed the lifestyle and having my own business. Due to personal circumstances we moved back to Wellingtin, the 'big city', where I started to work in the field of Education again. Somehow coaching came on my path – I had that dream of working closely with people instead of technology and the desire of making a difference in someone's life, which I felt was not what I was doing by then. I started training as a coach with the International Coach Academy and what really blew me away and absolutely made the difference was the realisation that a coach works with people that are willing to change, committed to take action and have a very strong motivation coming from inside. This made me realise that I couldn't work any longer as an employee within organisations where staff are generally not open to change and innovations.

But I realised there was a world to win in supporting and coaching education professionals towards success in their personal and professional lifes. Working in the field of education can be quite challenging at times with it's strong political influences and policy changes, the fact that educational organisations are usually very large and dynamic, the output-oriented student approach which puts staff who want to deliver quality under great pressure, and the never ending stream of pedagogical and educational innovations.

And this is where I am now, on the doorstep of certification as a professional coach and establishing my coaching practice.

Truth Telling

Truth = Authenticity. It is living according to your values, to what is true for yourself. Not everyone experiences the same situations in the same way. As a coach you mirror back what you are seeing and then ask: is that correct? Your view can create a different perspective for the client on their truth.

Truth is not an opinion (belief), nor is truth honesty (moral issue). When interacting with clients it is important to keep in mind that our clients are either telling the truth, lying, or witholding information.
The primary reason why people do not tell the truth is fear. The truth exposes them as they really are and many people live with a deeply held fear that if they expose their real selves, and people don't like what they see, this will lead to rejection.

To discover your values you can do the following:

• visualise a person you most admire
• sum up 3 qualities of that person
• these qualities are values that you think are very important - you are either living according to them right now or you want to achieve them.
  

And see below for the 'Values Game' (source: coachlee.com):

• Select 15 values that truly speak to you out of the following list:

Family Happiness	Personal Development (use of personal potential)
Health	Self Respect (sense of personal identity, pride)
Competitiveness (winning, taking risk)	Recognition (Status, recognition from others)
Friendship (Close relationship with others)	Advancement (promotions)
Affection (love, caring, etc.)	Religion/Spirituality (strong religious/spiritual beliefs)
Wisdom (discovering and understanding knowledge, etc)	Loyalty
Fame (being well known or famous)	Adventure (new challenges)
Achievement (a sense of accomplishment)	Sexual Orientation (having strong identity to sexual orientation)
Wealth (getting rich, making money)	Involvement (belonging, being involved with other people
Economic Serenity	Economic Security
Freedom (independence and autonomy)	Pleasure (fun, laughs, a leisurely lifestyle)
Integrity (honest, sincerity, standing up for oneself)	Power (control, authority, or influence over others)
Inner Harmony (being at peace with oneself)	Responsibility (being accountable for results)
Creativity (being imaginitive, innovative)	Order (stability, conformity, and tranquillity)
Helpfulness (helping others, improving society)	Gender (having strong identity to gender)
Cooperation (working well with others, teamwork)	Culture (race or ethnicity identity)
...	...

• Narrow it down to the top 10
• From your top 10 list, select the five that are most important to you
• From the list of your top five values you must select the top one, the one out of all the rest that speaks to you. Do not discard the rest, they are still important to you, you just want to select the one that when all else fails, you revert to. This is what your life is oriented around.
  
• Write a definition for each of your top five values
• Print the result of your work and refer to it often
  

Quick coaching

Below is a model that can be used for a quick coaching experience during a trial session - individually or in a group.

Box 1	Box 2	Box 3	Box 4	Box 5
Write down a goal you have. It can be a goal from any area of your life, a goal that feels important to you.	For how long have you had this goal? A month, a year, several years or all of your life?	This far, what has been your greatest obstacle in achieving this goal?	What specific activities have you undertaken during the last 24 hours in order to achieve your goal?	You might need to give this a bit more thought. What is it with this goal that makes you want to achieve it? How does it make you feel when you achieve this goal?
Look at your goal again. You don’t have to tell me what it is.	Have you been thinking about your goal for a long time? Has it often been on your mind?	Have you come with excuses or blamed yourself or others for not reaching the goal? Let’s go to #4 instead. This box is not so fun to stay in.	Has the goal been so important to you that you recently have made changes to your lifestyle in order for you to get on step closer to your goal?	Again, how does it feel when you achieve this goal? Isn’t it so that this is what you truly want, your real goal? Could this be an important value in your life?

Afterwards ask:

• 
  

• What is a step you can take during the coming month in order to move closer to achieving your goal?

• How does this all feel so far?

My Coaching Model

I have been working on the design and refinement of my coaching model, see below for the backbone of my coaching process and some more explanation:

I believe that the journey to who you really are and the discovery of what you really want is the hart of the coaching process. Through your personal experiences in life and the way you interact with the people that surround you, chances are that you have forgotten how it feels when your motivation and your drivers come from inside you. Only when you know what drives you are you able to define and achieve the goals that suit you personally.

During the coaching process you will reflect continuously on the steps you take, the goals you set for yourself, the things you achieve, your drivers and values that become stronger and make you grow.

To achieve your goals you will identify a path to close the gap between where you are now and where you want to be. This could be a plan with certain steps that you want to take or an overview where you break down your main goal in smaller and more achievable goals. And to be able to follow the path you've identified you will need to put in place some necessary structures; this could be the establishment of a certain support structure that works for you or the removal of obstacles that prevent you from achieving your goals.

All together it means that you are ready to take action, and that you are committed to change those things in your life that you decided needed to be changed in order to have a fulfilling personal and professional life. Along the way I will encourage you to celebrate your growth; it takes courage to start a coaching process and to undergo the journey to discover what you really want. You are taking responsibility for you own life and decisions, which is something to be very proud of.

Welcome Pack

A well organised coach has put certain structures in place to inform her clients about the coaching process. This means that my clients can expect to receive the following information:

Directly after scheduling a trial session (Intro Pack):

• Information about 'what is coaching'
• Information about me and my coaching model
• Information about the coaching process and 'logistics'
• Policies & Procedures

After signing up (Coaching Pack):

• ICF Code of Ethics
• Invoice
  
• Intake Form
• Session Preparation Form
• Feedback and Evaluation Form
• Release of Confidential Information Form (for International Coach Federation accreditation purposes)