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Business Coaching for Success

When business owners start up a business, more often than not they have never really considered all the things they have to be involved in. Some of these may come naturally to them, and therefore they find easy, other things are completely alien, and they hate the thought of dealing with them. However overall the 3 key scary disciplines for most business owners are taking on and managing staff, taking control of the numbers, and letting go.

Taking on and managing staff. The majority of business owners find this aspect terrifying. First they find it difficult to find the right sort of people. Secondly the thought of interviews and contracts is sometimes enough to stop them from taking people on. Thirdly managing and appraising staff is something they would do anything to avoid, rather than potentially having to face confrontational issues. A business coach can help them through all these concerns. Showing them how to describe the position they want to fill and the person to fill it, giving them the tools and knowledge to work with, and putting them in touch with experts to help and advise them.

Taking control of the numbers. Many business owners simply run their business on gut feeling, hoping that it will all work out O.K. while putting their head in the sand. They don’t set targets, they don’t know their break-even, and they don’t set out yearly cash flows, and they seldom look at their accounts figures yearly, let alone monthly. A business coach will help them to over come their fear of numbers, providing templates to work with, explaining in layman’s language what it all means, and why it is so important, and they will hold them accountable to filling in monthly figures.

Letting go. After all the business is their “baby”, and the last thing they want is to see all their hard work turn to dust. A business coach will help them to hand things over bit by bit. Having taken on the right people to free up time, they will help them to delegate, and after a while create a business which works without them. They then have a business.

One of the things I encourage my clients to do is to always ask for testimonials. Most people acknowledge that the power of someone endorsing their product or service is extremely persuasive, so you would think that they would immediately embrace this, and use this as part of their marketing strategy.

However, rather surprisingly, the actual response is rather more muted. The thing is that it turns out that people are fairly sceptical about testimonials, often stating that they don’t really believe them, or that the supplier themselves has made them up. Consequently their belief is that their clients will think the same, and therefore their credibility could possibly suffer as a result. It is true that a short one-liner with no name or company beside it might be considered a bit “iffy”, but a proper testimonial, proudly endorsed is without doubt worth its weight in gold.

The first thing about a good testimonial is that it is very cheap marketing, and that secondly you can use it on all sorts of your marketing materials, such as website, flyers, or newsletters. The other thing is that with contact names and company names included, people can actually enquire about you without you knowing, which means they know they are getting a completely unbiased opinion.

I recently met with a very nice lady who wanted to do the coaching course, but was clearly a little unsure even after she had agreed to go ahead. Subsequently she called one of my clients on my website testimonials (without my knowledge) who immediately calmed all her fears, and in fact re-inforced her certainty that coaching would be right for her. When we next spoke she was much more confident about it all, and whilst she was a little sheepish about having contacted my client without my client without asking me first, I was delighted that she had.

What do you consider most important when you are hiring new staff? To some extent it will depend on the sort of role you are filling in terms of seniority and/or technical skills required. But the majority of roles should be fillable by any number of different candidates, providing of course, that you have systemised your business sufficiently, so that your new employee can follow the instructions given verbally and supported by manuals.

However, it is something which is foremost in my thoughts at the moment as I have a daughter who is just coming to the job market and a son who will be following her in a couple of years. Reading an article in the Sunday papers this week made it quite clear that on the whole, most employers were no longer looking for the smart young things fresh out of university with impressive degrees, but much more for people with experience, both in work and ideally the ways of the world.

The trouble is, in the various government drives to make our teenagers look cleverer, and give them “more confidence”, there has without doubt been an easing of pass marks in exams (and exams getting easier especially as a lot of results are boosted by coursework). As a result far more graduates approach the job market with high degrees, but unfortunately no ability to communicate, tackle problems, use common sense, or even turn up on time and look presentable. Hence the general feeling of employers that they would rather turn to those with experiences of some sort.

Nevertheless, whilst I completely understand and support this viewpoint, we must also be careful not to “throw the baby out with the bath water”. There are of course still plenty of good graduates, and providing they have a good positive attitude, are willing to listen and learn, and fit in with your business culture, I would still advise that in many situations, you would be well served employing these people. After all it is much easier getting people with open minds to fit in, than teaching old dogs new tricks.

Business Life Ltd

Molens Cottage
Bures Road
White Colne
Colchester
Essex
CO6 2QF

Telephone: 01787 229908
Email: info@yourbusinesslife.co.uk

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