John’s reputation is first class
Our first introduction to coaching was the mention of John McHale. His names comes up again and again – he is a local legend. When we bought our business in 2016, it wasn’t in great shape and we thought there was no harm in at least having a conversation. That initial conversation was a real eye opener. When you talk with John, two things become apparent very quickly. He has a 360 degree view of how to run a business, which is frightening and liberating at the same time and your own judgement will be challenged. That is very valuable and doesn’t happen very often. Coaching does come at a cost but the return on investment is exceptionally good.
The importance of planning
A phrase that comes up again and again is, “Start with the end in mind.” Our initial start in coaching was to complete a 5 year overview covering our dream, aspirations and to consider where we might like to go with the business. We then worked back with a 3 year and 1 year plan and 90 day task view. Off the back of that one session, we then started group coaching.
Accountability and self belief
My favourite part of coaching is the accountability which is exceptionally valuable. Each session, we go through a lot of valuable material to help you succeed. You can learn a lot of techniques from books, but it is hard to learn the success mindset without a mentor. To give you a good example, with an engineering background myself, I am good at finance but have a blind spot with marketing, so when you start talking techniques and experiences in marketing, you realise it is only a blind spot for now and can be fixed by being guided through the steps you need to take to fix it. With each coaching session, I have found myself becoming a more rounded business leader each week.
