How coaching changed my life

It’s amazing how sometimes the simplest of things can have such a profound effect on your life when you least expect them.?

By the time I was 28 I was already CTO of a fast growing tech startup company, prior to that I had held senior technology positions in Tier 1 banks. I read nothing but non-fiction books, mostly around management science and business strategy. But I felt I really struggled with organisations adopting my ideas and often wondered whether it was my age that was holding me back from achieving more. A good friend of mine recommended a professional coach, Lesley Hamilton, who through 5 sessions fundamentally changed my approach to work and life. The short story is that she helped me to realise that I could only change/influence things within my control, and that anything outside of my control was not my remit and so I should not feel frustrated by those changes not happening. She also helped me to ask myself more questions, to be my own critic. I can not tell you how much of an impact this has had on me.

Wind the clock forward over 27 years and I have been fortunate to build and sell companies. I often feel like I have “been there and done it” about most of my professional interactions. But I am not foolish to think I know it all. There are still things that hold me back and I’ve spent many hours trying to understand why. Lesley has retired so I couldn’t go back to her. To my rescue it was my good friend, Dave Wallace , that introduced me to Coaching With Chemistry . He explained that after some online profiling I would be matched with a few coaches. Then I would be able to read and review a little bit about each one of my matches before selecting a few to have an introductory “chemistry call” with. This sounded perfect as literally for decades I have made do without a coach because I was uncertain who to go forwards with.

Coaching for me, and I suspect most, is quite personal and for it to work for me I knew I had to both like and respect the coach. Finding the right coach is not an easy task, believe me, I’ve been trying. So I was intrigued and keen to see if this would work for me.

The profiling was not at all onerous, and this alone helped me to think through what I was looking for in a coach and what I needed help with. When I got my results, I was quite surprised how different the recommendations were, but I found it easy to narrow my choices down to 3. From there it was simple to book an appointment to have a “chemistry session” with each coach. I purposely booked them pretty close to each other so that I could compare and contrast them easily.

Each session I had was really interesting and actually quite different. I did also find that the clarity of my coaching requirements were getting refined with each call. As to be expected each coach was patient, attentive and had a different approach to their service. For me this was really helpful and if budget was not a consideration, I’d probably start with all 3 coaches.?

The chemistry sessions not only helped me to get to know the coaches but also reminded me of the benefits of coaching. I really can’t believe I had let two decades go without having more, however, the main challenge had been finding the right coach.?

Next I will need to spend a bit of time to refine thoughts on my coaching needs but I am sure I have found the coach I would like to go forward with.

It's surprising that no professional athlete can get to the top without a coach, but in professional careers so few people actually use a coach. You have to be prepared to put the work in to benefit from coaching, it is you that will be working to improve yourself. But it is invaluable to have someone to help you think through your challenges, to push and motivate you whilst being brutally honest on your progress. If you want to accelerate your career or just be better at what you enjoy, I highly recommend coaching for you. Using a service like Coaching With Chemistry will definitely save you time finding the right coach, and the rest, including your success, is really down to you.