After months of spending time with and getting to know a construction contractor partnership we got to the point where they thought, “We really need help.”
After a few days, they came back and said, “I think we’ll really be ready in about six months… what do you think?”
This is a multi-million dollar, 40-employee business where each partner is having to stay at the office till 10 pm many evenings just to ensure that all of the moving parts of their business and life is being held up. They are spinning plates, juggling balls, throwing hail mary’s, and hoping that when all is tallied up at the end of each year that they have more money than when they began.
I asked simply, “what will be different in six months?”
They looked at each other at a loss for thought, “probably nothing” they replied.
In that moment I had a decision to make, give in to their excuses, or tell them the truth.
The truth is that they have the bones of a great, legacy business and yet they are at risk of losing their friendship and their family if they continue down the hair-on-fire path they were currently on.
I decided to respond with the mind of a coach instead of the mind of a placater, “you need to make time to begin right now…you have no time to waste, and if you do kick the can down the road, you will never get that time back…and time is ticking fast.”
They did not hesitate and we began a powerful coaching relationship.
Not everyone is ready for coaching. In fact, we have a 26-point checklist that each of our coaches use to determine the fit of an ideal client.
There are three questions we ask in particular that tell us if an entrepreneur and business owner are ready for a coaching relationship.
First, are they willing to make time for coaching and implementation?
We are told by many business owners, I can’t find the time. You will never magically find time… there is no more time to be found. We are all allotted the same quantity distributed at the exact same frequency.
There is no more time to find.
Instead, will you manufacture your schedule in such a way that you prioritize the content of your coaching to learn, install, and implement?
You must take the time you have and make it conform to your vision.
Coaching is not primarily counseling where you layout a problem and then discuss psychological mechanisms to leverage in the future when those situations arise (although there is plenty of psychology in coaching).
Coaching is game-planning, forethought, scouting, play-calling, no-nonsense communication, enforcing repetition, accountability, and motivation. Coaching is not cheerleading and empty flattery.
You are being coached for one reason... to be liberated from business chaos, so you can make time for what matters most.
Second question we ask is, "Is the business owner or entrepreneur willing to do everything we ask them to do based on the roadmap?"
A sports coach is not taking implementation cues from the player…a sports coach is leading the player into the direction they wish to go. Want to win a championship? It is the coach's job to help you get there. Want to build a team legacy? It is the coach’s job to help you get there.
I’ve seen it before when the coach loses her zeal for accountability, repetition, and implementation, rarely does the player take that responsibility on themselves. The coach creates a roadmap for the player.
Is the player willing to follow the roadmap even when it seems incongruent?
A final question we ask is, “does the business owner or entrepreneur have more money coming in the front door than is going out the back door?”
We have become too comfortable with what I’ll call day-to-day debt. Assuming that it is normal and customary for us to credit-card and line-of-credit ourselves into and out of situations.
We can brag on our profit and loss statements all day, but we all know inherently those are usually numbers on a page instead of cash in accounts.
In every business we have ever worked with, there are leaks, holes in the financial hull of the business. It is normal, but we should never be lulled into being ok with the holes long-term. Instead, we want to plug the holes and shutter the back door where appropriate payables get shipped out, but everything else is retained for reinvestment or just fun profit!
If the business is in a tailspin habit of spending tomorrow’s deposits on yesterday's payables, it is hard for anyone to help that situation without major intervention.
We’re not looking for perfectly healthy businesses, we are looking for business owners and entrepreneurs who have real desire to grow, to do things differently, leading them to a place where they are liberated from chaos.
In short, it is time to hire a coach when you are ready to do things different, to make time for the things that really matter, and follow principled leadership and wisdom in the mapped-out repetition of great discipline that leads to freedom.
