Now, you have decided to embark on a coaching journey. You may even have made contact with potential coaches using the guidelines and advice I listed in my previous post in this series. If you are at this stage, it is that you wish to change something. It is a very good start. If it happens that you have been asked (requested?) to go through some coaching sessions, you may be less inclined to wish to change.

However, readiness to change is a very important aspect of the success of coaching. To put it bluntly, if you are not ready to change, you will not change and even if you have the most talented and successful coach in the world, this person will not make you change. Change is a personal action and you are the only one to make it happen. It means that to be successful, you need to take the responsibility for the outcome of the coaching.

Wanting or not wanting to change is not bad or good in itself. You just need to understand where you are on this continuum. If you don’t, you may end up spending a lot of time and money on coaching without reaching the results you wished to reach at the start.

Let’s face it, change can be difficult and it is normal to feel some reluctance and be daunted sometimes. Change means you will gain beneficial things but also that you will lose things from the current situation. Very early in the coaching journey, you need to assess what achieving your goal would bring you, both positive and negative things. You need to assess if there is anything in the current situation that you may lose but that you want to keep. The fewer things you want to keep and the more positive outcomes you will gain, the higher your motivation for change will be.

You need to understand for whom you want to change. If it is for yourself, again your motivation and chance of success will be higher than if you are looking to change because somebody else wants you to change.

Finally, you need to assess the benefits of your current situation. There are some benefits in everything. When changing you will probably lose some of them. How are these benefits compensated, achieved in your desired outcome, goal? The benefits brought by the change have to be at least equal to the benefits gained your current situation.

Conclusion

If you change, what will you win? What will you lose?

Do you want to change for yourself or because somebody else asked you?

What are the benefits of the change and of the current situation? Another important part of being able to change is being in control of the change. I will discuss this aspect of your coaching journey in my next post in the series.