Wow, where do I start in order to tell you about my experience with The Coaching Institute. I suppose I’ll start at the beginning!
About 15 months ago I was at a rather significant cross-road in my life and was not sure in which direction to go. After 7 years of being stay at home mum I was facing the prospect of my youngest child starting school and had no idea what to do next. I was beginning to search the internet for ideas for courses so that I could retrain in something. My professional background was teaching and I knew I could fall back on that but I knew I had an opportunity to see if I could find something to do with my life that would give me a sense of purpose and fulfilment that was over and above that of raising a family.
I didn’t know what a Life Coach was, and I certainly didn’t know I could become one so when I found the words Life Coach on Google I was intrigued. I investigated and researched and the more I found out about Coaching the more excited I became – that this was something I could do that could tick all the boxes (own business, work from home, choose my hours, good income, something I would enjoy, connection with people etc) and at the time those were the things that were important to me.
After looking at all the courses on offer there were several reasons why I was attracted to training with The Coaching Institute in particular and why I eventually decided to join their Diploma in Life Coaching program.
I loved the fact that TCI’s coaching training is a mixture of face to face training and self paced study. This was important to me as a mother of 2 children; I could arrange my timetable to suit my family and the needs of my son and daughter. I come from England and have no extended family support around me to provide childcare and my husband works full time so this was a very important factor for me.
The Face to Face aspect is important to me too; connection and belonging are important values of mine and the fact that I could train with real people and likeminded fellow students was a big factor when I was choosing who to train with.
TCI’s credentials as being the most accredited training centre for Life Coach training were very important to me too. If I was going to make that leap and investment in my future it made sense to train with the best organisation out there.
Also, I loved The Coaching Institute’s money back guarantee promise; that you will earn your course fees back by the time you graduate or you get DOUBLE your money back. This was very important to us at the time as we were on one income and this course was a big commitment to us as a family.
It didn’t take me long to decide to go for the Diploma in Life Coaching option. The value that the Diploma offered me seemed (and is) a no brainer. Yes, the Cert IV could give me a coaching business but I was really attracted to the prospect of the Trainers Training component and the NLP training that was part of the Diploma program. My husband and I worked out pretty quickly that I would end up upgrading anyway so why not commit to doing the Diploma from the start!
I actually started my training with TCI about 3 months after I first started investigating. TCI were very understanding about my needs and commitments around my family and I was able to choose my starting date which I am really grateful for and so it was exactly 12 months ago I went to my first training weekend.
WOW! It was just SUCH an amazing start to my journey! It was 3 days packed full of information and knowledge and I felt so blessed to come away with such amazing tools in such a short time. It was a lot of fun and we were treated to first class training in a safe environment at TCI’s offices in South Melbourne.
After that weekend our first foray into coaching was being given coaching teams where we basically practised our coaching amongst other students – it was a great opportunity to learn our craft in a safe environment of other coaches in the same situation.
My journey since then has been phenomenal. Not only was I allowed to practise my coaching skills on other new coaches but I was able to build incredible friendships from this experience too. I have made friendships with people that I know will last a lifetime and who could put a price on that?
The self paced learning continued to build my skills and increase my passion for my craft. TCI offers webinars nearly every night of the week and it is truly up to the student to work out their own attendance timetable. Most people can manage 2 a week but you can do more if you like which is fantastic!
I think all new coaches start off with fears and challenges. I had several but I will share the 3 main ones. Of course the first one was a biggie: “Will I be any good?”
The second and one of my biggest concerns about coaching was the big question “How will I get clients”? This was a particular worry of mine because I felt I was more challenged by others as I liked to use the excuse that I am not from Melbourne or Australia so how can I get clients if I haven’t worked here or don’t have a network of friends?
My third challenge was “How can I run a business?” because not only had I been out of the workforce for 7 years but also, as a teacher, I had no experience in business and the thought of setting up a website caused me to come out in a cold sweat!
The first fear, about being any good as a coach, was easily overcome by doing what TCI advised, which was to ‘Do the hours’. The more you practise the better you become. The golfer, Gary Player once said, ‘The more I practise the luckier I get’. I love that quote because it translates so well in coaching. I think some coaches may be instinctive or intuitive but honestly, for the majority, the more hours you do, the better you get. It’s a fact. And you get to do the hours when practising in your coaching teams with other coaches! It’s a fantastic system and so worth utilising!
New coaches are also encouraged to get Pro Bono clients so that they can get their numbers up and TCI offer a Pro Bono pool where they have keen clients ready to be practised on so that new coaches can increase their coaching hours and hone their craft. I also found that there were loads of people (friends of friends) who were willing to get coached for free. In the first 5 months of my training I gave away 60 coaching hours for nothing, just to ‘Do the Hours’ and learn to be a good coach! 12 months in I have coached nearly 200 hours and those first 60 were so worth it!
The ‘How will I get clients’ question is something mostly answered within the training. Networking skills are specifically taught as part of your coaching program and I have found it absolutely invaluable! We get given guidance on how to network, where to network, how to find a niche market, how to market ourselves to our niche market. The list is endless. TCI’s aim is for their students to be successful coaches with working businesses so teaching us how to market ourselves is as important to them as it is to the students.
TCI’s step by step program on setting up a business helped me conquer any doubts I may have had around whether an ex teacher, stay at home mum can run a business or get clients. 12 months ago I didn’t even know what the letters ABN stood for (how embarrassing!) and now I am the founder and director of my own business with over 14 clients on my books. I have almost earned back my course fees and I told you I am a very slow developer; I know of people who do that in 12 weeks, not months!
AND despite my fears around the technological side to things, I am the very proud owner of a website (www.mlwcoaching.com)! Admittedly I had no idea how I was going to get a website up and running; I didn’t have the funds to pay someone to do it and I certainly didn’t have the technological know-how to do it myself so what I did was ‘sell’ my skills! A web designer contact of mine came forward and built my website in exchange for some coaching! How cool is that?
I have loved every moment of my Diploma program with The Coaching Institute. The 7 day NLP training was completely incredible and the Trainers Training weekend totally blew me away. I truly believe that those two trainings are the difference that makes the difference in terms of how good a coach you can be. The Cert IV and Adv Prac programs deliver so much value and give you everything you need to set up a coaching practise but NLP gives you a deeper knowledge into human behaviour and why people think the way they do and this alone, before you learn any NLP techniques, is invaluable as a coach. NLP gives you greater insight into yourself as a coach and as a person and gives you so many more skills to your coaching skill set. And if I were to think of one thing that Trainers’ Training did for me and my business it would be to say that I have developed the confidence I needed to go forward with my business to where it is now and where I want it to be. I truly believe that my life changed completely after my Trainers’ Training weekend.
The most important thing I have gained from the Diploma Program has to be my own self development so far; I still have some way to go to graduate – the next 12 months looks so exciting to me, with the development of products, the further development of my online presence and greater development into my niche market of Sole Business Owners who Work From Home – but I can honestly say that every single area of my life has improved immeasurably since I started training at TCI. My relationships with my family, my children and my husband; my health; my friendships are all areas of my life that just keep on getting better.
I will be eternally grateful to Sharon Pearson and all the staff at TCI for the last 12 months because when I started out looking for something that would tick the boxes of owning my own business, working from home, choosing my hours, earning a good income, doing something I enjoy and connecting with people and I have ended up with all of that and infinitely more!
Thank yo
u TCI!
Megan Leed-Williams
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