Tag Archive: business coaching

Business Coaching for Growth

Posted by Henry Barbey

Small business growth does not just happen. It requires planning.

It might seem like some owners get lucky. There is something to be said for being in the right place at the right time.

But usually if you take a closer look at those lucky individuals who developed a product at a time when there was a huge demand for it, you will find that they recognized the need for the product beforehand. They did some research. They talked to people and they planned. Sometimes they even created a new market where none existed before.

The details depend on the type of company, which is why individualized business coaching has become so popular. There are some bits of general advice that apply to all businesses. Here are a few of them.

Define Your Goals

It is not enough to say that your goal is to grow your company. You need to specifically define how much growth you expect to see in a specific length of time.

Defining your goals will help you to judge your progress as time goes by. You can create milestones and celebrate every time you reach one of them.

Celebrating is important because it helps you maintain a positive attitude. If you get down in the dumps, you can become depressed and you will quickly lose your energy.

Big companies use “SMART” goals to help their employees decide where they would like to be in one year, five years, ten years, etc. SMART goals are Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic and Timely. When you set your own goals, keep those five words in mind.

Do the Research

Some companies start up without doing the necessary research. They don’t know what the competition is like. They don’t know who their customers will be. Those companies fail as a result.

One of the plans often used in business coaching is a sales and marketing plan. Established companies use the plans to decide where to best spend their advertising dollars and to create sales goals for their teams.

Where does the information in a sales and marketing plan come from? It comes from research.

You need to know your competition. You need to know about the industry. You need to identify your target audience, those people who are most likely to buy your products or services.

Do the Math

Money is something that all businesses need in order to grow. Once you have defined your goals and done the research, do the math to figure out just how much money you will need to achieve your goals. Then figure out where that money is going to come from.

The basic advice you have just read does not guarantee small business growth but it does give you a starting point. The next step might be individualized coaching.

Business Coaching Program for Leadership Success

Posted by Henry Barbey

Business leadership is about the success of others. A business coaching program can help business leaders elevate their leadership skills to new heights.

Leaders take pride in helping others become successful. When you think about it in that way, you might not think we have many good leaders. Words like selfish, self-absorbed or self-centered might come to mind.

One of the things that you have to do if you want to be a successful leader is to stop looking at how badly others are doing and focus on how well you are doing. Being critical of others is widespread in today’s society. Not too many people take the time to critique their own actions. You might benefit from working with an executive coach if you are about to become a leader. You might also benefit if you are already a leader but you are not sure you are leading effectively.

Coaches can help you do some self-evaluation and help you learn how to evaluate the performance of others. You might need to learn how to give praise along with constructive criticism. A company’s long-term success can only be guaranteed with high quality business leadership, something greatly helped through a business coaching program. Organizations all over the world have started to realize that.

Many organizations are bringing in the executive coach to help improve the quality of their leaders. It is a pro-active decision. Rather than reacting to failure when it comes, they are pro-actively working to prevent failure.

The size of an organization matters. In large organizations, a schematic linking one individual leader to another and another can look like a huge spider’s web. The strength of the web may be weak in areas where the leaders are weak. Small organizations are less complicated but the strength of the company leaders is even more important. In a large organization, leaders can and should help to support each other. When there is only one leader, support can come from an executive coach.

Small businesses seem less likely to turn to professionals for help. Yet the quality of their business leadership could depend on getting the help they need. An executive coach can help with communication skills. Many talented individuals are terrible communicators. While we learn to talk in pre-school, we rarely learn to communicate effectively.

Coaches can also help leaders who are suffering from burnout or dealing with personal crises. Focusing on providing quality business leadership can be difficult for any number of reasons. Regardless of where you are today, you can be in a better place tomorrow if you take advantage of the help that’s available through a business coaching program.