July 15, 2019
MY COACHING EXPERIENCE AS AN EVENT PLANNER
“I slept and I dreamed that life is all joy. I woke and I saw that life is all service. I served and saw that service is joy.” Kahlil Gibran
My coaching experience has been phenomenal. Life as an entrepreneur for me has been a great experience of highs and lows, ups and downs, successes and losses too but it has made me a better person, a better entrepreneur! It has brought out the best in me, as a business woman, as an employer and as a leader. When I got my coach, John Hoover, a coach with The Coach Initiative (based in the United States of America) I did not know what to expect. Today, I believe I have been empowered to know that whatever I set my goal to do, I can and will achieve.
As a beneficiary of coaching I have enjoyed the benefits of consistent support and regular accountability while working with an inquisitive partner who ensured that I work towards achieving my set customized goals and then generated organic approaches to meeting them. Coaching from my experience, helps you meet and exceed your mission goals. At the beginning of the year I had a business strategy in place, an action plan which I was determined would help me achieve our company mission. “To promote client success and satisfaction by providing the highest level of service, fulfilling client wishes and keeping them ahead of their competition.”
Initially whenever we held our sessions, I would always begin with my problems “…John I was supposed to meet this target, but I have only met 15%. Why have I failed?” I would ask, until I realized that he was not supposed to be my consultant but a coach. When I realized that my coach was supposed to become a partner in assisting to make me (the client) achieve my goals and move towards it. For example, my coach has evoked my brilliance in managing the human resource of both my staff when we are on site during an event and managing participants at a workshop or conference and ensure that as my customers (internal and external) they remain happy and satisfied.
Coaching has helped me evaluate my performance at the job place against my work plan and my coach has acted as my cheer leader, champion, sounding board, truth- telling voice focused on following up what I had shared with him, I would achieve before our next meeting session. When I fail to meet my targets my coach encourages me telling me he knows I can do it and I will do it. I have discovered that setting these targets and working towards achieving them before our next meeting has in the short run enabled me to meet over 80% of my action plan for this year!!
Many a time my coach emphasizes through his questions of my work, the need to do things differently to catch the eye of new customers and also to keep my customers loyal to doing business with them.
It is not all work without play. I share my hobbies with my coach and this has brought out another side of me. I have discovered about myself and feel compelled to do.i.e giving back to those less privileged than I am. My coach, made requests to my inner self which have stretched me to move out of my comfort zone and move forward efficiently. I am into teaching the youth and specifically women in my community who are interested in becoming entrepreneurs, sharing my 16 years’ experience as a successful business woman doing event planning both as a business and also as a volunteer.
