I work with many small business owners. Most often they're professionals offering services. A lot of them are "solo-preneurs." Some are launching a new business and want to start off right. Something many of them have in common is being REALLY good at what they do -- but their focus is on their work with clients, not running every aspect of a business.

Pretty much anything related to growing or starting a business! I've helped people with marketing, including issues such as message, niche identification, or focus, and which methods to use and how. Working with start-ups from the beginning has helped owners tremendously.

I've helped owners greatly improve operations efficiency and profitability; Helped them learn how to hire and never make a mistake again (really); Purchasing a business; Strategic planning; Prioritization and time management; Sales training and management, and more.

Related to careers, I've helped people successfully find and interview into new positions, negotiate compensation, even decide on and enter new fields.

I've worked a lot with managers and other leaders who weren't the owners. These kinds of roles can also be tremendously lonely and many of these people find having a coach who's not on their org chart, who's impartial, yet firmly on their side, is something that makes a huge difference in outcomes and their own satisfaction -- and also boosts their career options.

That's an overview, I haven't found many issues I can't help with significantly so far. Schedule a complimentary Discovery session and we can discuss specifics!

Absolutely! I've worked with managers at all levels employed with most of the large corporations (and some non-profits) with operations in this area. This reminds me to mention that location is not a factor in working with someone since we usually meet by phone or video conference.

Yes! I have helped many people successfully find their next job, or, do a complete career change. My clients typically make those transitions faster, with less stress, and often for higher compensation, than they would trying to do it alone.

Usually, we meet by phone for about an hour every two weeks, over a period of 3-6 months. The duration of our work is completely up to the client, sometimes we work on one project and they're done, other times the client wants to shift our focus to another project after we finish the first one. I do not force my clients to sign a contract for a pre-determined period. They're in the driver's seat.

By "coach" I mean someone who works WITH their clients, not a guru delivering words of wisdom from "on high" to their poor clients, and not an ineffectual motivational speaker-type who tries to keep people pumped up but never seems to deliver results. Just giving advice is useless -- or worse than useless -- which is what some so-called consultants do (though not the best ones).

I work as a partner with my clients, and they're the experts on their situation, what they want, what they've tried, what they're good at, what they're not good at, etc.

We work together to be clear about their goals, then, every session, to together produce a clear, workable action plan they can actually do, which is carefully crafted to move them forward measurably. They usually report that they're seeing progress almost from our very first meeting.

You'll usually meet with me for an hour every two weeks. During that hour we check in and find out the progress you made on the action steps we created in our previous session, what you learned, what you want to improve next time, etc. Then, we move on to what specifically you want to work on in this session. Once we've defined that and the outcome that'd be most helpful to you, we start looking at that issue from all the relevant angles and working towards creating 1-3 action steps you can and will take over the time before our next meeting. We distill the million distracting possible things you could do into just the most important 1-3 you have to undertake immediately, giving you clarity and motivation. We make sure that what we end up with meets the goal you set for our session, adjust if needed, and that's it! We make sure you get what you want and need to meet the goals that are important to YOU.

That's a great question! I offer you this session because I've found most people have never experienced true professional coaching, so they don't know what it is, how it works, or what it can produce for them. And they obviously haven't worked with me before.

The "discovery" call is for you -- to give you the opportunity to actually experience a real coaching session so you know what it is and can create for you, and also, to give you enough of an experience to be able to decide whether or not you'd like to do that work with me specifically. So, you'll come to the end of that session with valuable insights and specific action steps you can use. Even if we decide not to work together, you'll get something valuable to take away.

It's pretty common for people to get to the end of the call feeling amazed at the progress they made in just that one hour on an issue they've been dealing with for a very long time.

I don't feel the need to "sell" people on coaching with me, they decide for themselves before the end of this session if working with me is going to be valuable to them.

What sets coaching apart from other similar professions is its focus on enabling and supporting action undertaken by the client. Coaching is about helping the client be clear about their goals and then doing those specific activities that move them measurably towards realizing those goals.

This makes coaching different from other fields. Consultants typically are paid to come in as outsiders and just give the client advice. If a client wants someone else to do some specific project for them they hire a contractor. Sometimes a person just isn't ready, or doesn't want, or is unable to take action. Someone in that situation might get more help from a counselor.

So, if someone only wants to talk about possibilities, or if they expect the coach to tell them what their goals should be; if they want the coach to do the action steps for them; or if they need some serious emotional healing before they're able to take action, then until something changes, they're probably not a good fit to work with a coach.