Here is the first of the early reviews of The Complete Woman’s Manifesto:

“Corry – this is so beautifully written! It speaks right to the heart and soul of women everywhere.
You have written very thoughtfully from your true authentic voice. Brava! Thank you so much for sharing this with me. I am inspired to reflect even more deeply on my true purpose. ” Jan Marie Dore, Toronto

I hope you enjoy the Manifesto and that you post your feedback, insights and questions right here on this blog. The full introduction of The Complete Woman’s Manifesto is on The Manifesto page of this blog so feel free to click through and have a look.

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When to call the coach
Helping business people is a growth industry, but it’s little regulated

By Alison MacGregor, The Gazette June 5, 2010
Photo: Business coach Lisa Chandler speaks with client Marie-Claude Pelletier.
Photograph by: Phil Carpenter, The Gazette

Marie-Claude Pelletier was in a quandary.

After 11 years, her company, Les Effrontes, had built up a loyal clientele in the Montreal area -its “army of professionals” was busy helping people overhaul their wardrobes and polishing their looks.

Her thoughts were turning to expansion. But how?

Should she build on her local reputation by opening a beauty salon adjoining her elegant Ste. Catherine St. location? Should she expand into a regional centre like Sherbrooke or Quebec City? Or should she go for broke and open an office in Toronto or the Big Apple?

In stepped Lisa Chandler, a coach specializing in entrepreneurs with established small to medium-size businesses.

Montreal is home to scores of business coaches like Chandler, offering guidance on a variety of such topics as leadership, marketing, senior executive skills, social networking and starting a small business.

It’s a sector that has enjoyed solid growth during the last 20 years and seems poised to grow even more as the practice is more widely adopted.

Instead of telling Pelletier what to do, Chandler acted like a personal sounding board, throwing out hard questions that helped Pelletier draw conclusions.

“It’s about listening at a level much deeper than what most people are used to,” Chandler said.

She challenges clients’ assumptions by “asking powerful questions that lead (clients) to their own insights.”

What’s stopping you? What can you tolerate? What do you want more of ? What do you need to know in order to say yes to the thing that you want?”

The coaching experience is “not ‘touchyfeely,’ ” Pelletier said with a laugh. “I didn’t want any of that.”

Instead she likened her coach to “a mirror that talks.”

Unlike counselling, which focuses on self-examination and reflection, coaching is about finding out what needs to be done to solve a problem or reach a goal -then going out and doing it.

Between sessions, coaches and clients usually communicate with each other. A client is expected to complete assignments and provide updates -usually through email, these days -while the coach monitors the client’s progress.

If a client refuses to engage in the process, the coach has the option of firing him or her.

The Quebec branch of the International Coach Federation, the international organization that oversees the independent certification of coaches, estimates that there are about 250 certified coaches in Quebec.

Clients range from senior executives to budding entrepreneurs.

Hourly rates typically range from around $250 to $350 an hour, but can go to $500 and up for senior executive coaching.

Government financial aid programs have encouraged growth, such as an Emploi Quebec program that subsidizes about 50 per cent of the cost of business coaching.

As everywhere, globalization and technological change have helped fuel the boom.

While coaching can be a positive experience, the industry is self-regulated, so unqualified people can promote themselves as business coaches.

There is “still a little of the Wild West” in the sector, said Jim Gavin, co-director of the professional and personal coaching certification program at Concordia University.

“It’s an industry in its infancy,” he said. While there are “a lot of great people,” there are also “a lot of people hanging out a shingle.”

Peter Vogopoulos, 39, a Montrealbased marketing coach, agreed. He runs Marketing for Real Results and has been working as a full-time coach for almost three years.

“More and more people out there are calling themselves coaches, and it can be difficult for consumers to discern what makes a great coach,” he said.

He pointed out that not all coaches have the same background and experience. Vogopoulos has engineering and MBA degrees and worked for several years as a consultant before becoming a coach.

“We don’t need to be subject-matter experts,” he said, “but having (a) richer background and experience just makes you a better coach because you have stuff to draw from.”

Jo-Anne Duquette, head of the Federation internationale des coaches du Quebec, suggested that one way for clients to protect themselves is to look for a certified coach on the website of the International Coaching Federation (ICF).

She also suggested potential clients meet with at least one or two coaches to make sure they find the right person.

“You need to have a good match,” she said.

Concordia’s Gavin said that even if someone is certified by the ICF and has numerous qualifications, it does not mean that the person is the right coach for a certain client.

Being certified is not the sole criterion, nor is it always necessary, he said.

“Someone can be certified, but only have a limited number of hours of classroom training or client training,” he said. “One hundred hours is a drop in the bucket.”

A business coach who has worked as a CEO in the non-profit sector, for example, would have a lot of insight into how organizations work, he said.

He suggested looking for someone who has an “extensive amount of relevant experience and training relevant to you and the issues you are dealing with.”

He also suggested asking for a trial interview -which is often free -to sample the coaching method and determine if the coach is someone you can work with.

When a coach and client work well together, they can produce excellent results.

“The coach is someone who provides insights and perspective and enables the executive to take different angles on the reality that they are confronting,” Gavin said. “So that they are pulled out of the typical lens or typical ways they engage in working or dealing with certain problems.”

Coaches can also help with the challenge of family-work balance.

“For an entrepreneur, that is a hell of a balance,” said Alain Theriault, 49, an entrepreneur and start-up coach who ran the entrepreneurship centre at the HEC for nine years before branching out on his own.

“When I work with my clients, I am making sure that they focus on their strengths so that they aren’t scattered all over the place,” he said.

“Entrepreneurs have a tendency to jump on every kind of business opportunity that comes up. It’s kind of an ADD personality” that we find a lot in entrepreneurs.”

And the biggest issue is “the continuous tango dance between the professional and the personal issues.”

And coaching isn’t always kind.

“Sometimes people need to hear something that they don’t want to hear,” said Vogopoulos, but he always tries to be nice about it.

Chandler, who is helping Pelletier wrestle with her choices, said keeping clients on track is a big part of her job.

A certified business coach with a Masters in Education, Chandler, 40, often finds herself pointing out: “You keep saying that you want to do this, but you are spending your time on this … How does this add up?”

As for Pelletier, she is working on her expansion plans for Les Effrontes and continues to meet with Chandler every two weeks.

She has decided that Quebec was too small to take her business to the level she wants and that if she wants to play in the big leagues, she needs to jump into a bigger market like Toronto or New York City.

“(Chandler) tells me things like, ‘You talked about this for two weeks and you have not progressed,’” Pelletier said with a smile. “She makes me reflect on what I want to do -she keeps me focused.”

Websites of interest:

Les Effrontes

Emploi Quebec

Chandler Coaches

Alain Theriault

Marketing for real results

International Coach Federation

Quebec International Coach Federation

For live links and to read the artilce in The Gazette online: http://www.montrealgazette.com/business/When+call+coach/3116144/story.html#ixzz0simJv5lw

© Copyright (c) The Montreal Gazette

Read more: http://www.montrealgazette.com/business/When+call+coach/3116144/story.html#ixzz0siiKiTtH

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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u6XAPnuFjJc

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I watched the video and think that he touches on many important points. One thing that comes through so strongly is that his bold and straight talk are starkly  juxtaposed to the depth and complexity of the issues that he broaches.

Sniper journalism, if I may coin a phrase.

The issues that he snipes at are, in and of themselves, symptoms of a deeper societal problem. To vaccinate or not to vaccinate? We can find doctors and scientists on both sides of the issue. Who do we trust?

Organic food or not organic? We put dinner on the table and hope there are more nutrients in the meal than poisons.
We hope that our purchases support the economy and do not lead to the corporate monopolization of farming, the pollution of the earth, the bankruptcy of farmers. We hope that our purchases create jobs and not the exploitation of workers, or the abuse of animals.

Michael, thanks for sticking up for science but does your educated and intelligent audience really needed to be reminded of scientific valour?

The deep societal problem is that we are over exposed to information and under exposed to knowledge. We are over exposed to opinions and underexposed to wisdom. There are so many experts out there yet so few viable solutions. In our consumer society we must be mindful of each purchase we make because a purchase has impact and a purchase is an endorsement. What do you endorse?

If you are interested in posts like this one, you should visit:

http://www.designingtransformation.com/2010/04/14/michael-specter-the-danger-of-science-denial

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The restaurant saga ends happily. After I posted the story here and fed it into face book, twitter and linked-in, you can well imagine that it stirred up quite a few comments! Following the post, I wrote to the establishment and advised them that if they would like to learn of our recent experience, they could visit my blog and I provided the link. That very day, I received a return e-mail thanking me for the link and that they would find out more on their side and get back to me. Here is the reply that I received:
“Sorry for the little delay but we wanted to make sure we understood what happened and were curious to know how the restaurant management interpreted the situation.
After our research, it became clear to us the restaurant did not understood our policies. There should not have been any issues getting plates to your kids as they do not eat enough to justify even a kid’s meal. I understand, having 3, and when younger, my wife and I used to do this a lot for our kids.Anyway we will follow up with the restaurant to make sure they understand the reasoning so it can respond properly next time.
In the mean time, I would humbly ask for your home address so I can send you a little gesture of appreciation for helping us getting better.”

WOW! This response is an intelligent and professional one:
He showed initiative and leadership
He was prompt and calm in tone and vocabulary
He took the time to find out both sides of the story
He showed understanding of the client’s point of view
He gets extra points because he supports his staff and explains that it was just lack of clarity around policy
He outlines steps to be taken to improve
He states appreciation for the feedback because it offered an opportunity to improve

This is inspirational leadership. I will remember this scenario in a positive way and if ever I am in a similar situation, my intention will be to do as this man did.
What else do you like about the professionalism and leadership that this business person showed? How can you use this example in your own business? 

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Thanks for your comments about my recent post entitled “When is losing a client good for business?” .  I have advised the restaurant in question of the post so lets wait and see if they have anything to say. Stay tuned!

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Tell me what you think about this. Last night my husband and I decided to take the kids out for an early supper  to a local restaurant where we eat quite often. We ordered our usual which was two meals that we would share between the 4 of us. We order this way because our kids are still too little to eat entire portions.  The menu that we ordered from was the weeknight special…two meals for just over $20.

Our waiter told us that we were not allowed to share meals with the kids and that is why they have a kids menu.  We explained that we had been dining there since they  opened and always ordered this way.

This was clearly out of the waiter’s hands so the manager got involved. After hearing us out, he confirmed that we could not share meals and that if we wanted a smaller portion, we could order from the kids menu.  I said that if that was the case, we  would feed the kids but we would not be back. The manager said that was fine by him. We fed the kids and in protest, did not order anything for ourselves.

That evening our bill came to $41 compared the $80-$100 that we usually spend there. We estimate that we ate there about a dozen times last year. We will not go back .

Did the manager make the right decision to ‘fire’ us as clients? Do people like us who go to restaurants before 6pm, with children, on weeknights and spend between $80 and $100.00 cost restaurants more than we are worth? Was it  a good business decision  for a manager to send away a family when the dining room was empty?

I would love to hear your opinion.

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1. acknowledged their error
2. declared responsibility
3. private and public apologizes were made
4. showed remorse by explaining themselves
5. explained what they have learned from it
6. offered to resign to show they meant it

On the part of the individual who was the subject of the error

1. She accepted the apology, but not the resignations
2. Did not condone the behaviour but noted that it was their opinion
3. Expressed her point of view in the context of the criticism
4. Declared it was time to drop it, move on, and get back to work as a team
5. Signed off in a positive way

I am so impressed by these ladies I want to cheer and hug them! Each of them behaved like true leaders and it is such a privilege to serve with them.

We all make mistakes, we all have lapses in judgement, say and do things we regret. It is very normal to speak more directly and bluntly when there is no one present who will be hurt by the lack of tact. Most of us choose our words and approach very carefully when not to do so would result in insulting, hurting or showing disrespect to someone. This is normal. We must allow ourselves and others our humanity and all the flaws and virtues that come with the human experience.

When it comes to genuine human error like the scenario above, we must accept that no one is immune to it. Our mark of leadership is revealed by the way we behave after the mistake is made.

When my next turn comes to make a mistake I hope I have the courage and wisdom to follow the actions of my peers.

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Coach Buffet, a brand new concept in business coaching is open for business thanks to my colleague, Lisa Chandler of Chandler Coaches. I welcome Lisa as my guest blogger today to share her very special announcement.  To help spread the news about this exciting development in the coaching world,  I will be featuring Lisa’s articles on my blog during the run up to the special event on October 15. 

 May I also take this space to share that I am one of the coaches who will be present at this event so I hope to see you there.

What’s a Coach Buffet Anyway?

 by Lisa Chandler M.Sc. CPCC, ACC, Certified Business and Life Coach

I have been dropping hints all summer about a new coaching concept my friend and colleague Tanya Geisler and I have been developing.  So it is with great joy and anticipation that I let the proverbial cat out of the bag. The “cat” is a concept called Coach Buffet and it’s coming soon to a city near you…well, if you live in Montreal or Toronto, Canada, that is. 

On October 15th, we will host Coach Buffet in Montreal followed by Coach Buffet Toronto on November 17th.  I could leave you to research it it on your own but I am far too enthused to let you go so quickly. 

The bottom-line version is that Coach Buffet is an innovative event that is designed to bring a dozen powerful life and business coaches together with participants for meaningful one-on-one coaching conversations in a social evening format.

Coach Buffet is ideal for professionals and business owners who feel stuck in some aspect of business, career or life in general and who are looking for possibilities.

For Montreal, our line up of coaches is extraordinary (by mid September, you can read all their bios on the site) and our venue is exquisite.  I can assure you that powerful coaching will take place and strong relationships will form. As we say at Coach Buffet:

We are serving possibility….Are you hungry??

Limited spaces for Montreal. Click here to register for Montreal

Limited spaces for Toronto. Click here to register for Toronto

ps: sorry for my wonky header on my blog. I tried to to ad an application and it all went wrong so now I am waiting for my web guy to get back from vacation to save the day!

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