Coaches often tell me that they’ve been unofficially coaching for much of their lives before they took coach training. That was true for me as well.
During University, my work study job was Peer Counseling and I loved it!
In my last job as marketing director of a testing laboratory, my colleagues would seek me out, wanting a sounding board.
It got to be that sometimes I couldn’t get my work done and I joked about putting up a sign on my door that said The Doctor Is NOT in. But in my heart those types of conversations were thrilling to me.
Has coaching always been in your blood too?
There’s another trait you need to be a top notch coach … to be coachable.
Not every coach is coachable.
Let’s talk about 6 behaviors of the coachable and 5 behaviors of the un-coachable.
What Does Being Coach-able Look Like?
Coach-able coaches understand what it’s like to be on that side of the table. They know that it takes humility and a great desire to grow to be coached.
How do you know if you are coach-able?
Can you:
- Share your truth?
- Take in feedback/observations about you given in good faith?
- Run it through your integrity?
- Make a shift in mindset?
- Take action on behalf of the shift?
- Be held accountable?
These things are a large part of what coaching is about. Our goal with clients is for them to become more self-aware and develop a growth mindset so they can take leaps towards what they want while releasing mindsets and habits that are in the way.
If that kind of progress doesn’t happen over time with a client, coaching isn’t really happening.
I was once taught and still believe it … if you aren’t coachable you won’t be a good coach yourself. It’s one reason why coach training organizations pair up two coaching students to coach each other.
Being coach-able requires vulnerability and the ability to self reflect. You have to be able to tell the truth and receive feedback as well as look inside yourself for your own wisdom guided by powerful questions from your coach.
You must believe that other people can help you on your own evolutionary path. And you have to allow transformation to happen.
Being coachable also requires you to stop being at the effect of your life and set intention to be at the cause of your life.
5 Ways Coaches Show Up As Un-coachable
Have you ever met someone so self sufficient and closed in their thinking that they cannot be told anything that will move them towards growth?
Occasionally, I meet someone who truly want to coach others who does not seem to be coachable themselves. It shows up as CONSISTENT:
- Resistance
- Know it all responses
- Lack of vulnerability
- Lack of self awareness, and
- Lack of accountability
Everyone at some time resembles these things. It’s when someone consistently shows up in these 5 ways that can reveal an inability to be coached.
So if you want to become a better coach, try becoming more coachable.
8 Ways to Become More Coachable
- Be curious about yourself
- Develop a growth mindset
- Strengthen your integrity
- Be willing to be challenged
- Take responsibility for your feelings, decisions and actions
- Question what you think you know
- Become more compassionate
- Do what you say you’ll do
You’ll see your coaching improve and your life as well!