Your Goals, Your Agenda: How Productivity Coaching Works
Recently, I was explaining coaching to a prospective new client, and thankfully what I was saying to them was mostly what they thought coaching was. But only mostly. They were pleasantly surprised to find out what coaching could really entail for them.
In the interest of my recently shared goal of “Explaining Productivity Coaching Better This Summer”, let’s get to it!
A few weeks ago, I talked about the Coachability Self Test that I have available on my website for people to fill out if they’re interested in learning more about themselves and about coaching. As I follow up with people after the Self-Test, I share my Coaching Intake Form. It’s a two page form, but my favorite questions are:
What are your two biggest challenges?
What do you want to have happen in this coaching relationship?
Who is the powerful person you are becoming (future self)?
How do you get in your way (habits and behaviors that keep you from getting what you want)?
There are no wrong or right answers. Because working through coaching, working with a coach, working with me on your productivity and organizing - it starts with awareness.
Awareness of where you are currently. Awareness of how you want your life to be different, perhaps how you might like to be different. Where you are today versus where you want to be. Coaching is the vehicle, the train, the way to get you there.
I mentioned the Gap a few weeks ago, the difference between where you are today and where you want to be. There’s no recrimination that there is a gap. It is not an indication that you are somehow less than, that you have done anything wrong or even NOT done something. So let’s park any of the negative self-talk at the door, and agree that every one of us can seek growth and progress.
But - we have to know where we are and where we want to be. When we talk about coaching, we have an overarching goal for the process, and then we also show up with topics per session that move us toward that goal.
Imagine with me, depending on your learning style, a vision in your mind, or a feeling you want to have, or a tangible item you want to achieve, like an award, that reminds you of your goal and where you want to be and, and what you want to achieve, right? That is the Goal. Then we figure out what are the steps, the things we need to do or learn or accomplish to have that vision or feeling or thing. We can ask what sort of support do we need? What tools? What do we need to learn about? What is it that can get us from where we are to where we want to be? And those become our session topics.
I hold on to these goals with you, and then I can hold on to the topics with you, too. This is your Coaching Agenda. And in my conversations with my clients, I always have those in mind for them.
As an aside - if you have issues with the word goals, call them something else. I had someone say to me just the other day that they don’t like the word goals. I asked if they have milestones in life they would like to achieve and they said “Yes, Of Course”! And that is a goal, friends. Call them whatever you want.
We figure out where we are, we think about where we want to be in life some day, we recognize that the two points are different, and we think about how to get from here to there. Sounds simple, right?
I have described my writing process to all of you before - I verbally record my content, have it transcribed into digital text so that I can write an article. Then I read the article, adding personal flair and info and that is my podcast.
I am saying all of this because this article was inching up to twice as long as it should be, so I am pausing right here and editing like crazy.
Instead of all the other things I thought I wanted to write about, let’s make this all about you, as it should be.
Coaching or not, working with me or not:
What do you want to see in your life?
If you could wave a wand, what would you change?
If a genie offered three wishes, what would they be?! (and no, no wishing for more wishes)
I can’t grant millions of dollars, dream homes, fame and fortune. I’m a productivity coach, right, let’s keep it in our lane.
Those questions from my intake form:
What do you want to have happen in this coaching relationship?
Who is the powerful person you are becoming (future self)?
What are your two biggest challenges?
How do you get in your way (habits and behaviors that keep you from getting what you want)?
And from my recent article, Redefining typical, what challenges do you repeatedly encounter? Or what problems do you repeatedly have to solve?
Recent examples of Client Goals are:
Make healthy and long-lasting changes to improve my quality of life.
Manage my home and personal life better, so that I can focus on work while I am at work and grow in my profession.
Get more organized in our home to set better examples for my children / teach my kids to be organized.
Be more productive given my new ADHD diagnosis.
Make adjustments to better function given my recent and now chronic medical issues.
Get more productive with home and work to make more time for my hobby / potential side hustle.
Improve my decision making skills because I feel like I am stuck.
Get better at disconnecting work time from personal time.
(more organizing specific) I want to get my house ready for a new puppy.
I want to talk through the process of an upcoming remodel, identifying steps and tasks and the order and time line for those steps and tasks.
Manage anxiety better in the time of Covid by getting affairs in order and getting better at finishing projects
Set goals and use them to better prioritize my work from day to day.
Do you see yourself in any of these examples?
And, once we know the goal, what might the coaching session topic look like?
What tools do I have to manage my To-Do list, and how do I choose which one to use?
Who are the supportive people in my life that can help me make the changes I want to make?
I think working on my morning routine would be a good place to start my wellness journey.
What are some routines I can complete or habits I can create that would help me reach my goals?
What do I need to learn more about, to reach my goal?
Here’s a specific and also very fictional example: Let’s say your goal is to level up your business and increase sales by 20% in the next six months. Cool. And as I also said in a recent article, I don’t need to know your industry to help you with that.
This is a productivity goal, and it’s a SMART goal, meaning it is Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant and Time-Bound.
If this was your goal, as we meet every week or two weeks or every month, you would identify session topics that will help you meet this goal and we work through them.
Some of your session topics might be:
Motivation is sometimes a struggle for me, how can I keep motivated? What makes this goal important to me now?
I think I need to create a budget, but I have never been successful at using one before. What are habits and routines I can create to help me check in on and use a budget more successfully?
Who is on the team, and how do we all work towards this goal together?
I know that taking on this goal will mean I am going to be working longer hours. How do I incorporate better selfcare to help me succeed and avoid burnout?
I need to talk through what needs to be included in my income statement so I can get an idea of what an increase in 20% in sales would be.
What makes this goal important to me now?
Setting your goals and determining your steps and tasks and therefore topics is the way to make progress from where you are to where you want to be.
