Originally published at nadiashapiro.com
Have you ever wondered what the real secret is behind the change makers, leaders and successful entrepreneurs in the world? How are they able to accomplish so much in what appears to be so little time? How are they able to make such a huge impact on the world around them?
Have you ever considered how people like Oprah Winfrey and Roger Federer got to where they are today? The secret is having a great coach, of course!
Only after twelve failed businesses did I ever consider hiring a business coach. Now, I can’t imagine my business and my life without one. The freedom I have to travel and work wherever I choose came from having an experienced business coach helping me to pave the way.
I was struggling to get any of my businesses off the ground and I just couldn’t get out of my own way. I thought I knew what my clients wanted and needed but I was way off course. I also had self-sabotaging behavior and limiting beliefs that were holding me back time and time again.
In the back of my head I had so much fear and was so afraid I was going to be a failure, that I didn’t try very hard. I was also overwhelmed with all of the day-to-day activities of being an entrepreneur. On top all this stress, I used to have anxiety attack during every tax season.
Finally, I decided to quit being a business owner and go back into corporate America. This was when I landed a job at Stanford University. I had an amazing job and I was successful in my career there, but in the back of my mind I felt like a sell out because I wasn’t doing what I thought I was put here on the planet to do.
That was when I decided to hire my first business coach. I left my cushy job at Stanford University back in 2015 and I haven’t looked back since.
During that time, I got my first taste of having a coach and this allowed me to leave my job. I was able to make more money in my first year of my business because I received clarity on my direction and clear action steps to follow.
I also learnt a lot about what worked for other successful people. I thought I knew it all when it came to making a business thrive, after all I had done it already 12 times before. I quickly found out that I didn’t know as much as I thought I did.
If we look at some of the most successful entrepreneurs in the world, we will find that there is a brilliant coach behind every one of them, pushing and driving them to break past all their barriers and limiting beliefs.
Successful people like Oprah Winfrey, Bill Clinton, Bill Gates, Phil Mickelson and even Barack Obama have all used a business coach on a regular basis to help them with their business and career advancements.
What Can A Business Coach Offer?
A different perspective — Your business coach will not look at your business the same way that you do because everyone’s brain is wired differently. Your coach may see a problem or an issue you’re having in a totally different way and may offer a solution you will most likely never have thought of.
New Ideas — As the well known saying goes “sometimes two heads are better than one’. Your coach may provide ideas that you have never entertained before or she may come up with an idea that you’ve dismissed in the past because you didn’t think it was worthy of further consideration. You may have thought the idea was a little silly so you never even mentioned it to anyone who may have persuaded you otherwise.
A breakthrough in performance that you never thought was possible — Let’s face it, you’re busy working in your business and are used to doing certain processes the same way and generally don’t think about whether these processes could be done differently or more efficiently. A business coach can look at how you’re doing things and offer new suggestions on how you can streamline some of your procedures to increase your business’s productivity.
Remove limiting beliefs — We all have certain belief systems especially around what we can and can’t do. Your business coach will help you to identify any beliefs that may be holding you back and help you to change your way of thinking so that you can move forward to far greater success than you previously believed was possible.
Motivation — Every successful entrepreneur has times when his or her motivation is not at the most optimum level. This is just human nature. Your business coach can provide you with the motivation even when you don’t feel like doing what you need to do to move forward.
Accountability — Have you ever had moments when you knew you should get a certain task done but decided to leave it for tomorrow? What if getting that task done immediately could have provided a breakthrough or helped you find a great new client? With a business coach, you’ll be held accountable for completing your tasks and projects on time. Being accountable to someone eliminates the ability to make excuses as to why you’ve not done a certain task and allows your mind to reshape the way it thinks about the necessary tasks on hand. It will also help you to effectively create a list of priorities which ultimately will make your work more efficient.
Help you to see your vision and create a clear pathway to achieving it — In business it’s vitally important to have two things firmly in place. The big picture or ultimate goal and a clear road map on how to get there. Now you may already have your vision firmly planted in your mind but have you mapped out your road map step-by-step so that you know exactly how to achieve that vision? A business coach can help you to put all of this down on paper so that finally you’ll have a clear direction of where you’re heading and exactly how to get there.
Gain clarity — Sometimes we face a problem or an issue and no matter how we look at it, we just can’t find a way to solve it. Your business coach can help you gain clarity by helping you to look at solutions you may never have thought of. On the other hand, you may have a number of new ideas but are unsure of which one would provide the greatest impact on your business. With clever guidance, your coach will be able to help you decide on the best idea to go ahead with.
Develop a successful mindset — Having the right mindset is vitally important for any business person who wants to be successful and grow their business into a thriving venture. A business coach is well trained in what that mindset should be and will help you to develop yours so that your thinking is fully aligned with achieving the success you want.
Break through plateaus — There will always be times when your business can become a little stagnant. Things are just moving along at an even pace but your business is not growing or moving forward. Your business coach can help you to identify these plateau times and make suggestions on things you can do to push forward to more growth.
Help you to gain a level of performance that you never thought was possible — Because we all have a certain amount of limiting beliefs, we quite often, unconsciously, set an invisible glass ceiling for our business growth. A business coach can help you to identify where you’ve set these limits and suggest ways to break through them. After all, you don’t know what you don’t know!
Some of the entrepreneurs I’ve worked with had already reached a certain level of success but they needed to break through their own limits to achieve more success and make a greater impact with their business.
Consider the highest paid athletes in the world like Rafael Nadal, LeBron James, Roger Federer, Phil Mickelson, Kobe Bryant and Tiger Woods. They all have one thing in common and that is that they all have a coach who helps and guides them to achieve the success they aspire to in their respective sports. You’re unlikely to ever find any of the top athletes in the world doing it alone.
The Oprah Winfrey Story.
Consider too, the story of Oprah Winfrey who is one of the 400 richest people in America and fondly labelled as the ‘queen of daytime TV’. Her rags to riches story is no secret but her determination to succeed and her ability to seek out mentors and coaches to help and guide her along the way is a true testament to how having a coach can help anyone achieve the success that he or she desires.
Born into poverty, Oprah spent the first few years of her life living with her grandmother on a farm in rural Mississippi. Her grandmother became ill when Oprah was 6 years old and she was forced to live with her single mother in a boarding house in Milwaukee where she experienced extreme poverty and was made to wear dresses made out of potato sacks.
By the time she was 14 years old, she had been raped numerous times by male members of her family but finally ran away and went to live with her father in Nashville, Tennessee.
That was the catalyst that started Oprah on her journey to success as her father became her first coach providing structure, discipline and direction for the young girl. She quickly became an honor roll student at the East Nashville High School and managed to secure a full scholarship to Tennessee State University.
At age 19, however, she decided to leave college early to pursue her career in media for which she had developed a passion while still in high school.
After various gigs as a news anchor and morning show host, she finally achieved her dream by turning the Chicago morning show “AM Chicago” into “The Oprah Winfrey Show”.
In 1986 she founded Harpo Productions and her company went on to produce other top shows such as Dr. Phil and Rachael Ray. Oprah has also been involved in movies, plays and television series and was nominated for Best Supporting Actress” for her role in “The Color Purple”.
She makes no secret of the fact that she had a number of successful mentors and coaches along the way who helped to guide her and shape her incredibly successful career.
Other Successful Influencers Who Have Coaches.
One of the top entrepreneurs of all time and founder of Microsoft, Bill Gates also had a business coach. In fact, in the opening of his TED speech which he gave in April 2013 he firmly states that “everyone needs a coach”. He went on to say that “We all need people to give us feedback. That’s how we improve”.
Gary Vaynerchuk is one of the world’s leading marketing experts and a coach himself, but in 2014 he needed to improve his health and lifestyle choices, so he hired a full time health coach and lost 22 pounds in 90 days.
Even Elon Musk, founder and CEO of Tesla has the need for a coach to help and guide him to get more meaning from his life and to also achieve contentment in his personal life.
And then there’s the late Steve Jobs, founder and CEO of Apple. He was coached by Bill Campbell, one of the most influential figures in Silicon Valley and previously Vice Chairman of Intuit.
I think by now, you can understand the value and necessity of having a business coach to help and guide you to achieve your greatest potential. A coach will help you to get out of your own way and gently drive you toward what you want to achieve as well as help you to identify your ultimate goal and create a solid road map to achieve that vision.
With the help of a business coach you’ll be able to eliminate any limiting beliefs that you may have and find solutions to problems or issues that you may never have thought of on your own.
Why not join the ranks of other successful entrepreneurs, influencers and top world athletes by engaging your own business coach. You’ll certainly be glad you did!
To learn more about Nadia Shapiro and her coaching programs, please visit www.nadiashapiro.com
Originally published at medium.com