No kind of formal coaching certification is required to call yourself a life coach.  Is that a problem?  I never thought so.  But recently in the news there have been two horrific events in our profession.  One was a sex scandal involving sexual abuse of a client by someone calling himself a life coach.  The other was the tragedy of three people dying because they stayed in a sweat lodge unmonitored and beyond endurance at the exhortation, although not command, of a well respected coach.  So what do we do to protect ourselves and our clients?   Is coaching certification a solution?

Would coaching certification help?

.

There would certainly be some benefits to requiring coaching certification for life coaches.  It would set a minimum standard of knowledge.  It would provide a formal code of conduct and possibly some level of legal status and protection.  It would also require some demonstrated level of expertise.  All of these are valuable safeguards.  And in fact there are several organizations and experienced master coaches that offer certification either as general life coaches or in a specific method.  JTS Advisors, for instance, offers a Master Coach Certification, which includes extensive training and experience in three discrete branches of coaching and which teaches, expects and reinforces the highest level of integrity in both staff and trainees.

Coaching certification is a double-edged sword

.

If coaching certification were to be legally required in order to coach, how could that possibly be monitored?  Coaches work in so many different ways, so many different fields.  Would the business coach get the same certification as the relationship coach? Who would be allowed to take the certification and who excluded based, for instance, on a criminal record?  Many people become coaches because they have recovered from some problem or situation which might preclude them from even being eligible to be certified.   Would we want to exclude the ex-con who wants to help at risk young people avoid prison but has a criminal record?  What about a recovering alcoholic who killed someone in a DUI and now can speak with credibility to others who are at risk of causing a similar tragedy?  And none of this addresses the issue of international coaching certification.  With the internet,  the availability of skype, and cheap international telephone communication, we can coach and be coached anywhere in the world.  There is no way to regulate that, so what is the point of trying to regulate and certify coaches on a national or a state basis?

While there are some obvious pluses to requiring coaching certification for life coaches, I believe it is not a very practical option.  Voluntary training and certification, definitely. But required?  I just don’t see it.  That’s my opinion.  What’s yours?

Dorine G Kramer
JTS Advisors Strategy and Accountability Coach

Technorati Tags: Coaching Certification

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

Coaching Certification Coaching Certification

Coaching certification is great, but do you need to be certified to be a life coach? What reasons are there for getting a coaching certification? These are great questions to ask if you want to be a life coach. One popular reason to get coaching certification would be to learn coaching techniques. Another reason would be to help your prospects believe you are qualified to coach them. Yet another reason could be that you believe you will get more clients than someone who does not have a certification. All of those reasons seem pretty good, but let’s look at them more closely. Are they really true? Do you need to be certified to be a life coach?

Do You Need To Be Certified To Be A Life Coach? Just Any Coaching Certification Course Will Not Be A Quick Fix

.

A lot of people take coaching certification courses because they believe it works just like going to college and getting a career. However, there are some problems with looking at coaching that way. While some people see going to college, getting a degree and then getting a job as a measure of success, in life coaching you would need a lot more than one client to be considered a success. Not only should you take a look at what other life coaches have done to be successful, but also ask yourself what do you need to be a certified life coach who considers himself to be successful.

Do You Need To Be Certified To Be A Life Coach? Only Get A Coaching Certification After Finding Out Which One Paying Clients Expect You To Have

.

When I get asked the question, “Do you need to be certified to be a life coach?,” I respond by asking why one feels the need to get certified. Usually, people think it will give them credibility with their prospects. This may be true, but you will want to do some homework before you dive into coaching certification by finding out if there are any particular certifications that your prospects will expect you to have. For example, some financial advisers obtain financial planner certification because it is one certification that prospects recognize. Other certifications may appear as meaningless letters on the end of their name. By learning what certifications your clients will recognize, you will avoid wasting time and money getting a coaching certification that means nothing to your clients.

If you are still hesitant about getting a coaching certification, the best way to start getting clients is to do free coaching sessions. You are applying for the job of being their coach. They need to have a great experience coaching with you. Do you need to be a certified life coach to enroll clients? NO. All you need is the ability to help them get results.

Do you need to be certified to be a life coach? Not before you get started. Over time you should get certified because great coaches are lifelong learners. However, don’t make the mistake of waiting to take certification courses before getting started coaching and making a difference for your clients.

Kris Thompson
JTS Advisors Strategy Coach

Technorati Tags: Coaching Certification, Do You Need To Be a Certified Life Coach

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

Coaching Certification, Do You Need To Be a Certified Life Coach Coaching Certification, Do You Need To Be a Certified Life Coach

If you want to become a success coach you’ll need a lot more than a life coach degree. You may be thinking, what could be more important than a life coach degree? But it is your beliefs that supply the foundation for success. They are passive memory; the instruction manual for how you operate. Therefore, it follows that to become a success coach, you will need to make sure your beliefs support you.

The Importance of Your Beliefs When You Become a Success Coach

e

How do beliefs dictate the likelihood that you will become a success coach? Beliefs are the conductor in the orchestra of success; not you, your beliefs. While your triad (the combinations of beliefs, physiology, and language pattern) dictates how you feel and how well you’ll perform in any particular moment, the biggest factor comes into play from your beliefs. Your beliefs organize and command when you choose what state of mind to go into. Belief delivers a direct command to your nervous system. When you believe something is true, you literally go into the state of its being true. In fact, there’s no more powerful directing force in human behavior than belief. And while earning a life coach degree may help your beliefs about your ability to coach, the degree alone is worthless if your belief structure isn’t supportive of your role as a coach.

How Your Beliefs Affect Your Ability to Become a Success Coach?

E

How do your beliefs affect your capacity to become a success coach? Your beliefs are the central orchestrator of all the motivating forces in your coaching business. Your beliefs dictate:

• What you will attempt in your coaching.
• Whether you pursue a life coach degree.
• The way your treat your clients and partners.
• How you feel about your coaching business.
• Your perception of your coaching.
• What you focus upon and think is important in your coaching business.

Use Your Beliefs to Complement Your Life Coach Degree

e

How can you make sure you succeed in your attempt to become a success coach even before you earn a life coach degree? The challenge is the opportunity. Most of our beliefs about what is going to happen in our coaching business were created from interpretations of experiences in our past, even if we’ve never started a coaching business before. Most coaches don’t consciously decide what to believe about their coaching business, but the truth is, we all can. It’s up to us to decide what we will believe.

The first step to become a success coach who chooses their own believes about their coaching practice, is awareness. You can just as easily develop powerful or limiting belief about your coaching business if you just find enough references to build them up. You could easily find reasons to support your beliefs that clients are rotten, or that they are wonderful! Which on is true? The answer is that it doesn’t matter which one is true. What matters is that you can choose. And it doesn’t take a life coach degree to figure out that it makes more sense to choose the one that is most empowering.

Colette Seymann

JTS Advisors Designated Accountability Coach

Technorati Tags: Become a Success Coach, Life Coach Degree

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

Become a Success Coach, Life Coach Degree Become a Success Coach, Life Coach Degree

When You Become a Coach, Do You Need to be Concerned About Coaching Certification ‘Criteria’?

The International Coach Federation (ICF) has certain coaching certification ‘criteria’ if you want to become a coach who has some credentials after your name. The ICF has 3 levels of certification, each with separate coaching certification ‘criteria’. Some people see certification as a valuable requirement to become a coach; others see it as a ‘money pit’. Which is it? Become a coach who makes your own decision.

The Associate Certified Coach… As a Coaching Certification ‘Criteria’, is it a Waste of Time While You Become a Coach?

Read more…

Technorati Tags: Become a Coach, Coaching Certification Criteria

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

Become a Coach, Coaching Certification Criteria Become a Coach, Coaching Certification Criteria

Prestigious Life Coaching Certification Realities: Become a Life Coach and Get on Food Stamps

There are a lot of coaches training programs that are mass producing “coaches”, each offering their own version of a prestigious life coaching certification. But really, what does a prestigious life coaching certification mean to you? Does it mean you have become a life coach who can help anyone? Does it mean you have become a life coach who has a steady schedule of paying clients? According to an International Coach Federation (IFC) published membership survey, about 4 out of 10 coaches earn less than $10K per year. That’s because 50% of members of the ICF are only coaching somewhere between one and six clients per month. More than half of these coaches said it took them up to 2 years to get their first paying coaching client.

What is Currently The Most Prestigious Life Coaching Certification to Get as You Become a Life Coach?

What is considered the most prestigious life coaching certification? What is the biggest barrier to getting prestigious life coaching certification? Read more…

Technorati Tags: Become a Life Coach, Prestigious Life Coaching Certification

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

Becoming a Life Coach, Prestigious Life Coaching Certification Become a Life Coach, Prestigious Life Coaching Certification

Becoming a Coach Can be Challenging, But do You Need a Degree to be a Life Coach?

One of the questions that people who are looking into becoming a coach wonder is, “Do you need a degree to be a life coach?” There are some key elements to becoming a coach, and at the end of this article you will be able to tell me the answer to the question, “Do you need a degree to be a life coach.”

Becoming a coach takes leadership. Basically to become a coach who provides results, you need to be able to take people where they can’t or won’t take themselves. If their results are predictable with or without you, then you are not a coach. To become a leader means you go first. Does leadership come naturally? Some people are natural leaders, of course, but to become a great leader or coach you will need specific training. Some of the most famous leaders in history come from the military, not universities. So do you need a degree to be a life coach?

Do You Need a Degree to be a Life Coach, or Does Becoming a Coach Simply Take Leadership?

Becoming a coach means people will treat you as a leader, rather than someone whose problems control them. This has to do with integrity. Having integrity means being committed to doing what you committed to, and empowering others to do the same. It means communicating fully and honestly, whether it is easy or not. Do you need a degree to be a life coach who has integrity? Integrity and reliability are not natural, but they can be learned. But, I’ve never seen a university course titled “Integrity 101” or “Reliability Training for Coaches.”

What’s More Important in Becoming a Coach, Commitment, or Do You Need a Degree to be a Life Coach?

Becoming a coach also requires commitment to your own goals and to your clients’ goals. Behind every goal is a desire to change what we are doing or how we feel. And the outcomes behind the goals are really about who we want to become. And through taking action, we start to become who we need to become and believe what we need to believe in order to fulfill our vision. To stay committed to that path when the ripples of life look like tidal waves requires focus. Do you need a degree to be a life coach who is able to maintain focus in their own lives and help others achieve that in their lives?

So what do you think? Do you need a degree to be a life coach?

Colette Seymann

JTS Advisors Designated Accountability Coach

Technorati Tags: Becoming a Coach, Do You Need a Degree to be a Life Coach

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

Becoming a Coach, Do You Need a Degree to be a Life Coach Becoming a Coach, Do You Need a Degree to be a Life Coach

There is one secret technique to getting top salary of a life coach that isn’t based upon the ability to psychoanalyse your client, or have some great ‘intuition’.  You can’t learn this skill with some business coaching certification, nor can you produce great results without it (unless you get top salary of a life coach simply because you are a guru already!)

The Secret to Top Salary of a Life Coach: Truth

I know it doesn’t sound like much, but the TRUTH is seldom the center of the focus when your client needs a breakthrough.  Your business coaching certification will tell you how to plan out your clients success.  They will promise that if you know the ‘how to’ and convey it to your client, then you are in good shape, but the fact is that no amount of knowledge will help most of your clients.

Why Are Clients Beyond the Help of Most Coaches With Business Coaching Certification?

Your client is having challenges, yes?  We’ll the real reason your client is having challenges (or not achieving their goals) is because they aren’t honest about the issue(s) surrounding the challenges.  Your salary of a life coach will depend on your ability to point out and discover which of these ‘dishonesty patterns’ your client is performing:

Dishonesty Patterns From the JTS Advisors Business Coaching Certification:

Dishonesty Pattern 1:  Confusion

Your client tells you “I don’t know” to every key question you ask them.  Or they freeze up and won’t answer any questions.  They are dishonest here because they ALWAYS know the answers to most questions about them.  They are so used to not answering these questions or leaving them unanswered, that they can’t believe that someone actually expects them to answer them.  Most people put up with their stonewalling because they are fooled that the client actually DOESN’T KNOW what to do or what the answer is.

Dishonesty Pattern 2:  Fear (Hiding out)

Your client doesn’t want to face the truth, so they hide from it.  this can take the form of trying to be ‘optimistic’ or just plain lying to cover up what they are afraid to tell you (or themselves).  

Dishonesty Pattern 3:  Bravado / Anger

Your client is really afraid of not being worthy or feeling worthless, therefore they cover it up with overconfidence.  Or they blame others around them for their problems and get quite angry about it.  This is really pattern 2 (fear) covered up with even more dishonesty, ala that they are not afraid.  This is a hard to see pattern at first because many times the anger seems so ‘real’… don’t allow yourself to be fooled!

Dishonesty Pattern 4:  Lemmingisms

Your client parrots a bunch of things that their last guru or favority author said, using it to cover up their own issues and problems.  for instance, I had a client once that used Robert Kiosaki’s concept of passive income to justify doing any real consistent work.  His dishonesty was:  ”Passive income is so great and active income is bad, therefore I shouldn’t make any money that I have to actually work for.”

Dishonesty Pattern 5:  Blinders / Tunnel Vision

This can collapse with pattern 4 as well, but anything that your client thinks about, buys into, or constantly falls back upon in order to run their limiting pattern is in the realm of tunnel vision.  This one can also be hard to spot because the thing that your client may have tunnel vision about may be somewhat accurate, which makes the dishonesty even harder to spot.

Dishonesty Pattern 6:  Laziness

This is an insidious type of dishonesty, in that the client will possibly admit any of the other patterns and make it look like that is the real problem, when the real problem is plain old laziness.  What’s the trick to spotting laziness?  Simple: Just notice if your client is taking much action in the area where they are having trouble.  If they haven’t been or aren’t taking much action, then laziness is highly probably that it is one of the dishonesty patterns they are currently running.  

If you can find these dishonesty patterns in your clients, and help them overcome them stopping them from reaching their goals, then you have a good chance at reaching your goal of having a top salary of a life coach.  There are a couple of pitfalls when helping your clients break through these dishonesty patterns that no average business coaching certification will tell you about.  Here are the common pitfalls when helping your coaching clients break through dishonesty patterns:

Honesty Coaching Pitfall #1:  Strategery:

Be careful about trying to strategize with your client before your confront the dishonesty.  No strategy will work (no matter how good) in the face of a client who can’t be honest.

Honesty Coaching Pitfall #2:  Helper-itis (Enabling):

This is where you buy in completely to the dishonesty of your client and just sympathize with them or give them rewards for their own lack of integrity.  

Honesty Coaching Pitfall #3:  Freezery (Deer in Headlights Syndrome):

This is your own form of the confusion pattern. Don’t let the dishonesty spread to you as the coach!

The Reality of the ‘Dream Income Makers’: What NOT to Expect From The Salary of a Life Coach

Remember that real coaching incomes don’t just fall out of the sky, and that no matter how fancy or elaborate your marketing and sales schemes are, you’ll need to work hard for your salary of a life coach.  Business coaching certifications are helpful, but your effectiveness as a business coach will ultimately create the results in your clients that help you get some serious referrals, hence building the kind of salary of a life coach that your want and deserve.  Just remember, that the client victory comes before the coach victory… Look that up in your favorite business coaching certification!

Jeffrey T. Sooey

CEO, JTS Advisors

Founder, Coaches Training Blog community

Technorati Tags: Business Coaching Certification, Salary of a Life Coach

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

Business Coaching Certification, Salary of a Life Coach Business Coaching Certification, Salary of a Life Coach

Is the Top Life Coaching School in America Teaching the Steps to Becoming a Life Coach With “Client Getting” Power?

I just talked with a few principles from some of the top coaching schools in America, and I realized that although they may understand the steps to becoming a life coach, they seem to not care about teaching it to their students.  A certified life coach has some real challenges in front of them if they are to get coaching clients in this marketplace, and you aren’t going to learn how to get clients from most of the top coaching schools in America.  

Why?  

Because you aren’t DEMANDING that they teach you how to get clients.  

Yes, I think it’s your responsibility to demand this type of training from these coaches training institutions and for you to let them know how ineffective their trainings are in teaching you the steps to becoming a life coach that can get paying coaching clients (even if they are effective in helping you become a certified life coach).  

I Could Blame Them for Making You a Certified Life Coach Without Giving You The Skills to Survive

I could say that the top coaching schools in America are irresponsible in their endeavour to help coaches learn how to get clients, and perhaps I would be right in saying that.  But, I’m not the one to say who’s responsibility it is to teach new coaches the steps to becoming a life coach (although I would assume it SHOULD be these so-called “coach training institutes”).  Personally I feel a responsibility to help every coach that goes through my training learn the steps to becoming a life coach that can get clients any time they want.  

Even though I’m not a certified life coach, I feel very confident that any time I want to get more coaching clients, I can just go out and promote a bit, call some past clients, and ‘voila’, I’ll have high paying clients.  You got to understand how great it feels to have the knowledge that you can subsidize your income and always just pull the trigger on a few things and then have more paying coaching clients.  The steps to becoming a life coach were challenging to figure out and learn because no one had combined all the most important information about becoming a certified life coach with paying clients in one area, along with a system for understanding how to use it.  

How a Certified Life Coach, Ignorant of the Right Business Skills, Fails to Understand the Steps to Becoming a Life Coach with an Effortlessly Growing Practice

But most coaches haven’t the foggiest idea how to get paying coaching clients, or worse, they THINK they know how to get paying coaching clients… and they’re dead wrong.

I had a coach come up to me the other day, very excited to show me their new website.  It WAS a good looking website.  They told me how they were going to make SO MUCH MONEY and get SO MANY CLIENTS with their shiny new website.  I didn’t have the heart to tell them that their website wasn’t going to make them a dime because of they way it was constructed.  This coach was a certified life coach and they simply didn’t know the steps to become a life coach who could effortlessly build their practice.  They probably shelled out at least $500 and time / money they didn’t have in order to get that website up.  the funny thing is that this kind of ‘coaching tragedy’ is happening every day.  

With the Accredited Coaching Schools out There, I Doubt You’ll Be Well Enough Equipped

It’s a jungle out there when it comes to coaching schools and what they are teaching you.  The steps to becoming a life coach can be long and quite hard without the proper life coach education.  A certified life coach needs to be careful of the ICF (International Coaches Federation) and their ‘accredited coaching school’ referral service, because it conveys a false sense of security based upon the dream of having lots of coaching clients because you learned some magic coaching trick (there are magic coaching tricks, but they don’t guarantee paying clients).  

Jeffrey T. Sooey

CEO, JTS Advisors

Founder, Coaches Training Blog community

Technorati Tags: A Certified Life Coach, Steps to Becoming a Life Coach

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

A Certified Life Coach, Steps to Becoming a Life Coach A Certified Life Coach, Steps to Becoming a Life Coach

The Lie of Professional Coaching Certification

.

Professional coaching certification is a whole lot of BS.  Really.  We are coaches, and we’re supposed to help people think outside the box, right?  

The fact is that you don’t get paid because you went to school and got a life coaching degree.  You get paid for the value and results that you produce through your coaching.  That’s it!  If life coaching education can help with that, great!  But if your professional coaching certification gives you some worthless knowledge and you think that it’s going to allow you to sit back and forget about your active role in producing great results, then you are going to need a lot of luck, especially in this  economy. 

Most experts say that the job market and the economy is going to get worse and it’s going to stay that way for somewhere between 3 years and a decade.  

Technorati Tags: Life Coach Accreditation, Professional Coaching Certification

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

Life Coach Accreditation, Professional Coaching Certification Life Coach Accreditation, Professional Coaching Certification

How to Become The Master Coach, and Make $5,000.00-$10,000.00 per month doing it…

The next two Thursdays I’m faciliating special workshops to teach you the most important things to know about becoming a master coach and building your coaching empire.  I’ll answer your questions and share some more techniques for building a successful coaching business with high caliber coaching and tons of cash clients.

…Even if You’re Confused About Where to Start, Don’t Have The Time to Start, or Have Heard Your Friends or Family Tell You to ‘Stop Dreaming’

Here’s what you’ll discover:

• The Coaching Quickstart system that I used to rapidly create a $30,000.00 / month revenue stream
• How to fill your calendar with cash coaching clients, even if you aren’t a ‘certified coach’
• Types of coaches and how each makes money
• The 5 secrets to get your first paid clients fast and – how to make it feel natural for you
• How to make $1,000 per hour with high caliber clients

Go HERE to learn to be the Master Coach.

Opt in.  You’ll land on the event info page.

Leave a comment at the bottom of the page asking me the ONE question you want answered at the event.

Jeff

P.S.  Seriously, I want to know what your questions are so I can answer them Thursday night.  Go HERE NOW to become a Master Coach.

Technorati Tags: Become a Master Coach, Coaching Business Empire, Master Certified Coach

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

Become a Master Coach, Coaching Business Empire, Master Certified Coach Become a Master Coach, Coaching Business Empire, Master Certified Coach