Organization on many different levels is important when you are running your life coaching business. It is vital to be practically organized as well as mentally organized. Being organized will maximize the quality of service that you will be able to provide to your coaching clients.

Set up an organizational system specifically created for your life coaching business and master it. Personalize it to serve you and your coaching clients. It should not be a burden or a hassle to be organized. The purpose of an organizational system is to make things easier for your life and your life coaching business. If staying organized seems too technical for you or too burdensome, you should consider choosing different organizational methods that personally suit you better. When it comes to organizing, there is no lack of the vast amount of organizational tools, systems, and methods that can be implemented. After all, there is an entire industry dedicated to the task of getting and staying organized. Take advantage of it.

How to Begin Organizing Your Life Coaching Business

Start organizing your life coaching business by making some deliberate decisions about the way you want to set things up. First, take an inventory of all of the things that need to be organized and taken into account. Make a list. Some of the most common things that you will have to keep organized will be:

• E-mail
• Physical mail
• Your business’s financial records
• Legal paperwork and records
• Client records, phone numbers and addresses
• Scheduling and appointments

This is a very personalized process. Everyone’s list may vary depending upon his or her life coaching business’s needs and personal preferences.

When to Use Paper VS. When to Use Digital

Once you have your list, you can begin to make some deliberate decisions. Remember that organizing is something that should make your life and coaching business easier. It should not be something that you have to battle with or feel burdened by. Be honest with yourself and make choices that will really help you. Go through your list and decide what basic system of organization you would like to use for each area of your life coaching business. This is simply a matter of deciding if you would like to use paper or digital technology for each particular area on your list. Make sure you get the things that you need in order to properly store and protect paper records and documents in an orderly way. You can also protect your digital files by backing them up on a backup hard drive or using a cloud service.

You will have things that you will need in the moment or that you are going to want to file and bring up day to day. You will have some files that you will store from the last twelve months. You will also have files such as, financial and legal records, that should be stored for a longer period of time

Simplicity Equals Sanity

Simplicity could mean the difference between staying sane or committing business suicide! Keep things simple when you first begin to develop a system of organizing your life coaching business. Add on and tweak as you see fit. Would you like a paper planner or a digital planner? If you are not already sure of what you prefer, shop around and decide what you think will work best for you. You decide and remain consistent with it so that you can trust in your system during crucial times when you will need it most.

If you get too technical or you get tools that extend beyond your true needs, you could end up sitting around all day at the mercy of tech support, or become a slave to your tools, rather than getting your work done. For example, be careful not to waste your finances on an expensive planner with all the folders, flaps, add-ons, bells, and whistles, if you do not truly need it. Go with the basics of what you really need at first. As you go along and use your planner regularly, you will notice the things that are lacking. Was your first planner too big and bulk for you to deal with? Alternatively, maybe you like to keep it on a desk and it was too small for your preference. Take note of things like this. When you decide to make your next planner purchase, you will be doing so, knowing what you really want and need. Make these types of choices with each thing on your list.

For The Tech Junkies

You can find programs for just about anything under the sun these days to help you to get you organized. There are programs for tracking the progress of coaching client’s, tracking finances, staying in touch with prospects, and more. Shop around, do your research, and ask other coaches what they like to use.

When you decide to incorporate the use of digital technology into your life coaching business, make sure that you learn to use the technology comfortably so that it will be more effective for you. Try trial versions of software programs and other technologies in order to reduce your chances of wasting time and finances on something that you might not like or need.

If taking on the challenge of setting up your personal organizational system for your life coaching business seems too daunting, get help doing it. Get some coaching. Coaches need coaches! It will be an endeavor well worth your time and effort and it will lead to more efficiency and productivity. Once you get over the hump of setting up a system and getting into the habit of using it, it will work for you like a well-oiled machine. Remember, if using the organizational systems you have setup for your coaching business is confusing or seems like more of a burden, then you may need to tweak it to meet your business needs and style of working.

Jeffrey T. Sooey
CEO, JTS Advisors
Founder, Coaches Training Blog community