How Do You Handle Your First Coaching Call?

19 Jul How Do You Handle Your First Coaching Call?

You’ve signed up a new client. How should that first call really go to make sure you’re setting up this coaching experience into a success. 

How do you make sure you have a successful getting started to call- that first call with your client?

1. 1. Prayer.

      The first thing that I do in every coaching call is to pray. I invite the Holy Spirit into the call. In this first call, I dedicate the whole coaching experience to Him. I would say, “ God, you’re the CEO. You’re in charge of our life. We humble ourselves, we surrender, we yield ourselves to you, and this process…” 

   2. Ask your clients what they want to accomplish in the coaching experience.

      After we pray, I will want to know from the client’s perspective what would make this coaching a win- is it more income? More time? A challenge in their lives or a relationship or communication? And then I’d like to ask, “Is there more that you want to get out of this?” A lot of times, coaching clients will come in with a lot of different things than you think that they are coming in for. So, asking clarity on what are the goals they want to accomplish so that when we look back 6-12 months from now, we would see what they have accomplished.

   3. Understand the client- their communication style, their personality by giving them a number of tasks to do.

      The first being the Keirsey Temperament Test. There are other ones like Marcus Briggs and others like that which are helpful to know their personality type. The next one that I do is a strengths test- I used Gallup’s Strengthsfinder Test. This will help outline their top 5 strengths and it ranks them as well so I will know whether they are gifted in this area, or if there are things that we should probably delegate or get off their plate. Because the coaching that I do is entirely Holy Spirit lead and I am always willing to interrupt our agenda and go where the Spirit leads them to. One of the things that I give them is the Spiritual gifts test- to help them identify how they’re wired and help you as a coach, know how best to coach them.

   4. Put everything down on paper.

      I have a little worksheet, or a little coaching session prep form that I use and all of our coaches use to make sure that they’re going to have a great first call and set that up well. These are some of the first few steps that I encourage people to take as a coach to really establish a solid foundation, a clarity of vision, and establish where they’re going to be going. Sometimes I ask the clients as well to share their vision, or write their vision, or create their vision board from that first session as well.

   5. Present to them a business development program or curriculum or a track.

      Show it to them like a road map that lets them know where they are now and what we’ll be looking forward to 6-12 months from now. This way, you can properly set the expectations for the client as well. One of the biggest reasons why a coach-and-client relationship does not go well is a mismatch or mismanagement of expectations.

      This first call is very critical. What would make this a win? If a client says, “ I want to be doing $20000/month in 30 days” and this person has no business, no product, no service- it would be tough to get a $20k residual right out the door starting from scratch, right? If you want to have realistic expectations, you can say, “Yes, we can get there but it will take a little more time because we have to take a few more steps beforehand.”

All these questions you ask to discover what’s holding them back, what will make this a win, getting clear on all that in your first session is going to ensure the expectations are met, managed well, and that you are doing everything that you can as a Christ Centered Coach to empower people to prosper.