The Reframe, Issue 01: Your client's goals are not your aim
In many of the life coaching/consultation courses I've taken in the past, I was always told to remove my biases and do not 'impose'. The consult exists to find out what the client actually wants. The programs we design exist to get them there. Meet them where they are. Don't put your bias on somebody else. Most of us hold that pretty tightly, because the coaches who ignore it end up building the client they wanted instead of the one sitting in front of them. So we ask better questions, we listen harder, and we let their goals set the direction. I would like to reframe this thought a bit. What if as coaches, we started to look at ourselves as leaders? As teachers trying to move our clients upward? Something that I have taught in CCP for many years is:
You need an aim for your clients that is independent of their goals. And you have to tell them what it is.
Not instead of their goals. Underneath them. If their goals are the only aim in the relationship, every decision defaults to what they want right now, and what they want right now is usually more of whatever got them here (they don't know what they don't know).
Mine is independence through awareness. I want every client to leave me understanding what they need to do to handle their own fitness, lifestyle, and nutrition practices. James put it quite nicely on the show. He tells coaches to sit across the table from a client and actually say the words, that they believe this person can become someone who never has to depend on anyone again. That actually cuts right to it and could be challenging for some coaches to say (a lot may think they are coaching themselves out of a job).
The math says otherwise. Average client life in individual design runs 13 to 14 months. Coach someone toward independence over eighteen and you have held onto them longer than the coach who never brought it up.
Say it anyway.
Where it fits: the consult, and specifically before you ask what they want and what their goals are. It has to be spoken, not implied. Then it goes in the written plan so it isn't just a nice thing you said once.
It also works as a filter, which is the part nobody likes. Some clients will hear it and leave. James was blunt about those ones. That person is just not a fit for your coaching practice. He's right. If your stated aim runs somebody off in the first consult, they were going to fight you for the next eighteen months anyway.
Try: on your next consult, before you ask a single question about their goals, tell them yours for them. One sentence, out loud, to their face. Then be quiet and let it land.
Have an aim for every client that is independent of theirs. Then say it out loud.
This came out of a conversation with James on Frameworks, Episode 39. Physical Freedom
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