Emily contacted me having seen me post on LinkedIn about the kind of clients I work with: deep feeling leaders, in touch with their values, who know they can make more of a difference, but something somewhere is holding them back. She’d read about my combination of coaching with Emotional Freedom Technique and thought it might be just the thing.
When we first met, Emily told me:
“For a number of years I have toyed with the idea that I want to be a Director but there is something holding me back and I am not sure what it is. Sometimes I think I am not up to it/not good enough but then I look at other people in these roles and think I could do that. Sometimes I ask myself if it will have a negative impact on my work/life balance but I don’t know if this is true (and could it really be any worse than my current balance?) and finally, sometimes I think is this what I think I ought to do next rather than what I really want???
I think there are a number of issues which have really affected my confidence over the years. Through coaching I would like to grow in confidence to follow my own path determined by my values and strengths. To develop some tools and techniques to acknowledge the uncomfortable feeling of being out of my comfort zone and not to become overwhelmed with it going forward. To explore the reasons why I stop myself going for promotion and to start to have the confidence to determine my next steps.
Ultimately I’d like to be in a new job that I have chosen.”
Emily was so ready to do this work that I could not wait to get started, and as a valued, senior member of her team, her employer was only too willing to fund the coaching, so off we set.
As with so much of my client work at the moment, session one was a clearing the decks session. Using Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT) we gently explored the emotions and beliefs Emily was holding, stemming from years of messages about what a good leader looks like from an old-school boss she’d had previously. Even though Emily knew logically that this old boss’s ideas were old fashioned, outdated and even harmful, emotionally they’d wormed their way in and caused her to doubt herself, and her abilities as a leader.
In that first session we gently had a look at the emotions associated with this experience and experimented with letting some of them go. Safe to say it involved consigning quite a bit of ‘stuff’ to a deep dark basement somewhere!
Again, as with many clients, Emily arrived at session two looking and sounding lighter and more confident already. (It never ceases to amaze me the impact of one 90 minute session of EFT to blow away the cobwebs!)
In our next meetings we covered so much ground: we focused on leadership styles, using Emily’s personalised Emotions & Behaviours at Work report, which is included with all my standard coaching packages. It gave her insight into how she was naturally approaching conversations about the next career move, and how she might switch that up, depending on who and how she wanted to influence, as well as giving her insight into some of those work relationships which were harder to figure out.
We also talked through specific relationship challenges, and spent time getting really clear on Emily’s values and strengths to position herself in a great place for the next step up.
We planned how and when to have conversations with senior stakeholders, and how to manage her energy in order to prioritise this.
During our coaching time together Emily instigated conversations internally about stepping up, positioned herself so she was in the running AND performed brilliantly at interview and got that new job that had been on our list of objectives. What a result!
She’s now in the new role, relishing the challenges and excited to bring her own brand of leadership, one she believes in, to a new department.
Other than the support to position herself for, and secure, a brand new job, what impact has coaching had on Emily? She took time to tell me this:
“I feel I am a more confident leader, and I definitely have more confidence in being myself in the leadership space. I understand more about myself in terms of what I need to do manage my energy, space and values and do this in a way so I don’t burn out.“
What will she take with her? she says:
“I’m going to use EFT when thinking/dealing with situations which bring up imposter syndrome feelings. I recently had an interview for a new director level role, it was a quite a long and intensive process and several times I felt feelings of inadequacy, at those times I took some time out to do some tapping and then continued.
I have more confidence in myself and in asking for help and the tools to help me manage my energy.
I’ve learnt that effective leaders ask for help all the time, to have the confidence to ask questions and build, strong collaborative networks which work together rather than the idea ‘one strong leader’ can do all of this.”
What made mine and Emily’s coaching partnership work so well? Aside from me bringing coaching approaches that supported Emily to move through the emotional fallout of challenges so she felt lighter and more confident, Emily was ready to do the work. She wanted to move forward and came to our conversations with an open mind. She prioritised the coaching process, reflecting and taking action in between our monthly sessions.
And it really paid off! I really enjoyed working with Emily so much and cannot wait to see what she gets up to next.
If you’ve read this story and thought, maybe I would benefit from coaching, this might help:
90% of my 1-1 coaching work is funded by clients’ employers. Any kind of work transition, including a new role, returning to work after a period of leave, or navigating a restructure, are typical touch points where 1-1 leadership coaching can be hugely beneficial. Many of my clients come to me not feeling confident that their employer will fund coaching, but most are very pleasantly surprised at the response.
If you have a people team or learning & development function, they will be able to talk to you about coaching.
Some conversation starters might be:
‘This current period of change has been a lot to navigate, and I’d benefit from space to recharge my batteries and to focus on my leadership and confidence so I’m ready for the next challenges on the horizon.’
or
‘We’ve a lot of uncertainty and change to navigate over the next 12 months on top of some existing challenges within the team – I’d really benefit from some external coaching support so this becomes a learning opportunity rather than a path to burnout.’
If you’d like to talk to me about coaching, feel free to pop in a free 30 minute conversation right here.
You can read more about 1-1 leadership coaching on my website here or share this 1 pager with your People/L&D team here.
A note on how client stories are created:
I pull together client stories based on both the client’s written words in their coaching evaluation form (which references objectives we set together at the start of the coaching programme) and my observations too. I share this in draft with my client and they ask for any amends, updates, wording changes so it accurately reflects their experience and they decide if they’d like to use their name or a pseudonym. Once it’s signed off I publish on my website as a blog post to help future clients understand the kind of work I do.
