Coaching

When to start charging for your coaching?

17 May 2018 in Coaching tagged business / charging / coaching / coaching practice / money

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When to start charging for your coaching?

“How do I know when to start charging for my coaching?” is a question I’ve seen many new coaches ask. I certainly remember asking myself questions about when to start charging and several people had an opinion and very different approaches.

You may be wanting this post to give a definitive answer that on week x or after y clients and if so I’m sorry this isn’t one of those posts. While I’m not going to tell you what you should do I am going to share some different approaches and you can decide which appeals to you.

You may even notice that you have been trying one approach and it hasn’t been working for you.

I use the word exchange a lot in this article. That is deliberate because you are exchanging your service for an agreed payment of some kind.

All sorts of beliefs, values and fears can get in the way of a coach charging. I will also offer the perspective that what you ask for in exchange for your service can be changed.

So in no particular order here are some approaches you can use when approaching deciding when to start charging for your coaching:

Coaching provides value. It is your duty as a coach to communicate that value by ALWAYS asking for an exchange of money.

I have no doubt that this school of thought is said with all the best intentions in the world. They already see the value that you can bring to your clients. However, I’ve also seen it be a belief that has stopped coaches from practicing because they didn’t feel ready to charge. The end result being is that they don’t do any coaching so are not bringing any value to anyone.

If you are happy this approach you may choose to start charging right from the word go. Your clients will soon let you know if they are not happy with what you are asking for in exchange. 🙂

Coach as many people as you can, regardless of if there is an exchange of money or not. Anybody who will agree – from the person who delivers your post to old school friends. Take the opportunity to get lots of experience.

This approach works particularly well if you are willing to notice the difference your service makes for your clients. While, it may take some longer than others, you will start to see the value that you bring – something that makes agreeing an exchange of money for your service a lot easier. The thinking behind this approach is that at some stage, providing you’ve been noticing the value your coaching provides, it becomes obvious that it’s time to start charging.

Invite your client to pay you what they feel the value that your work has provided.

Some people feel that this avoids making a “difficult” request for money and provides them with an incentive to do superior work. You may also choose to use that method of exchange if you feel that your client is cash poor.

This will depend upon your style but some clients may feel awkward with this request whilst some will love that approach. Often the coach is surprised by the amount a client chooses.

Invite your client to exchange your coaching for some other form of payment other than money.

In effect this is like a bartering system. For example, perhaps you will agree to work with a website designer to create a site for you in exchange for coaching.

If you choose to use this system then you will make it easier if both of you agree in advance what will be provided by both of you.

Exchanging your coaching for an agreed donation to a charity of your choice.

Many who start with this approach use it as a stepping-stone to being comfortable accepting a payment themselves. They find that they can practice asking for a payment in the comfort that a charity who’s work they believe in will benefit.

Exchange your coaching for honest feedback

I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve heard coaches share how they were surprised about how a client has found the experience of working with the coach and the value gained. With the permission of the client you can also use these as testimonials.

This can also give you an idea of how a non-coach would describe working with you. This can be important if you decide to work with individuals/groups who are not coaches/ familiar with the jargon and terminology coaches use.

Make an agreement that your client will “pay it forward” by donating their time and/skills etc to someone else.

Again this is often a gentle approach that some like to take to get comfortable asking for an exchange for the service they provide, before moving onto asking that exchange involve money.

Wait until a set time/event has happened

This normally takes the form of not charging until qualified or attended a particular course.

Sometimes this particular approach has a moving goal post, for example, I’ll charge once I have done the first training weekend becomes, I’ll charge once I am qualified which then becomes I’ll charge when I’ve worked with x number of clients or when I’ve done another course etc.

If this is the approach you are using I strongly encourage you to be aware of if you have moved the goal post.

Wait until your coaching provides x value to clients

Now this is an approach which I hear from a lot of coaches who’ve got stuck. Generally the aspect that trips people up with this approach is one of two things. Either they do not actually define what the “x value” actually means and it becomes this constantly moving goal post in their own minds that they’re never going to achieve. Alternatively they aren’t checking with their clients what value they are getting from the coaching.

I’ve seen all these approaches work for different coaches and I’ve seen some of the approaches trip other coaches up until they changed to a different approach. I believe that this does not have to be a one size fits all approach – I believe a more pragmatic answer is it’s the approach that works for you, and your clients, that’s the right one for you. There’s certainty nothing stopping you from incorporating more than one of these approaches and modifying it so it fits more with your style.

How much to charge is a question to be answered on another occasion but I invite you to begin to see the value that you provide your clients because when you see that when to charge and how much to charge becomes much easier to answer.

Have I missed an approach? Want to share which way you used, or the option that appeals most to you? Fill in the reply box below and click submit comment.

About Jen Waller

Jen Waller is on a mission to support, nurture and encourage coaching skills and talents from non-coach to coach and beyond.

As an experienced coach and trainer Jen is happy to utilise all skills at her disposal to assist clients from getting out of their own way and making a difference in the world with their coaching. One of the aspects of her role Jen loves the most is seeing individuals find their voice, grow their confidence and take the next steps so that they make a massive positive impact and difference with their coaching. Jen has owned and run Coaching Confidence, the coaching blog since 2010.

In her spare time Jen is a volunteer for the UK based charity The Cinnamon Trust who support elderly and terminally ill pet owners provide care for their pets. As a volunteer, Jen regularly walks dogs for owners who physically often find that more challenging then they once did. As a pet owner herself, Jen finds it really rewarding to be able to assist an owner stay with an animal that has become part of the family. (Plus it’s a great aditional motivator when working from home to get out and get some fresh air and exercise)

Jen also loves theatre and has been known to watch certain popular science fiction films and TV shows!

An interview about Coaching Confidence

14 December 2014 in blog posts / Coaching

An interview about Coaching Confidence

Last Thursday I was an invited guest over on coach Ruby McGuire’s site “Be the coach you dream to be.” She interviewed me on the subject of coaching and confidence.

In the interview I shared some thoughts including:

How putting off starting your coaching can affect your confidence,
3 tips when working on your confidence,
and Common mistakes made when working on developing your coaching confidence.

You can read all the interview by clicking here .

About the Author

Jen Waller is on a mission to support, nurture and encourage coaching skills and talents from non-coach to coach and beyond.

She has created a free 7 day e-course about how to create your own unique coaching welcome pack that works for you and your clients. Get your copy here.

What has Shakespeare got to do with coaching?

2 May 2012 in Coaching tagged business coach / business coaching / career coaching / coach / coaches / coaching / coaching content / coaching courses / coaching qualifications / coaching session / coaching skills / coaching techniques / executive coach / expectations and needs / Greg Doran / John Barton / leadership coaching / life coach / life coaches / life coaching / performance coaching / personal development / resource / RSC / shakespeare

This was originally published as a bonus article in the Coaching Confidence weekly email during June 2011. To start getting your very own copy each week enter your details under “Don’t miss a thing!” to the right of this page.

What has Shakespeare got to do with coaching?

The catalyst for last weeks post was observing a workshop that the Royal Shakespeare Company “Head of Voice” Cicely Berry ran. It was a piece based around what we can learn about best practice in other fields and including a few coaching questions. If you missed it you can read it here.

This weeks message will continue with that theme as I also observed a second workshop ran by two top directors working with a group of actors on a particular speech.

You’ll notice that there are coaching questions to consider throughout the piece. Feel free to play with those questions and I invite you to notice which one makes the most difference for you.

Greg Doran is currently Chief Associate Director with the RSC and has been described as “one of the great Shakespearians of his generation.”

John Barton co-founded the RSC 50 years ago and possesses an encyclopaedic knowledge of Shakespeare and is known to be able to identify one of his plays from a single line of text. With such a background of experience and knowledge he shared his perspective about how things have changed.

One of the things he mentioned is that “Now what I do is different to what I did then …Then the basic needs were different.”

The experience of actors and the expectations of the audience not being the same is probably not a surprise when you consider that half a century has passed since the RSC began. If you have a coaching business you may be aware that your dream clients expectations and what they see their needs as being have changed over time.

That may be that you find that potential clients over time approach you with different requirements. It may also be that an individual client, if asked, will say something different at the start as compared with at the end of you working together about what was important to them about your work.

A coaching question to consider: When was the last time you checked what your dream clients expectations and needs are?

In the workshop the actors all had the speech that they were working on, in their hand, printed on paper. One of the pieces of advice that the actors were given was not to read straight from the text and worry about getting the words exact immediately. They were invited to share with audience until that happens. The focus was ”not how to speak the verse but how to make the audience listen”.

A coaching question to consider: What else can you do to make a potential client listen?

If you were to draw connections between the last two points you may say that being aware of when things change allows flexibility in approaches and communication to reflect where someone is now.

As a coach you may be aware of a benefit that your clients value above all else at the need of your work together, however, if that’s not something that they rate as important as a potential client you are likely to struggle to attract their attention initially.

One of the changes that John Barton talked about was that 50 years ago actors had far more experience of working with Shakespeare’s texts in rep theatre etc prior to working with the RSC. This has also brought a change in attitude in those who he works with – “Now actors are perfectly prepared to turn up, knowing nothing, plunge in and find out.”

One of the things that many talk about that you can get from coaching is new insights – which can be thought about as a new thought or perspective not previously seen. As a coach I love when clients are happy to plunge into a conversation and find out what happens.

A coaching question to consider: If you were to let yourself” plunge into a topic and find out,” what would you do differently?

I loved watching two different directors at work with the same group to see each reaction and hear the comments that they made at specific points.

Both directors explained that they had similar approaches about how they work. John Barton said “You do a bit, then I react and pick out what I think will be the most useful for you at this moment.” Whilst Greg Doran said that he was only going to give a “Small nudge [as I] don’t want to say more then I have to, to get you going.” Asking himself “What can I say that’s minimal that will allow them to take off?”

This means that the responses and comments are different for different actors.

Why do I mention this in this piece? I don’t know about you but when I coach one of the questions I’m considering is a variation of “what is going to make the biggest difference at this moment?” And “what is the nudge that is going to get this person going?”

A coaching question to consider: What is the one thing that is going to make the biggest difference for you?

As part of a discussion about the words in the text that the actors were working on they were told, “Words themselves have a life of their own” providing a “series of clues and opportunities, that as long as you know how to read, you can then make it your own.”

As a coach you may be aware that in a coaching conversation sometimes it is certain words that prompts you to ask a particular question. Sometimes it may be a specific statement but other times it may be a clue that suggests a belief or perception that is hindering a client.

One of the things that I can see new coaches hunt for is the “right question” to ask in a specific circumstance. I’ve come to see, over time, that there is often more than one question that can be asked. It’s picking up on the clues and opportunities that allow you to develop your own coaching style that makes a difference for your clients.

There were many, many other areas I could discuss prompted by the examples and comments I saw and heard in that session and the one I wrote about last week. However, if I did this would turn into a piece as long as a Shakespearean play!

So before I go I wanted to share one last thing. That workshop had individuals with a wide range of RSC experience involved – ranging from 50 years to those who had only just joined. They all agreed that the great thing about RSC is “the other stuff that goes on” – it’s a learning environment.

To put this into context; the RSC has some of the best in their fields working for them – to my knowledge, an actor can only audition if they are specifically invited. Yet they are continually asking questions and it’s “impressed on that [we] don’t know it all.” They “encourage you to ask questions and to explore” which was credited with inspiring “investment from the company.”

I invite you to ask questions and explore more this week and see the difference that focus has for you.

Love

Jen

About the Author

Jen Waller is on a mission to support, nurture and encourage coaching skills and talents from non-coach to coach and beyond.

She has created a free 7 day e-course about how to create your own unique coaching welcome pack that works for you and your clients. Get your copy here.

Second World Business & Executive Coaching Summit Pre-series

25 April 2012 in Coaching / live event / Resource / site news / websites

Before you missed the complimentary Pre-Summit series I wanted to draw your attention to a global conference that aspires to raise the bar for coaching professionals.

The Pre-Summit series, May 1-31, 2012, offers a complimentary opportunity to sample the sessions of the full Summit before registering. (The full Summit runs June 14-29, 2012.) For more details visit here.

A selection of the 25 luminaries presenting include:

Dr. Marshall Goldsmith – voted the world’s #1 leadership thinker by Harvard Business Review;
Sir John Whitmore – the pre-eminent thinker in leadership and organisational change;
Prof. Vijay Govindarajan – voted the world’s #1 strategic thinker by Harvard Business Review;
Verne Harnish – named one of the “Top 10 Minds in Small Business” by Fortune magazine;

The skills, topics and strategies attendees can expect to learn about include:

highly effective coaching,
sales,
niche leadership,
creation of complimentary products and multiple income streams,
client retention,
intellectual property,
social media,
networking and much more.

This will be the second year that the conference takes place, with 7000 coaches from 129 countries participating via easy-to-use webinar technology. The aim is to deliver “sales-pitch-free, rich content to live audiences” allowing questions to be asked of presenters real-time and interaction with other attendees.

It’s a great opportunity to get exposure and experience different coaches and trainers styles, knowledge and expertise. Click here to register for the Pre-Summit series.

What can we learn from best practice in other fields? 1

23 April 2012 in Coaching / General life improvement tagged business coach / business coaching / career coaching / Cicely Berry / coach / coaches / coaching / coaching content / coaching courses / coaching qualifications / coaching session / coaching skills / coaching techniques / executive coach / leadership coaching / life coach / life coaches / life coaching / performance coaching / personal development / resource / RSC / The Royal Shakespeare Company / William Shakespeare

Although it’s a best guess, today is the day which is credited as being Shakespeare’s 448 birthday! So it seemed appropriate to publish this post today.

What can we learn from best practice in other fields?

Both this week’s Monday post and next week’s will focus on two workshops I have recently observed. Some of the following will specifically talk about a different industry with different job titles, yet I invite you to consider the points that you, as a coach, can take from this experience.

To help, I’ve added a few coaching questions to consider throughout this piece, however, feel free to ask your own coaching questions as they occur to you.

Last week I spent a delightful, if somewhat rainy, day in Stratford – Upon – Avon. The Royal Shakespeare Company (the RSC) was having an open day with various events scheduled throughout the day.

For those who are not aware of The RSC they are a theatre company who see their “job to connect people with Shakespeare and produce bold, ambitious work with living writers, actors and artists.”

The first workshop I watched was led by the RSC’s “Head of Voice” Cicely Berry. We were first treated to a bit of history about how in 1969 the RSC was the first theatre company in the UK to employ someone specifically to work with actors just for voice. It was felt that the training that the young actors were getting did not prepare them to “fill spaces.”

Being a new approach, Cicely Berry described how she was working on her feet, figuring out strategies and techniques as she went along.

She described how one of the issues she saw was that often actors lost connection with characters by conforming to what the director wanted.

Coaching is often discussed as being a “new field” and I do see some coaches figuring out new strategies and techniques as they go along – ones that work for themselves and their clients.

However, I also see some coaches who have lost connection with themselves – either because they are conforming to what a respected “expert” has wanted or by their own interpretation about who they “should” be as a coach.

A coaching question to consider: if you were working on your feet figuring out strategies and techniques as you went along, what would you be doing different?

As head of voice, Cicely Berry says “My job is to get them [the actors] free from their left hand side of the brain, understanding and really hearing it for themselves.”

A coaching question to consider: Are you aware as a coach what your role is working with your clients?

I know, personally I can have many different roles depending upon the client I am working with and where they are at any given moment. Certainly, as a coach one of the roles that I am aware that I do is to assist my client to hear their own inner wisdom – instead of listening to the stories and logical reasons they had been telling themselves.

As it was a workshop you probably won’t be surprised to hear that we also saw the actors participating in various exercises designed to emphasis various technical aspects.

One of these exercises was about recognising the beat and rhythm of a particular piece as the underlying rhythm gives incredible energy and makes it active.

A different exercise focused upon demonstrating that it Isn’t necessarily the volume you speak but reaching out with constinents etc that means you can be heard even in the back row of the auditorium.

A coaching question to consider: what else could you do to add incredible energy to something you are currently working upon?

Even though more mature in her years and walking with the use of a stick, she still got up during exercises to stand in the middle of the action. She made sure that she was monitoring what was happening and what each participant was doing. Often the exercises involved lots of movement and quick changes in direction. In the middle of this if any actor turned unexpectedly in her direction she just put a hand in front of her and stood her ground so they didn’t unintentionally bump into her.

A coaching question to consider: What more can you do to be more in the middle of the action?

As I watched I was aware that if we were to use labels that coaches would be familiar with there were numerous examples that we could use.

For example, after explaining an exercise she asked a variation of the question “Do you mind doing that?”

You may be familiar as a coach with checking someones willingness to an action. This phrasing not only does that but also being a closed question she was inviting a straight forward yes or no answer without any “story” associated with that.

At the end of each exercise the participants were asked, “What did you get from that?” giving them the opportunity to reflect and reinforce the learning from the exercise.

So my final coaching question to consider this week is: “What can you learn/take from this post?”

Using quotes in coaching – remembering them in the first place

21 March 2012 in Coaching tagged business coach / business coaching / career coaching / coach / coaches / coaching / coaching content / coaching courses / coaching qualifications / coaching session / coaching skills / coaching techniques / executive coach / leadership coaching / learning / life coach / life coaches / life coaching / memory / performance coaching / personal development / quotes / resource

In last week’s coaching post I asked “Do you use quotes in your coaching?” In that post I talked about why you may want to use a quote in a coaching session.

I was then asked a great question on twitter about if I had any tips about how to remember quotes. Many potential answers sprang to mind, all longer than the 140 characters I can use in a tweet so today’s coaching post was born. Feel free to add your own method and thoughts at the end of today’s post.

I will share some ways that I personally have used to remember quotes as well as offering some thoughts around this in general. As you read this, I invite you to notice which ones are most appealing to you.

Firstly, don’t presume that you have to remember them word for word to be able to use a quote. I know that may seem an odd place to start in a post about remembering quotes but I think it’s worth pointing out. There are several situations that can let you refer to a written form of the quote.

This may be down to the situation that you are coaching around. I used the example last week of coaching a customer-facing employee in a business where you may choose to quote a specific customer – is that a quote you wrote down at the time of observation, or is it a quote that you have taken from a written piece of feedback etc?

Can you incorporate reading a quote directly? Either from notes you use/take during a session or other methods.

For example, if you coach via the phone, can you pin some quotes within sight to glance at when needed? If you have written the quote down/it’s in a book, could you just reach out from where you are working and grab that so you can read out the quote?

Be prepared. Perhaps your client sent you a completed pre-session preparation/ exercise of some form in advance and a particular quote sprang to mind as you read it. What’s stopping you from having that quote to hand to use in case it’s still relevant when you talk to that client?

Last week I also spoke about using quotes to “borrow authority” to focus your clients attention or increase their willingness to answer a question or do an exercise. It can be used as a convincer to add extra-perceived credibility. If this is an exercise that requires you to print materials, could you add the quote onto the page in advance?

Make use of the strategies you already use when you coach – if you make a point of using the precise language and phrasing that a client uses, how do you do that? How can you use that same approach to use the same precise language and phrasing in a particular quote?

How much attention to quotes are you paying? It’s a lot easier to recognise that you are using quotes if you have acknowledged that they are quotes in the first place. 🙂 It’s also easier to remember to use “a quote” if you have mentally thought of that phrase/saying etc as a quote.

Over the years I have used various methods that have led to me memorising quotes. Some of these methods have been a conscious attempt to easily recall a quote. On other occasions it’s just been a by-product of another event/activity.

Some of the most popular tweets that get shared from this blogs twitter feed come from song lyrics, films and TV. Consider the quotes you already have in your memory.

When I was still in education, one of the ways I revised for my history exams was to learn various quotes to back up various historical perspectives of events. I had turned this into a game – I wrote each quote on it’s own card, the quote on one side and a brief description on the other. I could then use those as a memory aid and just play, often involving repeating what was on the card.

On other occasions I’d use them to play and draw “Pictionary” style representations of the quote that stuck in my memory (often because they just looked ridiculous, after all I was studying history not art 😉 )

I also remember learning one set of quotes stood in a different location in the room – so when I came to recall the quote I imagined standing in the location that I’d connected to that phrase. I was even known at one stage to replace the lyrics of songs with the quotes instead.

I’ve also found that I’ve learnt quotes purely because I’ve heard or seen something over and over again – maybe because it’s stuck to the wall in a prominent place. Perhaps I’ve heard someone else say it many, many, times over.

My suggestion would be if you decide to actively memorise quotes to use a method that appeals to you and is fun and easy for you.

What other methods would you add to these suggestions? Has something popped into your mind as you read this that you want to go and play with?

About the Author

Jen Waller is on a mission to support, nurture and encourage coaching skills and talents from non-coach to coach and beyond.

She has created a free 7 day e-course about how to create your own unique coaching welcome pack that works for you and your clients. Get your copy here.

Do you use any quotes in your coaching? 1

14 March 2012 in Coaching tagged business coach / business coaching / career coaching / coach / coaches / coaching / coaching content / coaching courses / coaching qualifications / coaching session / coaching skills / coaching techniques / executive coach / leadership coaching / life coach / life coaches / life coaching / pace / performance coaching / personal development / quotes / resource / Richard Branson / Rudyard Kipling / words

“Words are, of course, the most powerful drug used by mankind.” (Rudyard Kipling)

If you have been following this blog on twitter you will have noticed a regular number of quotes tweeted throughout the day. These are quotes that often prompt a response from those reading.

It’s not at all unknown for one person to contact me to share that they disagree with the words in one quote, whilst someone else will tell me that the exact same quote is positive and encouraging, maybe even offering a new useful insight.

So are you reading that and thinking that a quote like that would be one that you would or wouldn’t like to use in a coaching session?

Quotes are yet another thing that can be at the coaches disposal to use during a coaching session. As with all methods that are at our disposal as coaches when and if you decide to use a quote will vary on individual circumstance. But why would you want to use quotes?

I thought I’d share some of the things I consider when using quotes and which ones to use. Quotes are not the only way of doing many of these points; it is just another approach to have added flexibility.

I may use a quote as a starting point with a client. Perhaps a way to gently test if my suspicions about a belief or perspective that is causing an obstacle for the client. Using the quote as a way to gauge their reaction and take the next step.

I may also use a quote to “pace” the clients current position before leading them into exploring new perspectives. By “pace” I mean starting with the same perspective as the client. It is quite possible that the quotes that are most appropriate in this instance are not necessarily a perspective you personally share.

I personally believe that my work is not just about what happens during our scheduled time together but also about being a catalyst and facilitating outside of that time. If I know I’m working with a client who likes to learn by researching it is possible that I will use a quote to credit an origin of an approach etc if I suspect that they may want to explore that in more depth.

It is not the only reason I may use quotes as a coach. I may want to use a quote to gently provoke and challenge. Placing a distance between the words of the quote and the person saying it in some circumstances can make it easier for the listener to hear the message or underlying question.

Some coaches also use quotes if they feel that a more direct option may damage the coaching relationship. Perhaps they are at the start of their coaching relationship and feel that the client may feel defensive if it’s offered as a direct observation or question.

You can also use quotes to “borrow authority” to focus your clients attention or increase their willingness to answer a question or do an exercise. It can be used as a convincer to add extra-perceived credibility.

For example, coaching a customer-facing employee in a business you may choose to quote a specific customer. It’s entirely possible that your client will be far more open to a conversation around this than if a bystander voices the same opinion.

Or maybe you know that your client admires Richard Branson and the way he does business. You may choose to introduce an exercise around adding fun into a situation with “I’ve heard Richard Branson say ‘A business has to be involving, it has to be fun, and it has to exercise your creative instincts.’”

You may also use quotes that can inspire and motivate, grab attention or trigger new thoughts. It’s not at all unknown for me to share a quote for no better reason that it’s one that I think a client will like! 🙂

What about you? Do you use quotes in your coaching? If so what else would you add to this post?

About the Author

Jen Waller is on a mission to support, nurture and encourage coaching skills and talents from non-coach to coach and beyond.

She has created a free 7 day e-course about how to create your own unique coaching welcome pack that works for you and your clients. Get your copy here.

How to start charging for your coaching – part two

7 March 2012 in Coaching tagged business coach / business coaching / career coaching / charging / charity / coach / coaches / coaching / coaching content / coaching courses / coaching fee / coaching qualifications / coaching session / coaching skills / coaching techniques / executive coach / exhange / leadership coaching / life coach / life coaches / life coaching / money / payment / performance coaching / personal development / price / resource / value

When to make a transition to start charging for your coaching?

Last week I discussed what’s stopping you from charging for your coaching? This week I want to continue that conversation and look at some different approaches people can take to making the transition to easily asking for an exchange of money?

I’m not going to tell you what you should do but let me share the following approaches and see which appeals to you.

You may even notice that you have been trying one approach and it hasn’t been working for you.

You may spot that I use the word exchange a lot in this article. That is deliberate because you are exchanging your service for an agreed payment of some kind.

All sorts of beliefs, values and fears can get in the way of a coach charging. I will also offer the perspective that what you ask for in exchange for your service can be changed.

Coaching provides value. It is your duty as a coach to communicate that value by ALWAYS asking for an exchange of money.

I have no doubt that this school of thought is said with all the best intentions in the world. They already see the value that you can bring to your clients. However, I’ve also seen it be a belief that has stopped coaches from practicing because they didn’t feel ready to charge. The end result being that they don’t do any coaching so are not bringing any value to anyone.

If you are happy with this approach you may choose to start charging right from the word go. Your clients will soon let you know if they are not happy with what you are asking for in exchange. 🙂

Coach as many people as you can, regardless of if there is an exchange of money or not. Anybody who will agree – from the person who delivers your post to old school friends. Take the opportunity to get lots of experience.

If you want to use this approach, make it easy for yourself and put in place some form of system that supports you to spot the difference you make for your clients. You choose what will work for you: perhaps it’s getting feedback from a knowledgeable third party, maybe it’s having a set of questions you work through after each coaching session or even ask your client directly!

Invite your client to pay you what they feel the value that your work has provided.

This will depend upon your style but some clients may feel awkward with this request.

Invite your client to exchange your coaching for some other form of payment other than money.

In effect this is like a bartering system. For example, perhaps you will agree to work with a website designer to create a site for you in exchange for coaching.

If you choose to use this system then you will make it easier if both of you agree in advance what will be provided by both of you.

Remember that different services will have different value to each individual. For example, someone who does not have a computer and has no intention to have a website will not consider that a website design will be that valuable to them. Someone else who is looking to create a website but hates the idea of working out how to design it themselves will value a website design much more highly!

This means that sometimes in a barter exchange one half can end up feeling that their service is being under valued etc.

Exchanging your coaching for an agreed donation to a charity of your choice.

Make an agreement that your client will “pay it forward” by donating their time and/skills etc to someone else.

Again this is often a gentle approach that some like to take to get comfortable asking for an exchange for the service they provide, before moving onto asking that exchange involve money.

Wait until a set time/event has happened

This normally takes the form of not charging until qualified or attended a particular course.

Sometimes this particular approach has a moving goal post, for example, I’ll charge once I have done the first training weekend becomes, I’ll charge once I am qualified becomes I’ll charge when I’ve worked with x number of clients or when I’ve done another course etc.

Have I missed an approach? Want to share which way you used, or the option that appeals most to you? Fill in the reply box below and click submit comment.

About the Author

Jen Waller is on a mission to support, nurture and encourage coaching skills and talents from non-coach to coach and beyond.

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