I’ve been excited to share my experience with this.In fact, I think it’s alittle weird to be sharing…BUT, I think this will behelpful for a lot of you.*Opens kimono*So, I spent $24k on a coachand my business went backward…Yup, I said it.Revenue went backward.It’s not for reasons youmight be thinking though…In today’s episode I breakdown what happened and what you should do and not do when hiring a coach.
Transcript / MP3
So I hired a coach and my business actually went backwards. Does that mean I’m not going to invest in coaches or mentors? Again? Absolutely not. And here’s why.For three years, my agency built funnels and automation systems for the biggest names in marketing today since then have transformed that agency into a hyper profitable training and consulting business. While everyone is out there talking about scale, like it’s some sort of destination, we’ll be asking the real question, how do you transform your business into a more scalable model using the knowledge, skills and expertise that you already have? This podcast is here to give you the answer. …Join me and follow along as I learn, apply and share the strategies I’m using to build my multimillion dollar business. My name is Greg Hickman and welcome to scalable. What’s going on guys, welcome back and in this episode I actually want to talk about something that feels awkward actually kind of weird to talk about. So hopefully you appreciate this, this topic. Um, I’ve had a handful of conversations with, with close friends of mine and also a few people that I’ve kind of re re caught up with so to speak. Uh, peers of mine. And what I’m finding a lot is the, the similarities in our stories. Um, really the ups and downs. And if you’re trying to build a business, if you’re an agency owner and you’re trying to grow that or you’re an agency owner and you’re trying to get out of that by adding on more leveraged streams of revenue, like mentorship and coaching, which is a lot of what we teach our clients, guess what, business is hard. Uh, there’s going to be ups and downs if you go into this game expecting that there isn’t going to be ups and downs, like you got another thing coming.And so in my conversations, uh, you know, I had shared a story about how um, the, now by the time you’re listening to this, this is happened a long time ago, but the story still resonates because the lesson still applies and it’s actually a lesson that I keep, keep telling myself. And again, a lot of this podcast is very much for me. I’m sharing these stories and lessons so that I can look back on them as well and learn because I can continue to learn from my old mistakes and also the lessons that I’ve learned along the way. So that’s pretty much a lot of this podcast is for me. But I know a lot of you guys are going through the exact same thing. So what I was telling my friend was that, you know, I went through a period in my business where I was working with too many calm coaches, are going through working with too many consultants at one time, uh, specifically I was in a really high level mastermind.Um, that was, I’d say in its earlier stages of infancy. Uh, and then I simultaneously a coaching program together. These were very large investments. One was 40 grand a year and one was 24 grand a year. And for me, what I learned about myself, and so, you know, the, the kind of, the topic of this podcast was, you know, I invested in a coach and my business went backwards. But will I do it again? And the answer is yes. Because what I learned was that the fact that my business went backwards actually had nothing, nothing to do with the coach that I, that I had hired. It had everything to do with me. And what I learned about myself was that I was taking in way too many inputs at the exact same time, many of which were, um, I don’t want to say they were contradictory, you know, the methodology of one was not necessarily the methodology of the other program I was in.But what happened to me was I was consuming, consuming, consuming, asking questions, asking questions, asking questions in each of these programs and to the communities because they were also powerful communities along with these programs. And I’m not going to say what these programs were or who the coach was, again, because it had nothing to do with them. This applies to a lot of situations and I just had too many inputs and because I had too many inputs, I got in my own head and I got in my own head. Thus I’d actually didn’t take any action at all and the lack of action and the constant second guessing of should I do this or should I do that, let me go check and kind of seek validation from this person over here. Let me go seek validation from that person over there before ever doing anything is why my business went backwards.It was the lack of action. It was the inaction and the non application of things that I was learning and not only that, it was also the non application of doing the things that I should have been doing consistently over and over and over again and this is why one of our core values in our company has become do the unsexy work because it’s not fun to always be launching new ads and always writing new copy and always creating new podcasts all the time, right? It sometime is draining. Sometimes you don’t know what to talk about. Sometimes you don’t feel great on that day, but it’s the sheer act of showing up consistently that is going to get you to your result. And also the sheer act of constantly applying the information that you’re learning. You could go spend whatever money on a coaching program or a course. And if you don’t apply anything, you’re not going to be able to, or you shouldn’t expect to get any sort of result. Okay. Rocky.And if you just heard that squeaking, that was my dog and a chewy toy, I just had to throw that in the other room. He may bring it back. But it is the, the willingness and commitment to continue to do the unsexy work. Right. A lot of us, I think I said in the last episode, you know, think that, Oh, you can just hire a coach or you know, join a mastermind and they’re going to build this seven figure business for you. And while I didn’t think that, um, I just kept consuming and consuming from various inputs and didn’t implement and the, the kind of second guessing myself and thus then not taking fast enough action on certain things, that was the result of why my business actually went backwards and actually started solving problems out of order because I started becoming blind to the actual problem that was, um, in my business at the time.And I was looking at what everyone else was doing. And so I think one of the things that happens a lot, uh, you know, people, I talked, you know, I talked to know agency owners all the time about joining our programs and if they’re, you know, heavily invested into another program, depending upon where they’re at, I actually say, Hey, it’s probably not the best time because with where you’re at, it’s going to be at an additional input that you might not need right now. And there’s also times where I’ll speak with a prospect and the programs that they’re in are actually very complimentary to what we do. And thus, I don’t think it’ll be a huge issue. And I think that’s okay. I think what I did and my mistake was, um, you know, the business was growing really quick. Things were really, really good.And so I kind of, honestly, I think Chris had a little bit of an ego and I was like, I’m going to invest in all of the best coaches when I really should have just continued to keep my head down doing what more of what was working and applying more of the things that I hadn’t gotten to yet that I knew I needed to do. And instead I hired coach, consultant, mastermind, whatever, bought a course and just kept consuming. And that led to a lot of inaction, a lot of second guessing. And with entrepreneurs, it’s very easy to get in our own head and then not do anything. It happens all the time. And so that is what happened to me. So I wanted to kind of share that because you know, people, I tell this story and they’re like, well, are you, are you not gonna like you shouldn’t hire a coach again?And it’s like, no, I’m 100 I want to hire. I actually want to hire a mentor. I want to find the next person that I’m like really truly aligned with and resonate with because that’s the person that I’m going to hire. I’m not going to go invest in 15 different programs all at once because then I have too many inputs. And really for many of us, and again I’m saying this to myself, but also to you is more likely than not. You know what you need to do and you just need to be reminded to continue to do it. You don’t need to keep learning new stuff. Now if there’s a bottleneck in your business and it’s a bottleneck because you lack a skill, which typically there’s there, there is a common, uh, common thread with a lot of agency owners that have, you know, are stuck somewhere between 20 and 30 K a month.That usually it’s a skill that you need to acquire and you need to go learn that skill or go find the person that has that skill, that can bring it, bring it to the table. And that’s where a lot of these programs do come in handy. When you go buy courses, like I love buying courses to go acquire a new skill so that I have enough knowledge about it to either start doing it myself and then be able to hire someone else to do it internally on our team and or at least interview someone with some level of knowledge to be able to bring them on board. So will I, will I invest in a coach and a mentor again? Yes. I’ve even before this experience that I’m sharing now I have invested in courses and or programs that you know haven’t worked, but then I hired the next one and it worked.I got help, I got the help that I needed, I got the the mindset shift that I needed. So look, if you’ve been burnt before or if you’ve invested in a course or a mentor or a coach and it hasn’t worked, that shouldn’t deter you from doing it again. You need to look at that as a lesson and understand why it didn’t work for you and likely it has nothing to do with the course or the content or the coach. It has everything to do with the lack of implementation that you probably, you know, put in and or maybe in some cases you were trying to do too much, maybe like me and that kind of paralyze you and you just didn’t apply anything because all you were doing was assessing opportunities. But if all you’re doing is assessing opportunities and you never decide to do any one thing, that creates a lot of anxiety.A quote that one of my previous mentors share just recently that I want to share with you about this kind of feeling is this anxiety lives in the space between alternatives. Anxiety lives in the space between alternatives. And so if you’re consuming all of these things like I had been, you have a lot of options as to Oh well I can do what I learned over here or I want a model that piece over there and I want a model that piece over there and you start giving yourself all of these options and all these paths to doing the thing that could get you to the result. The reality is many of them will probably get you to the exact same result. It’s just a matter of deciding. So hopefully this message finds you well today. Um, again, if you’ve been burned by, if you feel like you’ve been burned by a course or a coach, don’t look at that as a mistake.Look at that as a lesson. Now you know that the next time you invest, you’re going to invest more wisely into something that’s going to be more of a fit for you. Maybe it just wasn’t a fit, but the reality is you wouldn’t have known until you did it. So it’s actually you just still, you’ve shortened the gap into understanding what you want because now you know more clearly what you don’t want. And that’s really what I’ve learned is one, you know, I was, my major takeaways were I was consuming too much so I didn’t take action. The lack of action was what turned into the lack of result. That’s the first one. So that probably could apply to you in many cases. But then the second is, okay, well now when I go to invest in a mastermind or go to hire a mentor in the future, which I will do, I have a much better sense of what type of person I want to hire.What sort of values do they need to have? What sort of structure do I feel like the program needs to offer in order to, for me to extract the most value and then I’m going to T going to decide and invest in one of them and go all in and really continue to look for that one nugget. I have a previous episode of my biggest lesson from interviewing my clients and one of my clients basically said, look, there’s a lot of value that you, that you deliver to us in your program. I’m always looking for that one nugget that I can apply that’s going to, you know, multiply my business and that’s the thing. If you’re just consuming, consuming, and consuming and trying to execute on every little thing that you learn, it’s going to be tough to find that one nugget that is going to be the real catalyst for your growth, for you to hit your goals.So I spent 24 grand for a coaching program for a year and my business went backwards. Will I do it again? I will invest in a coach again. I will invest in a mentor again. And because of that I learned more about what I need from the next program and I’m all the wiser. And guess what? It had again had nothing to do with that coach or their program or their style of program and had everything to do with me not actually putting in the work and up and applying it because I was taking in too many inputs. So for some of you, you might just need to cut out some of those inputs and go all in on the help that you currently have. And, or if you don’t have any help, maybe you need to focus in by getting that one mentor that you resonate with right now and start working with them and applying what they’re you and ask them how they think and learn how they think. Those are the sorts of things that are going to get you ahead. Hopefully you found this helpful. If your an agency owner and you’re looking to transition out of the done for you service game by launching a group coaching or mentorship program that compliments your agency services, uh, send me a private message. I’d love to chat with you about how we can help accelerate that path. Obviously if it’s a fit, so hope you guys enjoy the rest of your day. Be good.If I give you five to 10 new clients, would you or your agency break if so, your current agency model is broken? I struggle with this too until I found a better way by adding online programs, training and coaching to our agency, we doubled profits without adding more hours. If you want to work directly with me and my team to transform your agency, visit my scalable business.com to learn more.
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