5 Areas Where a Business Coach Can Add Value
Providing better products and services is only one of many skills required to run a company successfully.
Launching a new business is easy, but staying in business is much harder.
When entrepreneurs come up with a new business idea, they often leverage their own knowledge and capabilities to find novel solutions. As experts in their fields, they like to focus on delivering better products and services to their customers.
If you are a photographer, your next photo will always be better than the last one. As a chef, you will learn new techniques or be inspired by other cuisines to create dishes that are even more delicious than those you have prepared before. The same applies to most business owners. Advancing their skills to serve their customers better is what drove them to start their company. And making a difference is what they love to do.
While providing better products and services is essential, it only covers one of many skills required to run a company successfully.
As an entrepreneur, you also have to know how to
market your business in person, on the internet, or on social media to attract new customers;
maintain accurate financial records;
calculate a profit;
read a balance sheet;
file your taxes and licenses;
manage your employees;
improve the efficiency of your company's workflow;
invest in computer software and hardware;
procure raw materials at reasonable prices.
Unfortunately, this list is not complete. However, it is crucial to realize that each of these topics can present a surprising blind spot that, if left unaddressed, can jeopardize your company's very existence or at least cost you a lot of money to solve later.
1: Identifying Your Blind Spots
Like sports coaches, who enable learning and offer advice based on the strengths and weaknesses of each player, business coaches help entrepreneurs understand their company's strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats and provide feedback and ideas on how to address any issues without losing focus of the goals.
Business coaches work with their clients regularly and maintain a relationship of trust and integrity. As outsiders, business coaches tend to stay emotionally neutral, letting the facts speak instead. Drawing from their past professional careers and experience with other business owners, they can be of tremendous value to new entrepreneurs eager to succeed.
2: Seeing the Bigger Picture
Since business coaches are not employees of their clients' companies, they are not part of the power dynamics every business encounters. As outsiders, they can help the leadership team see the bigger picture of where their company is headed and the consequences of their actions or inactions. They also often provide honest feedback on their client's financial metrics.
Running a fast-growing startup can be very challenging, and any business owner can quickly get sidetracked and lost in the details. Maintaining a strategic view, understanding what it all means and what to focus on and when is crucial to success.
3: Benefiting From a Different Perspective
People sometimes interpret the same event differently. What may be bad news from one perspective may be good news from another, or vice versa. It often depends on how you process the news given your experience. Seasoned business coaches have encountered many situations in their long careers. They have decades of knowledge that you can draw on and benefit from a different perspective.
4: Staying Focused on Your Goals
Achieving your goals rarely happens in a straight line. There are just too many internal and external variables affecting your company. A suddenly changing legal environment. The affordability of rental real estate space. The availability of qualified employees. These are only a few external factors that have the potential to derail the best business plan.
Like a small boat shaken by waves in a stormy sea, as long as you are heading in the right direction, you will eventually reach your destination. Maybe not in the timeframe you initially thought. But you will get there. During this journey, keeping your confidence and focus on your goals is crucial. Having a business coach on your side makes that easier.
5: Helping With Your Personal Growth
As you dedicate yourself fully to running your company, you will shape your business, but your company will also shape you. Being an entrepreneur is a tremendous personal growth opportunity. In the beginning, you will learn something new every day. As open as you may be to acquiring new skills, you may find that you like doing some tasks more than others. A business coach can help you gain confidence, overcome fear, and improve your time management.
In summary, a business coach can add tremendous value to any of these five areas. Their wealth of knowledge, experience, and people skills can make them an effective resource in guiding you through the early stages of your new venture.
