My Leadership Journey

I thought it might be helpful to tell you a little bit about my personal journey and let you know how I came to focus on ‘coaching’ as my career.

As a young leader in the 90’s, I was the Manager for the Regional Training Unit for what was then the Department of Social Welfare. My team had a pivotal role in the organisation to train frontline staff. I had a team of very capable and committed trainers and while I was helping them to learn to develop others, there was a huge gap in their own personal and professional development. I was able to teach them to perform a FUNCTION but I recognised that there was something missing.

Discovering my own leadership voice

My natural leadership style is to ‘coach’ so I developed a basic coaching program to help my team discover their buy-in to both their business goals as well as their personal aspirations. This was my first ‘aha’ into the process of developing authentic leaders because I recognised the leaders aren’t born, they are made.

So, what was the missing piece to the jig-saw? I discovered that it is recognising what we want to protect, promote and preserve – the things that allow us to gain some ‘skin in the game’ with our most desired goals and outcomes.

Understanding Our Personal Why

As I focused on developing my coaching practise, I recognised that as we put ourselves in the centre of our own lives we become very practised at requiring a personal commitment to each goal regardless of whether it is a business or personal goal. The question that I now ask my clients to consider is “Why will you bother?” This question allows for personal buy-in as well as for well-constructed action to happen because when the going gets tough, we will always understand our personal ‘why’.

Why Will I Bother?

With this question as my driver towards discovery, I then use a process called ‘Mining, Defining and Shining’. Put simply, we MINE for what is most important to us, DEFINE the list down to areas that feel urgent to work on and then SHINE these areas, creating statements of INTENTION around them.

Creating the Coaching Space

So, I was destined to become a coach, creating a space where my clients can establish their own pathway towards actualising better outcomes in the areas that are most important to them. This self-directed, personally committed activity allows for growth and development, both professionally and personally.

I sit in the coaching space myself every 2 weeks. I take an hour out with my coach to focus on my goals and desired outcomes. This enables me to drive consciously towards my destination, being in control of both direction and pathway. Coaching is my profession, my passion as well as one of the tools I use personally to gain both success and satisfaction in my own career and life.