Business Coaching: The Benefits

15 January 2015

CAN BUSINESS COACHING REALLY HELP YOUR BUSINESS?
Business coaching is on the increase. It is viewed as a cost-effective means of driving enhanced performance. The benefits of business coaching are substantial with 79% of medium and large businesses in the United Kingdom reported as using coaching of some type to support their high growth ambitions.

In my last post New Year, New Start, New Plan, I suggested that setting goals and making a plan for the year ahead was good practice. Research shows that it is two times more likely to happen.

However, there are times when a business can simply become stuck and it takes more than producing a plan or setting a new goal for it to become unstuck. Sometimes, we need a different kind of help. A Business Coach can offer a ‘fresh pair of eyes’ that brings a new perspective to any situation. Especially, when we believe that we have exhausted all the options.

How Can a Business Coach Help?

1. one-to-one coaching sessions can help you to give time to solving the problem that hitherto you have avoided because you are too busy to allocate the time to sort it out.
2. Coaching helps you to reflect on your own behaviour, learn and grow from it. However, you will only benefit if you have a desire to change behaviour and be willing to take some personal responsibility.
3. A good coach will ask the awkward questions so all the possibilities are explored in order achieve clarity on how to take the business forward. They will offer an independent review of your business, working with you to establish a business plan for improvement and change.
4. A coach does not judge but offers an impartial ear enabling you to share your fears, doubts and aspirations with someone who has formerly been in the same position. Being able to confide in someone outside of your business has enormous benefits.

How to Choose a Business Coach

When engaging a business coach, you should ensure that it is someone who has a good understanding of your business, ideally with experience in your sector, and someone whom you feel you can trust. The latter is particularly important because you should be able to confide in your coach, the good and bad things about yourself, your business and you in the business.

Funding for a Business Coach

In the UK, the Government is investing £180m in identifying companies with high growth potential. GrowAccelerator assigns a business coach into the business, to work alongside the Directors and Management Team. The Programme is run via the Business Growth Service.

After more 2 years in operation, the Programme shows that of the 18,000 businesses being supported, 93% agree that it has helped them achieve their goals. Even more importantly, those businesses are currently growing 4x times faster than the average SME.

Although it is problematic to try to quantify the beneficial effect that coaching has on the bottom line, research demonstrates that a number of indirect benefits can be realised, leading to improved engagement, better performance, greater efficiency and effectiveness and, ultimately, enhanced business results.  It’s a new year. Why not think about the reasons why engaging the right coach, can help you, your management team and your business, to grow and improve your business.

Jean Talbot is a Business Coach operating from Harrogate, North Yorkshire. She specialises in long-term change and strategy planning, as well as process improvement SMEs. If you are struggling to shape where you want your business to be next year, contact me on 07795810639 or at www.lamplighterassociates.com. I can help you be focused on growing and improving your business.