What happens in a coaching session?
If you’ve never worked with a coach before, you might wonder what happens in a coaching session. Working with a coach is quite different from working with a consultant - whereas a consultant simply tells you what the best course of action is, a coach works with you to help you decide for yourself how to move forward.
Each coaching session is tailored to a client’s specific needs. One of the things I enjoy about coaching sessions is that they’re both structured and fluid - every 60 minute coaching session follows a very similar structure, but the content, questions, tools, and topic areas discussed are all directed in the moment by the client and the flow of the conversation.
Here’s what you could expect to happen during a typical coaching session:
Check-in: We always spend some time checking in at the beginning of the coaching session. If there were homework or action items that a client planned to complete, we would spend some time discussing how those went and what insights were found.
Agenda setting: Coaching agendas are co-created between coach and client. This doesn’t mean that a client needs to come to the session prepared with meeting minutes! We spend time at the beginning of each coaching session setting the agenda together. Clients typically come to the coaching session with a general topic they’d like to discuss - as a coach, I ask questions that help the client hone in on that topic more deeply and set goals for the session.
Powerful questions: Powerful questions are at the heart of coaching. During a typical coaching session, we will spend the vast majority of our time asking and answering powerful questions. Powerful questions create opportunities for deep insights and understanding, furthering a client’s understanding of themselves and their goals. Some examples of powerful questions would be “What tells you that your actions are aligned with your values?” and “Who do you need to be in order to accomplish your goals?”
Coaching tools: Sometimes coaching tools might be integrated into coaching sessions. Coaching tools are useful in that they help provide structure for specific kinds of introspection, but they’re typically only introduced into a session if they’re a clear match with the client’s goal. Tools can also sometimes be part of the homework items a client chooses to complete between sessions.
Homework: Towards the end of the coaching session, there are usually natural action items or next steps that a client may want to complete. At the end of the session, we will discuss what homework a client will choose to complete before the next session. As a coach, I never “assign” homework to a client, but I may offer suggestions and resources that may be a good fit.
Accountability: One of the benefits of working with a coach is that they can serve as an accountability partner. As a coach, I always ask my clients what kind of accountability I can provide in helping them to complete their goals between sessions. Some clients are satisfied with knowing that we will discuss these tasks at our next session during the check-in. Others ask me to reach out over e-mail between sessions as a mid-point check-in. As a coach, I provide whatever kind of accountability that’ll be most useful to my clients!
If you want to learn more about how coaching can benefit you, schedule a free 30-minute coaching session at the link below.
