Smokie Sizemore and Company, Inc.

The United Way of Greater Richmond and Petersburg came to the business community to plan and guide their Emerging Leader Program to facilitate their $18. 5 M fund raising efforts. Community leaders filled the roles including training customized to their needs, reinforced with coaching.

Smokie was instrumental in securing 10 coaches needed to provide the one on one coaching for the 16 Emerging Leaders selected by the United Way. The United Way reported that their aggressive $18.5 million dollar goal was exceeded by the Emerging Leaders due to concentrated training and focus.

Today you're starting that project that's been on the back burner for months. Life shows up. Minutia steals your day. Frustration grows. Your focus is scattered. You've said that before. Another work day ends with the familiar song - same stuff, different day. A sense of accomplishment is nonexistent. No success today.

There is little balance in life. Todays technology allows us to work when we're deep sea fishing in the Gulf Stream, skiing in Aspen, or vacationing in New Zealand. The big picture gets lost when we stay immersed in the day to day operations. Doing more of the same doesn't get those new divisions started or give you more time with your family, let alone quality time.

Eventually it will happen. That project is in the front of your mind. It was the reason you have the position you do. You've even hired that special employee to help you implement it. Maybe you joined forces with a partner with huge connections to expedite it. And still other more pressing, urgent matters fill your day and the project waits another day. It won't stay on the burner any longer.

Something has to change. Now is the time to start. You're not waiting another day. Your sense of purpose is huge. Focus has never been sharper and it feels good. You're in charge again and you will succeed.

Success is defined in Webster's dictionary as the achievement of something desired, intended, or attempted. Reaching goals are the best successes and create the momentum to keep on keeping on. Being successful takes hard work, focus, intentionality, tenacity and support.

Today's wave of successful men and women are peak performers. These peak performers, several of whom you know, don't wear out their family and friends, talking about their challenges and the accompanying hurdles blocking their path. They use the services of a personal success coach to create a mastermind, a sure formula for success. Like the athletic coach who watches the game and players from the sidelines, supporting, assisting and adjusting the plays, a personal coach works with clients to determine and make the moves they want, stay on track, overcome obstacles and make the best use of their time.

In The Master Key to Riches Napoleon Hill tells of the master mind. Recognizing that the total is greater than the sum of the parts a mastermind is created by several people focusing on the same goal and working for the same result. A Board of Directors for a corporation is an example of this mastermind concept. The Directors are focused on the achievements and success of the business and those it serves.

Harvey Mackay, author of several inspirarional best sellers including Swim With The Sharks Without Being Eaten Alive, knows what is needed to be successful. He says emphatically, "...Everyone needs a coach. You can't do it alone. You have to have advisors and counselors."

Partnering with a coach allows you to focus, be intentional in your actions, stay on track and take steps to create the successes that fuel achievement and provide fulfillment. Huge accomplishments are easy to recognize while forgetting about the small steps and hard work needed to make all of it happen. Those small steps taken every day get us to our goal. They are not exciting or glamorous. They are drudgery. Often we don't even want to take them. We are faced with fear and procrastination. Success is taking these small steps in spite of our fears.

partnership. Expectations of open communication, ownership of actions, and accountability are keys to the successful client-coach mastermind.

In 1999 many peak performers have taken charge of their lives, hired a coach and experienced numerous qualitative and quantitative successes to share. Long overdue mission statements have been written. Start up businesses have flourished and been profitable in their first year. Goals have been set and often exceeded. Chris Thurston, CEO of Thurston Chapman & Associates, wanted to spend less time working and more time with his family. By working with a coach since February, 1998 Chris has achieved this goal. He hired a personal assistant and ceased micromanaging. In addition to his CEO duties for Thurston Chapman & Associates, he is focusing on RightMinds.com, a company whose idea had been on the back burner for too long.

Chris hired the same coach to work with Jorge Chazo, a Vice President. Jorge succeeded in cleaning up and putting away the stacks of paper and files from projects completed months earlier in his office and getting his department self sufficient, freeing him to focus on helping Chris with the changes in their company.

Better time management is one of the major goals for everyone, especially peak performers. By tracking how he spent his work day Mark Towell, Vice President - Sales, National Church Purchasing Group, saw how his days evaporated. He taught and delegated to an employee a major time consuming financial task. He was then free to spend more time in sales and memberships where he's happiest. His company sees results in the bottom line as well as other places. Memberships have increased significantly, surpassing his targeted goal.

Many obstacles get in our way on the road to success. Because no one wants to be rejected or suffer a loss, procrastination can become rampant. This tool of the fear of success keeps us playing small. By putting off that project, making those calls from that 800 pound telephone, or setting that appointment, frustration builds. Eventually this becomes burdensome. That goal remains elusive. Seemingly we are powerless. Little seems to go the way we want. At times it is easier and safer to stay where we are. That stand doesn't serve us and drains our energy. Eventually we are between the preverbal rock and hard palce.

Staying in this comfort sone, not wanting to be uncomfortable and feeling safe are the marks of the average person. Being uncomfortable and adopting new behaviors to help them get what they want are the hallmarks of successful people. Experiencing these changes isn't easy, doesn't feel good and is very scary. Tremendous learning and a willingness to push past self imposed barriers separates the successful from the unsuccessful person.

It's the very brave and courageous person that will face fully what's not going the way he wants and do something about it. John Lindermuth, a veterinarian, "couldn't see the forest for the trees." Being behind in his taxes was a major concern, sapping all his energy. With his coach's support, changing his attitude to focus on taking care of himself and what he has gives him the energy to keep things together and move ahead to resolve his tax issues.

Learning to be comfortable asking for what she needs is a success for Anne Harvill of Team Harvill Real Estate. Additionally with her coach's help she is looking at her life to see what she wants and is taking those small steps each day to make her life what she wants.

Anne shared the opinion of other peak performers that coaching is "fantastic! Anyone not being coached is living in a vacuum."

Finally you're not saying "Is this all there is?" Success is a daily occurrence. You're having fun doing what you want. Business is thriving.

The term coaching conjures up images of high school and college athletic days. Maybe it was football or golf or soccer or any one of dozens of sports. You remember the coach on the side lines yelling and cheering, keeping you focused and pushing you. You stretched yourself until you reached your goal. Your coach, whom you called "coach", was always on the sidelines, never on the field playing. How many times did you think coach didn't know how to play the sport? And somehow you knew deep down inside that if you did what coach pushed you to do, you'd be the best you could be and your coach knew you could do it. Coach would support you in your pursuit of success and be your best cheerleader.

Knowing a coach is key to athletes' success, no athlete goes to the Olympics without a coach. Why don't we do the same for ourselves in business? How does a coach on the athletic field relate to the business arena? In today's business world coaching is a buzz word. Small businesses and Fortune 500 companies alike use coaches to create a highly productive work force with improved interdepartmental relations and key employee retention. Reinforcing the gaining popularity of coaching articles on this new management tool are in such major magazines as Inc. and Success and in newspapers such as USA Today.

Now you're asking what is coaching? How does it work? As in athletics, coaching is a partnership between a client and coach to keep the client on track and shorten the time that it takes the client to reach his/her goals and break through self imposed limits. Business coaching, too, is about reaching your goals and fulfilling your dreams and vision as quickly and intentionally as possible. How many people do you know who have realized their dreams? The number one rule in coaching is nobody is wrong. Coaching is not about pass or fail. It is about getting what you want and doing what you must to make it happen. The way that works for you is what counts.

Winners and pro active people work with coaches. Examples are leading insurance agents and entreprenuers. IBM, AT&T and Fidelity Investments use coaches. Some popular areas for coaching are time management, life balance, financial management, career guidance, integration of corporate cultures and all areas of business.

Everyone has areas in business that aren't working properly. Things just aren't happening when and how they want. This causes frustration. Some of that can be overlooked. But the major issues can't. They will nag you and become a thorn in your side and sap the energy you need to do your job. Problems that aren't handled grow. That's an experience everyone has known. By being proactive and handling situations, even though it's unpleasant and uncomfortable, consequences can be minimized and damage controlled.

Doing these unpleasant and uncomfortable things and pushing ourselves past self imposed obstacles is extremely hard. Left to our own devices most of us simply won't do them.

Recently, for example, a well established company in Oregon was put up for sale at a cost less that its true value because the owner wouldn't dismiss the CFO, and as a result experienced a decline in business. With the support of a coach, the owner could've avoided this unfortunate situation.

This emerging trend of coaching is also an excellent tool for combating the isolation that so many business people experience, whether they're in a home-based business or work as the CEO of a Fortune 100 company in a corner office with glass walls on the top floor. In both scenarios executive isolation is huge and responsibility is weighty.

Confidentiality and trust in the coaching relationship allow open and free discussion between the coach and client. Coaches are ever only as successful as their clients are in reaching their goals. And coaches do whatever the clients need to support them in their journey. Clients know that their coaches are their partners and are committed to their success.

Consultants and coaches differ greatly in their service and how it is delivered. A consultant assesses a situation. When he makes a recommendation regarding the situation at hand, he has completed the project and leaves. A coach ensures his clients accountability for the duration of the relationship. The client must reveal his goals and his plans for achieving them. In turn, the coach keeps the client focused and on track for as long as necessary.

In looking for a coach as you would any professional you hire, interview the individual and ask for references. Inquire about the coaches training, also. With any new trend, many people can call themselves "coach" but aren't trained in the techniques that professional coaches use.

Statistics from a recent survey revealed that the typical client is a college graduate, a self starter and earns an annual salary of $63,000. Business is the most common area of focus.

Ninty-six percent of coaching is done over the telephone. Thanks to advanced communications and cell phones, travel doesn't interrupt coaching. A client in California on business can work with a coach traveling in England. In this manner coaching is becoming truly an international profession.

As in athletics, the coach and client are a team, a mastermind, committed to the client's success. The coach knows without doubt that the client can achieve his goals. A coach's greatest achievement is helping the client position for success to reach his goals and score on the playing field of business.

Published in Virginia Capitol Coverage of the National Federation of Independent Business, December, 1998.