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The Leader in You - Coach-To-Transformation

I love watching kids go about doing things they do. It is my so called ‘therapy’, my quiet moment by myself, sitting at a corner watching kids play, interact, fight, compete, cry, laugh, being silly and simply being happy.

From these observations, I noticed that leadership qualities actually start to develop at quite an early stage. Once I witnessed a group of kids dutifully forming a line behind a stern-looking girl. She dictated what they were going to play that day, and decided on ‘catch’. It was a game where one child is ‘selected’ to be the hunter & her role is to ‘catch’ anybody by touching or tapping that person. Once that is done, the new person becomes the hunter. As I sat watching the group of kids play, questions start to form in my mind. Why does the stern-looking girl have the authority to decide what game to play? Who gives her the authority? Why did the others follow? Why didn’t anyone object? What special characteristic does this girl has over and above the other children?

What defines a good leader? I think the answer to this question vary according to which angle you are looking at. In the context of an organization, if you ask the shareholders of a Company, the definition of a good leader will be along the line of ‘those who is able to lead the company to achieve the highest return on investment or profit’. Ask the employees of the company, their answers will probably be ‘those who takes care of the needs of the employees’. A good leader to the managers could be ‘those who inspires you to do better’.

Some leaders are strong in character and their leadership skills may be easily recognizable. Others are less obvious, opting to walk beside rather than in front, they prefer to urge and encourage, rather than order and dictate. So which is better? Often judgment is based on outcome rather than the method. If this is the case, then the leader who delivers the results will be labeled as a good leader, irrespective of the method he so chooses.

We are all leaders, in one way or another. Even those who may not be shouldering a management position in the organization where they work, are leaders in some ways. A manager is a leader to everyone under his department. A supervisor is a leader to those he supervises. A senior clerk is a leader to the junior clerks. Even the junior clerks are leader to a few. All mothers are leaders to their children, at some point of time. Most older siblings assume the leadership role over their younger siblings, and a quite few retain this authority well into their adulthood. Husbands are leaders to the wives and children. Your community representatives are leaders entrusted with the responsibility of ensuring that the safety and other needs of the community, is taken care of.

So there is a leader in all of us, shouldering that bit of responsibility we are meant to shoulder.

Therefore, the question is, what kind of a leader are we?

About the Author: ‘Roslina is a  mother, a wife and a daughter. The youngest girl in the family yet an older sister to many. A friend to talk to, a shoulder to cry on. A source of strength when strength is needed. A slave of Al Mighty above all others.’

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Wheel of Life

We are constantly told we learn from our mistakes (very often when someone is trying to make you feel better about just having made a mistake!) But how comfortable do we really feel about putting ourselves ‘out there’, this is as much a comment on how we feel about ourselves as it is about how others perceive us.

All the neuro-science tells us that synapses ping and pop into action (layman’s term) as our brains wrestle and grow with the challenges a potential mistake presents to the contents of our cranium: quite the opposite of the response to always being right creating a sea of tranquillity ( another layman’s metaphor!).

At a recent training event, colleagues were asked to write a brief sentence on a blank piece of paper and to deliberately include a grammatical error; the look of horror and shock on the assembled faces was clear to see – “a mistake, you want me to make a mistake?!?”

Task completed, they vented their frustration by throwing the piece of paper across the room; the final act unfolded as the anxiety levels reached a palpable level as someone else was told to pick up their paper and correct it, ‘will they find the mistake; was it too obvious?’.

We appear to have been programmed to fear failure and this clearly fed the responses we received on the day, however, is it possible to create a climate in which we can we turn that perception of negativity relating to mistakes into a positive? Attempting to avoid the apparent negative event is an exercise in futility – “Shit happens”, one of the biggest mistakes you can make in life is to believe we are always right; making mistakes is when you learn most about yourself… honestly, I can vouch for that!

I have childhood memories at school at a time when mistakes were certainly NOT celebrated; when judgements came thick and fast; as marked test papers were thrown back across a crowded classroom usually accompanied by ritual humiliation, a cutting one-liner leading to another sizeable dent to our fragile confidence. As I am writing this, I am experiencing a very emotional response and as a coach I am asking myself ‘what is making you feel this way after all these years’; how profound was the damage done? How negative was that experience of school?

Day to day experiences have a habit of washing over us, we neither challenge or feel challenged. It is important to be able to self-regulate and be emotionally intuitive enough to be able to recognise when we have entered ‘the rut’ otherwise and often referred to as ‘The Comfort Zone’.

We should ask ourselves how long should I stay here? Am I stagnating? What is the motivation to leave? But leave we must! Take that leap of faith and lay yourself bare to new challenges; ‘feel the fear and do it anyway’.

We just need to look at the rewards:

an opportunity to strengthen our character

an opportunity to strengthen our self-worth

an opportunity to strengthen our minds and soak up new learning

Learning the art of coaching takes time. Remember that first coaching session in front of your peers?

I now reflect on how I would feel if I had passed over that opportunity for fear of making a mistake and looking foolish. I have now left my comfort zone; I have created a new chapter for myself; I have left the childhood memories behind and am open to the new learning ahead – and I am fully prepared to make as many mistakes as it takes to reach my potential personally and professionally.

I am reminded of the lyrics from the LCD Sound System:

“Come laughing at everything we thought was important, whilst still making mistakes that you thought you had learned from”

Just accepting that mistakes are a part of the cycle of life, sometimes we learn from them; sometimes we forget the lessons and repeat the same mistakes again – but learn next time – but that’s life!

So let’s embrace it!

About the Author: ‘Martin is a former Executive Head teacher with 34 years’ experience in the education sector. He is currently working to complete the ICF ACC Coaching Certification Programme with Coach-To-Transformation. Martin is  excited by  this new chapter in his (personal and professional) life and views coaching as the cornerstone of this new journey’.

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What is Imperfect in this ‘Perfect’ world?

What is Imperfect in this ‘Perfect’ world?

“It is better to have a meaningful life and make a difference than to merely have a long life”.

-Bryant H. McGill

Most of us today live in a ‘perfect’ world where we have a good job, family, house and all the resources that we need for a comfortable living. Yet there is a vacuum, there is dissatisfaction, there is a missing piece in the puzzle which we all searching for.

Why does this happen? As a human race we have been trained to evolve. We go through a cycle- until age of 25yrs, we are growing, focused on the future, risking, dreaming. There is a lot of momentum during this phase, moving forward with eyes on future. At 25yrs, 30 or 45 yrs or so, we stop looking forward and we start looking backwards in the past. Instead of asking ‘who can I be’, we start asking ‘who am I’?

We keep recreating our same life again and again cos we keep recycling our old thoughts. Our thoughts create our feelings which lead to actions and then results. We find ourselves in a vicious cycle reaching same point again and again. A self-talk then begins- we should be happier, we got a great life- we should be doing better & better things- we should know our purpose in life.

Why do we keep looking at our past again and again to create our future? We keep looking at our past cos we have had a model in the past which helped us survive. Having successfully survived, we still consider that as a model in today’s world which is actually not relevant. Model describes human behavior over centuries being driven by primarily a triad: a) seek pleasure, b) avoid pain and c) conserve energy. While this sounds very simple, this triad has helped us ensure survival. This tendency served us very well in Stone Age when food was difficult to come by and there were life-threatening danger everywhere.

In our today’s modern world of convenience and abundance, this triad is actually working against us. We want to gain most pleasure with least pain for the least effort. Hunger causes pain and so we go and seek food which is easily available. Instead of eating whole natural foods which require more effort to buy and prepare, we ‘conserve our energy’ by pursuing pleasures of easily and readily accessible ‘instant’ foods which has loads of sugar, fat and refined carbohydrates. We end up seeking pleasure in social media (facebook, Instagram, twitter, etc), we keep procrastinating to avoid pain and keep consuming materials passively (overeating, overdrinking, etc.).

We are continuously looking at our past model of survival- our triad and working in accordance to it. We escape from emotional pain and seek pleasures in food (overeating), drinks (overdrinking), sex (porn), etc. This is exactly why we are facing the dissatisfaction. We look at our past for answers. We could do that in the past cos there was a need for survival. However, in today’s era of abundance there is no need for survival, there is no need to look at the past for answers. Magic of human species is that we are designed to evolve from this too. We can evolve in a new way and new possibilities to create our future. This is what separates us from the rest.

We can create a fulfilling life (that missing piece of puzzle) by getting out of the triad that keeps us in survival mode and move in the opposite which will help us thrive. We can do this by keeping our focus on the future rather than the past. If we try creating our future being focused on the past then we can only recreate our past. We need to be able to put ourselves in the world outside and experience it rather than shy away from it. We need to learn to be in discomfort. We need to learn to manage our emotions. We need to bring an awareness that emotional pain is self-inflicted and is not required. By reprogramming ourselves, rewiring ourselves, changing the mindset we can move towards a better future which enables us to – manage emotions, think clearly, be in control of actions and create better results.

All this can happen when our thoughts are based on the possibility of future rather than events of the past. We need to make efforts to change our thoughts, practice these thoughts and create results. This shall change our beliefs, feelings, actions, breaking the vicious cycle resulting in a fulfilling future.

About the Author–  Dr. Ashwaria Gupta is a postgraduate Medical doctor by qualification and in leadership position in a Corporate. She satisfies her passion in helping people find their purpose, create a meaningful and fulfilling life and Be Alive. She is a certified Coach by American Board of NLP and is also undergoing ICF coaching certification program.

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A crash-course in survival. And self-coaching!

Every path hath a puddle. ~George Herbert, “Jacula Prudentum”

Except in this case, it was a deluge!

August 29, 2017. 468 mm of rain in 12 hours in Mumbai, over 7 hours of driving, the constant fear of drowning in the flood, and my own personalised coaching crash-course. I survived the night to tell the tale and my recent experiences with coaching had a big role to play in this. Here is my story on surviving the Mumbai floods. And on self-coaching.

Meteorological department had forecasted heavy rains combined with high tides and flooding in many parts of Mumbai. People were advised to exercise precaution while venturing out. In many offices, arrangements were made for the employees to stay indoors while others released transportation earlier so employees could reach home in good time.

Some of us who had driven to work that day, decided to stay back in office till the traffic cleared out on the roads. After 8 hours of wait, we reviewed the situation based on news, Google maps and inputs from colleagues/ friends/ family who had ventured out. It seemed like roads had cleared out and we could go.

Before driving out, I had a good meal in the canteen, took a bottle of water and some chocolates for the way. These supplies kept me going through out my journey. It’s important to prepare yourself for the journey, but sometimes that may not be enough. In those moments, use your common sense and intuition, these are powerful tools.

I took my regular route and covered 2/3rds of the distance in a record time. I was beginning to feel happy, and then, my car was stopped. Roads ahead were submerged in neck deep water with buses floating in it. My car stood no chance of crossing that.

Based on inputs from some good samaritans and traffic police on the roads, I decided to take the alternate (and longer) route to home instead of going back to office.

There can be different paths to get to the same destination. If one does not work, there may be others. Make your choice.

All was well, until a certain point where I was told that the second route was blocked too and I had to take the only open route. At this point, there was no scope of returning to office. No one could tell how much time it would take to reach home or how bad the traffic or flooding was.

In that moment, I told myself a few things –

drive on, without dwelling much on what could have happened had I left earlier or stayed in office etc. There was no looking back.

stay calm, look at what you can do in the present to get to your ideal place. Use your common sense, drive slowly, be vigilant about the surroundings, listen to your car and save your energy (mental, emotional and petrol)

It was raining heavily with traffic either moving at a snail’s pace or totally stuck at most places. Google maps to destination would show 45 minutes, while I would spend 45 minutes in one spot. No clarity on how much time it would take to reach home.

To keep my sanity, I spoke to other drivers/ bikers every now and then. It helped me deal with my feelings knowing there were others in a similar situation. It also gave me some useful insights on what to expect next.

My radio was on to help me pass the time, stay calm and get news updates on traffic conditions.

And then I reached a point where all you could see was waterlogging. It was a stretch of alteast a few kilometres and vehicles were wading through that water. Given my small automatic car, I wasn’t sure how it would fare.

It’s important to be in touch with your feelings and surroundings. I was well aware of the little butterfly fluttering in my tummy, but kept driving slowly and steadily with the goal of getting to the other side. When I reached the other side of water logging, it was a feeling of triumph. To celebrate the occasion, I treated myself with a small piece of chocolate and a few sips of water. Thereafter, I repeated this ritual, every time I crossed a difficult stretch.

After driving for almost 5 hours I reached the highway that connects to my locality. It was good to be in familiar surroundings, except this seemed like the worst waterlogging so far. Traffic was stand still and only a few vehicles were allowed to cross at a time to avoid a panic situation. I waited for my turn, trying to stay calm and have a plan to go across.

Plan was simple, keep driving on extreme right, without stopping. I started with two more cars ahead of me. Just in that moment a scooter with 3 people on it shut down and skidded ahead of us due to water getting into its engine. The cars had to slow down. In those few minutes (which seemed like a long time), focus was to keep the engine running, without crashing into the car ahead or losing my mind. At certain points in time, you have to give it your all to stay afloat.  Just in nick of time they managed to pull the scooter out and moved ahead. I pressed on and was glad to drive through to the other side. I celebrated by finishing my chocolate bar.

My house was just a few minutes away but connecting road was shut down due to water logging. So near, yet so far. I got down from the car and caught up with folks waiting around to figure out how to cross that last hurdle. Sometimes a road is more difficult in your mind than in reality. After waiting around for an hour, I took a leap of faith and drove away on the alternate connecting road to my place. That road had cleared out by now and I was home in 5 minutes. I came out as a stronger person and am grateful to the universe for that experience.

Every time, we face a deluge (metaphorically speaking) in life, the true strength of our character is tested. The choice is upon us to give up or face it, with faith, and that determines how the story develops.

“It went in a Sorrow, but through the alchemy of Self, it came out a Song.” Muriel Strode (1875–1964), My Little Book of Life, 1912

About the Author-  Abhilasha is an HR professional with over 16 years of diverse experience across pharmaceutical, consulting and IT services sectors. She has been in leadership positions for over a decade and has helped grow and manage the business by partnering closely with the business leaders. She is a travel enthusiast and loves being amidst nature. Abhilasha is currently undergoing the ICF coaching certification program with Coach-To-Transformation.

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My First Encounter with Coaching

I have always been one of those people who was an advice giver. Friends, friends of friends, used to seek me out to discuss their concerns and problems and I gave them a patient hearing and helped them come up with solutions. It was for this reason that I initially thought I could get into coaching. People would often tell I should consider it as a career. Little did I know that we weren’t going to be the ones to provide solutions!

Yet now when I think back I realise I’ve been at my most effective when I’ve really just listened to the person, not offered a solution, and allowed them to come up with a solution of their own.

A stark example of this was Shivaji. Shivaji was not exactly a friend; he was a homeless man who lived outside our building, an amputee with a Jaipur foot, and an alcoholic.

I used to see him when I took my kids down to the bus stop every morning and always kept my distance, and was even a little scared of him. He would sometimes rant and rave and I always feared that he might kidnap my children. But early one morning, I saw that his Jaipur foot was missing and he was eating from the garbage truck, my heart went out to him and I decided to take it upon myself to help him. I began looking for someone who could make him another foot and take him into a shelter. I offered to take him to the centre myself and reached out to communities across the city.

It was then that I met Abhishek. He had been working with homeless people for many years and very gently asked me if I had found out what Shivaji himself wanted. I was taken aback. It never even struck me to ask him. Surely all a homeless man would want was a roof over his head and means to get about! Abhishek came to my building, encouraged me to get over my fear and to come down and speak to Shivaji.

We found out that Shivaji had sold his foot to get money for liquor. He actually found that he was earning more without it. He begged us not to take him to a shelter and even told us not to set him up in a PCO booth. He said even beggars have cell phones these days!

He told me I was a nice person and that if he needed anything he would be sure to tell me but that he was fine for now. I was humbled and a little shamed. Shivaji and I remained friends till he died suddenly one monsoon from a chest infection that I didn’t know about.

As I think back I see that all it took was for me to listen, really just listen, and not try and find a solution for Shivaji‘s life. With that, I got to know a remarkable man, overcome my own bias and hopefully also teach my children compassion. Thank you Shivaji for all that.

About the Author:  Sandhya Krishnan has a career that spans 20 years, over areas as diverse as law, operations, media, management and retail entrepreneurship. She currently heads the India business for Kenzai.com, a wellness platform, and is passionate about her coaching journey too. She’s also passionate about scuba diving, music, her cat…but that list could go on…

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My daughter…….my mentor coach!

They say after becoming a parent, you grow as a person.

They say when you become a parent, it changes your life for good (well for the most part!).

I am a mother to a two year old girl and could not agree more. So much so, that when I enrolled for my training to become a coach, I realised I had a mentor at home.

Coaching, as defined by The ICF (International Coach Federation), is partnering with clients in a thought-provoking and creative process that inspires them to maximize their personal and professional potential.

The ICF also defines a set of 11 core competencies of a coach, as mentioned below for your reference. You may click on this link to know more about ICF Core Competencies – https://coachfederation.org/core-competencies/

Meeting Ethical guidelines and Professional standards

Establishing the coaching agreement

Establishing Trust and Intimacy with the Client

Coaching Presence

Active Listening

Powerful Questioning

Direct Communication Ability

Creating Awareness

Designing Actions

Planning and Goal Setting

Managing Progress and Accountability

My daughter makes me practice many of the core competencies of a coach on a daily basis. She brings coaching to life for me. Let me share how.

A few days ago she got under our dining table and declared it to be her house. She called out to me to do a few things. After some effort I understood what she was looking for.

She wanted me to arrange the dining chairs around her in such a way that it became walls with windows to her little house. For some reason, she was happy jumping in and out of the house through the window and did not require a door. As I was arranging the chairs I kept checking if that’s what she was looking for. After a few rounds, she was satisfied with the outcome.

It did not end there. She then wanted me to blow bubbles into her new little house so she could burst them. There were specifications on sizes of the bubbles – big or small and how to burst them. Some were allowed to fall on the floor while others were actively sought and burst by her. She was happy with the outcome and helped close the session in 45minutes with a big smile.

In this case, there was ongoing trust and intimacy (which is why I was called out instead of others in the household). I established an agreement with her, used powerful questioning, active listening and direct communication to understand what was required and was present with her, playing without the distractions of my gadgets or my mind.  You see, right there I used 6 out of 11 core competencies of a coach.

Currently she is in the phase where she wants to do everything herself. We live on the first floor and she wants to climb up/ down the stairs on her own every time we go out. I create a safe and encouraging environment by letting her do that and at the same time be around her in a way that I can catch her, should she fall. I do direct communication with her on what she could do to not get hurt and help her plan her position for climbing up/ down so she gets support of the railing. Now when we go out and if she finds some stairs too big, she shouts out ‘Pick me up’ or ‘Hold my hand’. She gets a round of applause when she climbs the stairs well or asks for help, at the same time reinforcement of what she needs to keep in mind to be safe.

Each incident of ‘climbing stairs’ requires complete presence, establishing trust and intimacy, active listening, action planning, creating awareness, direct communication, managing progress and accountability. Well that is 8 out of 11 competencies.

While I have to make an effort all the time to apply my coaching skills, the most amazing part is that my daughter effortlessly demonstrates a lot of these competencies herself, on a day to day basis. Her ability to be present, listen, ask questions, integrate information from multiple sources, do direct communication, taking action in the moment and monitoring progress (against promised actionsJ) is phenomenal.

Dr. Seuss said “Adults are obsolete children.”

Stay childlike and keep learning lest you will become obsolete. There is so much to be learnt from these little but very wise ones.

About the Author: Abhilasha is an HR professional with over 16 years of diverse experience across pharmaceutical, consulting and IT services sectors. She has been in leadership positions for over a decade and has helped grow and manage the business by partnering closely with the business leaders. She is a travel enthusiast and loves being amidst nature. Abhilasha is currently undergoing the ICF coaching certification program with Coach-To-Transformation.

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More work = Burnout; REALLY???

I need a break..I am burntout totally” – how common do we speak or hear these sentences? Its familiar- have been working really hard, too busy and now need a break. At times you also hear the reverse- I don’t want to make more money cos to make more money, I will have to work hard and I don’t want to work that hard.

We associate time and energy with money. We think that our hard work creates money and so if we put in more and more hard work or effort, then only we can make more and more money. But the fact is what creates money is actually the value and results. More value we create, more results it produces and more money it makes. In doing all this, we start screaming- I am burning out.

If we do not want to get burnt out, we should first know what burnout is and what causes it. People think that burnout is caused by working long hours, working over weekends or working too hard. Fact is one can work for many hours and still not get burnt out. It’s about the attitude around the work that causes burn out. Burn out can be caused if planning is poor, people are stressed out in thinking and there is a continuous thinking of scarcity.

When one is trying to resist failure, that’s when the person will be stressed all the time and that’s when there will be scarcity. When planning is not done well, one would end up fire-fighting. One ends up dealing with crisis all the time. Adrenaline levels are consistently high declaring emergency to brain. This will cause a burnout.

Question is how to decide whether one needs to take a break and rest or not? For that it is important to distinguish between a burnout and being overwhelmed. If one is  overwhelmed, person will be confused, will procrastinate, will not have clear plans and will always say- “I don’t know what to do?”

In this case taking a break and resting is not the solution. Solution is to plan well and then do more. Overwhelming happens not when there is a long to-do list but when there is humungous chatter of thoughts which makes a person confused and ‘appear’ busy. Solution for somebody who is overwhelmed is to plan, plan and plan and then execute, execute and execute the plan.

So, how does Burnout look? There is immense clarity on what to do, one has planned well, executed well and is very high on productivity. Thoughts are positive, producing great results and one thinks that he/she can make up with it for more, more, more and then the plans start getting unreasonable. In the growth journey, results start taking more importance than the journey. This is where burnout results. One starts feeling by doing more here, there is a better there.  This is the time one needs to take rest. One needs to slow down and enjoy the journey of growth and not run behind the results. One needs to understand that life won’t be better there than here. Journey has to be enjoyable for the results to be better. There is no need to rush, no need to hurry. One needs to understand there is abundance and no scarcity. One needs to plan for space and rest on purpose and reenergize oneself.

So, classic difference between burnout and overwhelm is that in burnout one is producing results whilst in overwhelm there are no results. In burnout one is in a hurry to product next result whereas in overwhelming state, person is lost about what to do next and is procrastinating. Take rest in a situation of burnout and plan well and execute if you are overwhelmed.

So, are you Burntout or Overwhelmed?

About the Author- Dr. Ashwaria Gupta is a postgraduate Medical doctor by qualification and in leadership position in a Corporate. She fulfills her passion in helping people find their purpose, create a meaningful and fulfilling life and Be Alive. She is a certified Coach by American Board of NLP and is also undergoing ICF coaching certification program.

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Why great people will not stay!

Lately, there have been many movements and instability  in my organisation, I tried to understand the reason why all my talents are leaving the esteemed organisation where people has been enjoying working in the organisation and even many of them has been with the company for more than 5 – 10 years.

The impact were crucial when 3 of the directors who has been in the company more than 10 years  resigned at the same time. All the employees start to worried and gossip started. Morale went down and many staff is demotivated. Many employees started to look for job.

Since I have taken the coaching course and did many of the coaching session with some of our staff, it has been so much easier to engage a conversation on this topic why people are leaving.

After more than 12 conversations with different employees, it seem the final conclusion is the cause by one Leadership that people feels so much of frustration and would not stay in the company.

So,  my questions to myself “What is wrong with the leadership in our company”. What is leadership style we have in our organisation” and “what good leadership means”.

Then I came across what Steve Jobs quoted, “If you want hire great people and have them stay working for you, you have to let them make a lot of decisions and your have to be run by ideas, not hierarchy. The best ideas have to win, otherwise, good people don’t stay.”

If we do take care their needs, they will take care of the company business, client and future of the whole organisation.

Overall, what I learn from this change management is NEVER TAKES EMPLOYEES FOR GRANTED!

Employees needs:-

to give our employees the opportunity to excel in all areas and expertise

to be listened to

recognition and reward a job well done

fair culture with removal obstacles and blockers

transparency of information and company directions

training and opportunity to grow within the company

Honesty and integrity from leadership

Respect, trust and empowerment them

Feedback from us to help them be their best and inspired them.

Leadership focused not only on day to day but also the long-term strategy.

A good leader is always inspire and empower the employees, walk the talk and willing to go extra miles for them.

Do you agree?

About the Authour:  Ms Sim is a HR Professional with over 20 years of working experiences across many different industries. She has been in leadership position in HR and has helped to manage the company business by partnering with the business leaders and stakeholders and empowering employees through inspiration and coaching. Sim is currently working to complete the CTT certification program and ICF coaching Certification program.

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To Be, or not to Be - Coach-To-Transformation

I’ve been a person with what you’d call a colourful past. Well, at least, career wise. I went to law school, and after five gruelling years, decided to pursue a career in theatre and radio. Although I enjoyed it thoroughly, I missed a particular kind of intellectual challenge and working with and building a team.

I went on to work in Web 1.0, in content, technology, operations and management. I worked in fields as diverse as legal editing, music, art, alternative health and fashion. The radio bug hit me again when private FM came in, and I was a drive-time radio jockey on the city‘s largest radio station. I then had kids and worked as writer, voice-over artist, and corporate trainer during their early years.

Next I had an opportunity in retail and jumped into that and there I stayed for 8-9 years. I created two brands and hoped to build my own retail empire.

The one question that always niggled was whether I was truly working to my potential or whether I was just choosing an easier route because I was scared of failure. Mind you, it’s not exactly cowardice to stand in front of an audience of 3000 and sing a solo in a musical night after night for a hundred weekends. Nor was it to open store after store, set up in short time, manage staff, operations, finance, sourcing, marketing and CRM.

But for me, my true challenge lay in using my intellect to create something, something successful, something commercially viable. And I felt I had never really done that.

I realised a year ago that my dream of a retail empire would take more resources and bandwidth than I had access to, and it was only once I decided to shut down my business that, for the first time, I took a pause to just think and really understand what drove me and what my goals were.

It was then that I discovered coaching and it was through a series of these sessions that I finally learnt to stop running, chasing, living with an agitation that I often described as “the beast deadly in my throat”. I was finally able to quell that beast and to just be.

Today as I embark upon a new career as a coach and in the wellness space, I am no longer anxious. I no longer feel the need to prove myself to the world. Yes I am still driven, but as our Indian philosophy says, I take to work “as a Prince does, to sport (hunting)”. I take it one day at a time and joyously throw myself into everything I do. The world won’t end if I don’t do it all. There is a lot less “I” in everything. The beast has been laid to rest.

For this, I thank my coaches…and I don’t just mean Rajat and his team and the trainee coaches at CTT. My kids, my husband, my staff, my cat…they’ve all taught be the meaning of “being”.

About the Author:  Sandhya Krishnan has a career that spans 20 years, over areas as diverse as law, operations, media, management and retail entrepreneurship. She currently heads the India business for Kenzai.com, a wellness platform, and is passionate about her coaching journey too. She’s also passionate about scuba diving, music, her cat…but that list could go on…

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Types of Coaching

The term coaching ordinarily refers to strategies for helping other people to enhance, create, learn new abilities, discover individual achievement, accomplish points and to oversee life change and individual difficulties.Coaching regularly addresses attitudes, practices, abilities and knowledge, and in addition profession objectives and yearnings, and can likewise center around physical and profound improvement as well. As coaching turns out to be more pervasive in the work environment, it can be valuable to recognize the different kinds of coaching that are accessible,so as to establish the correct type of coach for your specific needs.

1) Executive Coaching.

Executive coaching has a tendency to be centered around  helping senior leaders  inside an organisation to enhance their authority and individual performance.  It is given by an external coach and determination of a coach can be based on referral,as it is based on ones capabilities and experience.Executive coaching empowers the official to have a thinking space and a sounding board to thoroughly consider issues and produce new ideas. I have discovered that it is often as much about the self-awareness of the official and can be transitional for them, as they redefine their motivation or what is imperative to them by and by. Any reasonable person would agree that the expense rates for Executive Coaching is regularly considerably higher than for different sorts of coaching, which has a tendency to mirror the position of the clients. Executive Coaching helps improve people productivity,which boosts the organisations performance. It additionally distinguishes and use the qualities of individual colleagues, and integrate the groups qualities with the organisations mission. Executive coaching engages basic leadership and compelling correspondence which rules out vagueness and confusion at the work place. It may help in getting a better work life and ensure optimal functioning.

2) Life coaching.

Life Coaching is a continuous expert relationship that can enable individuals to achieve personal aspirations. Life Coaching isn’t advising or treatment; it is forward looking and is tied in with accomplishing positive outcomes in ones life.  Life Coaching offers help to people wishing to roll out critical improvements in their lives. With the assistance of life coaches, people identify what they need throughout everyday life and how to accomplish their set goals.  Life instructing gives a stage to clarify and set up individual objectives and help in prioritization of the same.  Life Coaching enables individuals to find what they have to do any other way and support them in their accomplishments. Furthermore, a life coach will enable people to think of procedures and strategies which help them to achieve their objectives faster. Likewise helps in the investigation of the possible choices there are to accomplish the defined objectives. Life coaching will help improve an individuals interpersonal and communication skills. Life coaching also enhances confidence and plays a part in building up an enabling mental self view which are fundamental for goal achievement in the working environment.  A life coach will hold an individual accountable for the attainment of the set goals; this will steer the individual towards achieving their business, career and personal goals.

3) Business coaching.

Business coaching is a procedure used to take a business from where it is presently to where the entrepreneur needs it to be. A business coach will help and guide the entrepreneur in developing their business by helping them clear up the vision of their business and how it fits in with their own objectives.  In the wake of illuminating where an entrepreneur might want to take their business, coaching will help strategize and organize what objectives and procedures are expected to help advance the business nearer to its objective. A business coach will meet with the entrepreneur frequently, either week after week or month to month, to keep them on track to the responsibilities made during the past coaching session.  A business coach can enable you to focus on your shortcomings and enable you to ensure the hires you make are the correct answer for adjust. At that point, they’ll urge you to center around your qualities with the goal that your business works proficiently. A business coach is a gigantic resource in building an extraordinary business group.Business coaching helps in productive conceptualizing, It can be hard to see the greater part of the distinctive approaches to handle an issue without anyone else’s help. Life coaches provide a second opinion when making critical decisions. Business coaching brings a lot of profitability by bettering the individuals attitudes.

4) Leadership coaching.

Leadership coaching is devoted to improving initiative aptitudes and capacities by upgrading the leader inside and creating self awareness. Focusing on and understanding the basic procedures that direct predictable practices makes an essential mindfulness in arrangement with reality that empowers predominant initiative. All authority isn’t equivalent, yet rather, liquid, adaptable, and versatile to the circumstance and condition. Executing the right formative process proactively isolates the great from the strategist. Our authority instructing forms creates incredible pioneers. Be that as it may, confronting apparent feelings of trepidation, tolerating basic criticism, and overseeing enthusiastic highs and lows in arrangement with general laws is required for expanding individual and expert development. Leadership coaching is an individualized procedure that builds a leader’s capability to accomplish short and long-term objectives. Coaching is customized, and is usually conducted one-on-one for a defined period of time and because of a particular business reason. At first established to spare crashing supervisors,leadership coaching now normally centers around upgrading performance of leaders at all levels. Leadership coaching underscores the use of Else’s-up taking in, the significance of building trust and rapport, the benefit of being a decent audience and the need to make inquiries and give feedback that advances reflection and development in new and experienced instructive leaders. Leadership coaching draws on the best of administration styles and techniques. Since they manage various types of organizations, mentors see fruitful applications in inconsequential circumstances. They convey these qualities to your group. Your pioneers will build up the aptitudes to cross-fertilize and attract different ideas to dissect and take care of your organization’s troublesome issues.

All the different types of coaching are beneficial to personal growth and business success to those who apply them.

If you are interested in Coaching or want to know more about it, then click here –> CONTACT US

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What is Transformational Coaching? - Coach-To-Transformation

In general, coaching is, generative in nature, results oriented and requires the client to learn how to be accountable for everything that goes in their lives. Coaching empowers you to shift interpretations that no longer serve you in your life. Now, transformational coaching is basically the deeper work of coaching. A transformational coach seeks to encourage an increased awareness of of an individual’s models and ideals of the world around them in order to have them create and design new possibilities for not only themselves, but the people around them. The main focus of a transformational coach is to help the client’s exploration of their underlying beliefs, assumptions, values, personal attitudes and expectations that are used to help shape their experiences and world in general, shift in a positive way. Of course, the exploration in itself is no where near unfocused. It begins with the presentation of the client’s issues, challenges, aspirations or expectations, however, rather than purely focusing on achieving or resolving those different things, it concentrates on determining what is at the heart of the whole situation whilst enabling the achievements of the main goals, where relevant. This type of coaching is basically pretty similar to life coaching. Its main intention is to help people better both themselves and their lives by encouraging them to adopt the necessary changes. However, compared to like coaching, the difference it has here is that instead of changing the way you act, transformational coaches help their clients change how they see as well as feel about themselves. This usually involves changing the limitations and perceptions they have about themselves and others, and changing their whole self image in general. Those of you seeking to become transformational coaches should possess a few vital characteristics. For starters, when it comes to both non-verbal and verbal communication, it would be extremely helpful if you were a veritable expert. Aside from that, you should also be non-judgmental, understanding, inspirational and motivational.

WHAT DOES TRANSFORMATIONAL COACHING DO TO YOU?

Once one goes through this type of deeper work coaching all aspects and areas of their lives will be completely changed, often simultaneously. The client and coach partnership is important because it helps reduce the overwhelming feeling of the program. These positive changes will be found in:-

1. HEALTH

This transformation will usually have a positive effect on your overall health. This is because becoming aware of unhealthy behaviors and habits will help you avoid poor diet plans and will encourage you to exercise more for you’ll be conscious of the direct effects these behaviors have on both your ability to focus as well as your energy levels.

2. RELATIONSHIPS

As clients become more appreciative and positive toward the people and environment around them, and begin to do away with old insecurities, eventually, their relationships with their family, friends and workmates become much better. They do away with the relationships that didn’t add value to their lives and keep the ones that did. Individuals learning how to value themselves will have a natural state of greater openness and love.

3. FINANCE

Transformational coaching entails building a new future for yourself by realigning yourself with a constructive plan. This will build an anticipation and excitement to do what you love doing most, in turn, encouraging a positive shift in your mere survival financial concerns. Those that successfully go through this will learn that unhappiness is basically all about what they are not doing toward achieving their own greatness.

4. SPIRIT

Your spiritual world expands because this type of coaching will teach you how to listen and hear it. Learning how to recognize the different inner voices that come within you will help you sort out and distinguish the positive ones from the negative ones. One of transformation’s unifying processes are acknowledging the sources of inner understanding, giving the client a greater presence in their lives and encouraging self confidence in their ability to create and design their own individual life paths.

BENEFITS OF TRANSFORMATIONAL COACHING

The school of thought in this type of coaching is that happiness basically starts from within. It is all to do with looking at your life’s bigger picture in general. Unlike the many other coaching styles out there, It doesn’t focus on fixing different parts of yourself.

1. DISCOVERING YOUR LIFE PURPOSE

Most life coaches will teach you that external goals are what will be the key to unlocking your life purpose as well as being the key to happiness. Transformational coaches do not go by this belief. They understand that life is much deeper than that. They understand that without a positive shift of perspectives, it’s meaningless to chase external goals. Their goal is to help you experience life’s fullness in all your waking moments. True life purpose is brought about by connecting with your state of presence.

2. A DIFFERENCE IN SELF PERCEPTION

This deeper work coaching technique will help you see and perceive yourself in an empowering and new way. A transformational coach will guide you on how to start feeling and thinking in a new way when it comes to being who you are, thus enabling you to inevitably connect with the magnitude and power within yourself.

3. INCREASE YOUR ZEST AND VITALITY FOR LIFE

The feeling that all you do is go through the motions and living like that is true I can be such a waste of this precious life you’ve been granted. Transformational coaching will connect you with the everyday pleasures and satisfaction that life has to offer. It will help you find your inspirations, motivations and your sense of fun and playfulness. It will teach you how to avoid those feelings of sadness and unworthiness. No other style of coaching achieves this better than this one.

CONCLUSION

Becoming the best version of yourself is something everyone can achieve. Basically, all that is needed is a bit of dedication and determination to change yourself, accompanied by a little transformational coaching. Bringing dreams to life and releasing ones full potential is something this style of deeper work coaching does extremely well. There is no better way to get right to the heart of the problem. All in all, change begins with you.

If you are interested in Transformational Coaching or want to know more about it, then click here –> CONTACT US

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Timezone Bias!!

You are working in GMT + 5:30 timezone and you have either clients or office colleagues working out of GMT – 7 timezone on the other side of the world. You usually take calls at 11 PM in the night, irrespective of the other person being a client or colleague!! Does this sound familiar??

I have worked with multiple clients in Asia region, who say they do not have work life balance. When asked why they do not have a work like balance, they say because their company is global, they have mostly calls in the evening and they have to stay late in office to attend those calls!! This is a story that I see often playing out there with employees in this region.

I ask them what stops you from asking for a morning slot and the typical reply is “how can I ask that!!” or “It would be evening for them.. and they might not like to attend!!”. For me this sounded like a bias based on time and hence the name “timezone bias”.  The people who are attending these calls at 11 PM, believe that they do not have a choice. Most of them have never checked if these calls can be shifted to a morning slot or a mutually convenient slot. Its a belief that my time is less important than theirs. Its ok to extend my working hours. Or there might be negative feedback coming in, if I ask for such luxury!!! Are you one of those people? If yes, then it is time to check your assumptions.

There are more and more companies worldwide who are trying to be truly global culturally and the counterparts are trying to do calls in their evenings to balance on both sides. They understand the importance of working together and ensuring everybody’s time is respected. Timezones are a difficult thing to manage. I am not denying that. I know how difficult it is for International Coach Federation (ICF) to have a common time for committee calls with 10 – 12 different nationalities attending the call from all over the globe. The team is so culturally aware that we make it happen and take care of each other all the time.

I think it is all about having conversations within the organization and see if there could be agreement on managing time for each other. I am sure your voice will be respected and the organization will support you. It is more difficult for client and vendor kind of arrangement, but again, this might be an assumption. You might want to have a conversation with your client or make it as part of initial contracting. Your clients might start respecting you more for standing up.

I would love to know if you have had such an experience and how things changed!!