Surviving a Train Wreck - Tom Teague
Have you ever experienced being in a train wreck and survived?
Well, I haven’t been in a literal train wreck, but it sure felt like one – I felt totally tossed about, injured, and disoriented, but I managed to walk out of the wreckage.
This experience was the derailing of my primary career as a software development manager at age 62.
Today, I’m going to talk about the power of collaborating in a supportive community to help you get back on track.
Hi, I’m Tom Teague, author of the best-selling book “Online Business Success for Thought Leaders” and President of the Professional Coaches Alliance.
In my first career, I was a leader and manager of software development teams for large organizations like Exxon and NASA for over 30 years.
In that career, as a side interest, I became interested in coaching and became certified in Brendon Burchard’s high performance coaching program.
When my career derailed, I found the professional job opportunities in my primary career were very limited for 62-year old baby boomers.
So, being the sole income provider for my family, my thought turned to building a coaching and consulting business – rapidly!
I had been studying online marketing for 2 years at the time in what I now call “Internet marketing grad school,” and I thought “I can do this.” And then ……
I discovered I didn’t really know how to build a coaching business ….. Not really. I had been living in an illusion.
All the training I had invested in for two years, including coaching certification training, at tens of thousands of dollars, did not really teach me the specifics I needed to know to build a coaching business. OR how to apply online marketing and sales to support a coaching business.
So there were two big problems – insufficient skills, and the requirement to do everything on my own.
First challenge – insufficient skills. I had coaching skills. I was certified in them, and as a leader, I had informally mentored employees for a career.
What I was missing was how to meet people to generate and qualify new leads, in other word, “Marketing” and (2) how to have conversations with qualified leads to enroll them as clients to generate “Sales.”
Second challenge – No one to collaborate with.
In an employment situation, although I didn’t fully appreciate this at the time, you have your organizational teams and the team collaboration for problem solving is built in.
When you’re on your own, who do you collaborate with? The answer is that you have to create your own collaboration team.
I found my collaborative team when I moved from Albuquerque to San Diego and was introduced to the San Diego Professional Coaches Alliance by a friend and colleague from “internet marketing grad school” live events that I had previously attended in San Diego.
If you are coach and you find yourself with insufficient business skills because no none taught them to you in your coach training program,
and if you need a friendly supportive team of peers to collaborate and learn with, I have an invitation for you to consider.
The Professional Coaches Alliance helps address both of these challenges.
I currently lead the Professional Coaches Alliance, and we are dedicated to supporting coaches in creating, growing, and sustaining a thriving coaching business.
We invite you to join our professional community of coaches and service providers. Every month, we offer several live virtual learning, networking, and collaborative community events each month and an online library of past guest speaker presentations in multiple topics related to coaching and the business of coaching. And you get all that for only $29/month.
Best of all, we are currently collaborating with our sister organization, California Coaches, to offer you a 3-month trial membership with all live events from both organizations being available to you for only $58. So you get 3 months for the price of 2, this month only.
