“Why is this important to you?”

“Because if I didn’t go for it, I don’t think I can ever look myself in the mirror with respect…”

“So… what’s stopping you?”

“I’m afraid… I’m…”

“…because…”

”I don’t… know…”

(Followed by 15 seconds of pin drop silence)

“What do you feel when you say afrai…”

“2 MORE MINUTES!”

Coaching on Zoom

Processed with VSCO with preset — *(3,2,1 smile doesn’t work with differing internet speeds)*

One of the limitations of my online coaching course was time.

Understandably, with 15 students per Zoom class, we can’t exactly spend an entire hour on a coaching session. 12 minutes was the typical time limit.

While I’ve learnt a lot of practical skills in these short sessions, I always end my 12 minute coaching sessions eager for more. I would have loved to guide my coachee through the long, arduous, but necessary process of unpeeling through layers of internal doubt, truly know them, and partner them in achieving a goal that’s uniquely theirs.

These quick sessions affirmed my appreciation for long form communication. Which reminds me of another thing I appreciate- barbeque.

Coaching, to me, is like barbeque. To get to the perfect outcome, there needs to be, of course, knowledge, skillset, attentiveness, passion, and tender loving care to name a few.

But most importantly, it takes time. It is meant to be slow.

Or should I say… SLOOW:-

The SLOOW Coaching Model

Search

Search within you what it is that you truly want to achieve.

And do it slow. Better to be slow and correct, than to be fast but wrong. There’s no point driving a really fast car if you’re going the wrong direction, get my drift?

Also, a “true” goal doesn’t just surface at the snap of a finger, like a diamond, it takes time and pressure to unearth.

However, we’ll re-visit this in the second O. As of now, questions are straightforward, iterations of:-

What are you searching for?
What is it that you wish to achieve through our coaching session(s)?
Why is this important to you?

Link

In this the step, we link your goals to reality. We connect your lofty, sky high dreams to the ground.

Gasps!

“How could you?!”

That’s not necessarily a bad thing, because a stable ground is necessary for a massive take off. A goal is only achievable if you can see a link to it from where you are at!

Questions to include:-

Where are you currently at in terms of achieving this goal?
What obstacles are currently in your way?
What have you tried doing? How did that turn out?

Optimize

Tim Ferriss, one of my favorite people on the internet, is widely referred as the master of optimization.

I particularly love this quote from him:-

“Even a small amount of non-reactive planning will completely transform your approach, because you are avoiding the impulse to multitask, and that ultimately transforms your result”.

It’s perhaps the most practical rendition of the “Less is more” cliché.

While it’s important to come up with action steps, but it’s even more important to come up with the right action steps, and it usually not a list of 25 things to check off.

Like being slow, doing less flies in the face of dogma—but why do more when you can be effective with less?

Doing less also fosters focus, especially on what truly matters.

Questions to include:-

What do you think are effective steps that will lead you there?
Which one of these do you want to pursue?
What do you think would be the most important step, that, when taken, will render all other steps unnecessary?
What could be the biggest obstacle to this step?

Own

“Is this truly what you want” is perhaps one of the hardest questions to answer. Try asking it to yourself.

I’ve given this a lot of thought. To be honest, this could easily be placed in step 1 -“Search”. However, I believe that asking “why” after realizing that you can, puts in in a completely different context.

Now, you’re not haunted by a goal that feels so insurmountable, and controlled by the notion you’re a failure for not being able to do it. Now that you know you can do it, you have a choice of whether you want to do it.

This lyric from Eminem puts it together nicely:-

“Segregation is bein told where I’m gonna go,
Separation is bein woke and goin wherever I wanna go”.

Having a choice changes everything.

Also, it’s true that establishing this as an extra step slows down the entire coaching process. And no, I didn’t make this step up just to play up “slow”.

Rapport is an important aspect of a successful coaching session, and coaches and coachees may not be able to go “deep” with each other before building rapport. However, after going through processes Search, Link, and Optimize together, the wall of reservation would have been better broken down.

Questions to include:-

Why are you hoping to achieve this goal? (note: the meaning behind their goal is more important than the goal itself)
Is this truly what you want?
Can you see yourself truly embracing this?
Does this goal truly relate to your higher purpose?
On a scale of 1 to 10, how committed/ motivated are you to doing it? (follow up: Why is it not a 10? How can we make it a 10?)

Way Forward

Now that you’ve searched it, linked it, optimized it, and owned it, it’s time to work on the nitty gritty. Dreams are products of habits, accountability, planning, and executing!It is, indeed, a SLOOW grind!

But if it’s the right one, every slow second is precious.

Questions to include:-