I have previously written about the beginnings of my life coaching experience, but now that I feel I have achieved my goal I'd like to bring it all together, so forgive the slight repetition at the beginning…

As part of my learning journey I am making sure I have a goal to work towards. One of my long-term goals is my learning plan. Another was to understand what I want to be, and I completed this in my NLP course last year: see this dairy here

My next goal was to decide what to do with the new knowledge about myself: to make a decision with regards to my career direction by the end of February 2004.

Goal: decide on career direction by end Feb 2004

All of this arose from an unexpected opportunity to have some life coaching. I was awarded a red-letter day experience for work on the staff suggestion committee. Not being a huge fan of heights or strenuous activity I was finding it difficult to get rid of, when they started offering life-coaching as an experience.

Needless to say I jumped at the chance and soon met Usha Nair from One2One Professional Coaching Ltd. She got me to complete a wheel of life in preparation, and then I was to meet her in a London hotel for just one hour... My wheel showed by deep dissatisfaction with my career.

The session itself was surprisingly unhurried given the time constraint. Usha was able to very quickly understand what I needed from the session and to suggest how I could improve my career score. One thing she said of particular impact was simply to agree that I did need to change career. This was powerful for me, because you always wonder if it is just you, or if you are 'running away' from a situation that it would be better to try and change from within.

In one hour Usha transformed me from someone who had a growing idea that things were not right for me into a person who had made difficult decisions and had an action plan to follow to correct this. Simply put she empowered me.

The list of actions wasn't small, and I've had to work fairly hard to keep on track. The basic format is to agree on something that needs to be done (improve interview skills for example), explore what can be done about it (in my case a course) and to set a deadline by which it will have been achieved. The deadline is crucial - this is the bit that gives you the buy-in to your goal.

Later on I was to receive a follow-up conversation, and I had this last night [10-FEB-04]. This was well timed as I'd got most of my goal completed and have now taken some key decisions about my career.

• I have established that I don't share the values of the organisation I work for and thus must leave it to be happy.
• I also know that I want to be more creative, radical and make a difference
• I need to be valued and am motivated by a need for achievement

My new mission is:
I want to improve organisations' revenue with innovation

This can be through innovation with products to increase sales or innovation with people to improve processes.

My life coaching experience has frankly been central to my ability to achieve this. Having someone else rooting for you is great and the deadlines ensure you stay on track. I'm now ready for my next goal: a job that I will love for an organisation that shares my values.





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