Hey do you want a life coach certification for you. Not quite sure which one to get.
Stick around and I'll give you my honest thoughts based on years and years of experience in the coaching industry.
Now if you've looked into this before you'll know that there are tons and tons of
options. I mean literally thousands of coaching certification programs out there. But in my
opinion there are five main criteria that you should look through.
So do I call these criteria? Because id I call these criteria, each one is a criterion; the singular and I don't like that.
Now I publish new videos every single week on this channel so if you're interested
in the conversation around coaching, building a business, becoming a better coach, make sure
you subscribe and hit that little bell so you get all the notifications.
And by the end of this video I'm gonna give you the main criteria. I suggest you use to decide which
certification program you should invest in.
I'm Sean Smith the founder of elite coaching
university where we give you the skills to be a better coach. And the strategies to build a bigger business.
After all these years in the industry I get this question asked
of me a lot. What certification program is best for me if I want to be a successful life coach?
Let's talk about it.
So first of all you need one. And if you haven't watched my
full discussion video on the four main benefits you're going to get from a good certification
program click that link or I'll put the link down in the description as well. So the first
thing to consider is really the most important one in my opinion and it's not even about
the program it's about you. The question you've got to ask yourself is "am I really, truly, committed
to becoming a coach?" And the reason this is the one to start with is because whatever
coaching certification program you get into if it's a legitimate one it's going to be
lengthy it's going to require investments of time, energy, and money. And it's not going
to be convenient so if you're not really fully committed to becoming a coach save your money
it won't matter which one you choose because you won't do it. And then obviously if you
don't consume and use the program it doesn't matter how good it is, or how many fantastic
testimonials it has, it's useless to you because you're not implementing it. Now, how you dig
into the curriculum and implement what you learn is going to be the most important factor
to you becoming a good coach or not. And contrary to what a lot of people are searching for
the single most marketable factor in you building a good coaching business is your skill set.
But on the flipside if you really are serious and committed to becoming a coach then you're
going to get something powerful out of just about any program you invest in because you're
going to take personal responsibility for your learning. And it's not so much about
the bells and whistles of the program. It's really about your engagement in the program.
The second consideration is a very simple one. Does it teach the tools that you need?
I mean let's not overcomplicate this too much; does it give you what you want to do the work
that you're committed to do as a coach? If it doesn't give you the right tools then it's
not a good fit. And I know that might sound super basic but I'll tell you what a lot of
people choose to invest in programs because of the testimonials or because of the website
or because of the celebrity status of the trainer and all of that is well and good but
if it's not a good fit it's not a good fit it doesn't matter how shiny and seductive
the package is. It was not practical for you. What's the point? So really check into it
with some scrutiny look under the hood a little bit and see if it's going to equip you with
the tools, and the confidence, and the resources, to make the kind of impact you want to make
in the world. So if you want to coach high level athletes find a program that teaches
a little bit about the psychology of competitive athletes or the physiology what happens to
the brain in high stressful, high competitive situations. Maybe a little bit about sports
nutrition but if you want to help couples create more joy and happiness in their relationships
then maybe you want to look into the masculine feminine dynamic, communication styles vulnerability,
intimacy, all that stuff as it relates to relationships as opposed to intimacy as it relates to strangers.
That's a different topic. That's actually that might be a good niche. I haven't seen
that one before. Again the message here is get the tools that are going to help you with
whatever work you want to do in the world. Now if you don't really know exactly what you want
to do specifically but you know you want to get into the coaching industry and maybe get
a little bit of traction then just go a little more broad maybe find yourself a general behaviour
change sort of curriculum that can be applied to any context. And then once you decide exactly
what you want to do obviously get the specialized tools that you'll need at that point and that's
totally fine if that's where you are. Don't wait until you're 100 percent clear on exactly
what you think you're going to do for the rest of your career. In order to get started
because a lot of times you will ever be able to figure it out until you get started. Now
a third consideration is something that a lot of people don't pay a lot of attention
to but it's really important. Does it feel right? We spend too much time on this planet
being slaves to our intellect. And while that helps us not get into trouble sometimes and
not do things that are stupid. It also doesn't allow us to follow your heart when that's
the most important thing to do. When I got serious about becoming a coach and got certified
in NLP, I didn't do a bunch of research and figure out what's the best program. I just
followed the person that gave me a life changing experience and he wasn't certified by some
board or some institution. I didn't need that for the trust. I trusted him because he shifted
my life. I felt it in my body. So, if you can, give the program a try.
Now this is actually something that I had never thought about or considered until I was writing my notes today
right before I started filming. Whenever possible, see if you can actually experience the curriculum
and I'm not talking about the curriculum that you're going to learn to be a coach. I'm talking
about experience in the curriculum as a client. I mean if you don't really believe in the
methodology that gave you a good experience what's the point of learning it. And honestly
when I came up with that earlier I thought that's a pretty good idea I'm going to start
doing that. So if you're interested in checking out our program we want to give you a neuro-transformational
experience and then you can decide if that's what you want to get certified in. I'll put
a link down in the description or you can go to coach Sean Smith dot com slash try coaching
with a hyphen in between. This is going to be just the sales call is going to be a full
on coaching call. When you feel something you're like "I want to be able to do that
for other people." So on this call we want to give you an actual experience of the Neuro-transformational
processes that we teach. So in this experience we can help you clarify and identify your
biggest goals and dreams and maybe help you set a game plan to achieve them. We could
help you identify and shift limiting beliefs or values conflicts. We could go super deep and
give you some trauma release or neurological release. If that's what you need.
So the bottom line is give it a try. If you like the methods and you like the experience great will tell
you how to get certified and doing that kind of work with other people and if you don't
like it great. At least you now know that it didn't resonate with you and you can close
that door. And honestly I'm happy to give this to you because I'm not interested in
seducing you into a relationship and pulling money out of your wallet. If it's not a good fit.
That's not what I'm about. That's not for me. You can keep your money if I can't change your life.
All right the fourth consideration is are there happy customers?
Now this is a big one out there it's probably the main one that people use to decide on the certification program.
And I totally get it. Social Proof is important. We don't want to be the guinea
pigs right. So we want to know that somebody has gone through the program and they have
good things to say about it and it actually delivered what it said it was going to deliver.
What I would say though is really dig into the details of the success stories.
I would even reach out to people if you want to to check in with, again, the details of the tools
that you want. Is it going to give you the skills, the competence, the resources, the support,
to do what you want to do in the world. And just because a program has 100 testimonials
doesn't mean that it's right for you and if a program has no testimonials then you're
going to be one of the beta clients. That also doesn't mean you shouldn't do it there's
nothing wrong with trying a program if it feels right and you think it's going to equip
you with what you need. Go for it. I mean every great program out there at some point
was starting out and had no testimonials so a program doesn't have to be around for years
and years, and years, with hundreds of success stories to be valid as long as you put it
under the microscope and it looks good. It sounds good it feels good do it.
And finally number five is does it teach general Coaching Concepts? Specialized tools are awesome, but
specific tools don't always transfer to utilization. And what I mean by that is just because you
learn how to use certain specialized tools if you don't know how and when to implement
them in the general coaching conversation then how useful are they going to be.
When I got certified, for 21 straight days by the way inand speaking coaching, I walked out of
that room feeling like I had all these tools at my disposal. But it wasn't until I actually
got on the phone with people that I realize I'm not sure how to use these things. It actually
took me several years to get comfortable using the tools in a generalized coaching sense.
So I spent a lot of my time trying to help coaches understand when to do certain things
how to do certain things how to decide on the fly when they use certain tools but also
a lot of the bigger aspects of coaching things like how to create rapport, how to set clients
up to succeed in between their calls. Give them self coaching tools and techniques. How
do to know if a client has leverage in the moment for you to be able to do your work
or not. And then there are practical things like how to manage your schedule or how to
block your coaching time to get more effectiveness out of your energy how to take notes on the
call and share those notes. How to prep the clients before the call. So the calls are
better. So think of the specific modality or methodologies as the engine that give you
the skills as the coach we need. But if you don't have the body of the car to put the
engine in then how useful is the engine. So to recap these five criteria number one. Are
you even committed to becoming a coach and digging into the program? Number two does
it teach the tools that you need to do the work that you want to do? Number three does
it feel right to you, Intuitionally? is that a word Intuitionally. Number four. Are there
happy customers and success stories? And number five... is it going to give you the generalized
coaching awareness and understanding to actually use the tools that you learned. Now once upon
a time when people would ask me this question all I could give them were these five criteria
about how to decide on a certification program. But now I got one of my own. We actually have
two certification programs one online and one in person if you want to do the deep work.
And what I teach is something that I call neuro-transformational coaching that's learning
how to change the neurology in people's bodies so that any shifts in behavior can actually last.
If all we do is play at the surface and teach people how to change their actions
through will power without addressing the issues that created the sabotage in the first place.
It's not going to last. We can give them a little bit of progress but eventually they
will revert back to whatever behaviors and thoughts and emotions are embedded in their
neurology. So, if you're interested in helping people make these foundational and fundamental
changes in their neurology and completely transform their lives. Check out the online
program is called Breakthrough Coaching Certification. And of course I'll put a link in the description
so I hope this discussion has been helpful for you. Please comment below with any thoughts
or questions you have about the whole conversation. And remember to hop on these new calls that
we're doing to actually experience what a neuro-transformation is. If you decide that
BCC is a good fit for you, then I can't wait to welcome you into that community and support
you in your goals as a coach. If you decide if that's not a good fit for
you but you want to join the Facebook group called The Truth about Coaching then click
the link in the description and we'll support you there. Either way, I hope you like this
video. Let me know by liking and subscribing. Feel free to share it with your communities
if you have other people that would benefit from the conversation. Thanks for watching.
Stick around for a few bloopers. And I'll see you in the next video.
**Dance Break**
Stay tuned.
Frickin' Michelle.
Five steps to be more intimate with total strangers.
Step number one... I'll stop there.
That was going to be way too easy.
Oh my goodness. I'm really glad I've filtered that out.
(((Buy my program))) See that slick embedded sales technique.
Everybody who's watching right now they just got their credit card swiped.
Feeeellllings.
Grand. I don't even use that word.
I just kinda grabbed my boobs, I don't know if that's gonna look weird. Whatever! If grab my boobs, I grab my boobs, who cares?!