A Master Coach - What Does It Take?

As Sandy got deeper into the NLP world with her repertoire of coaching clients increasing through the years, she began to achieve phenomenal results for her clients. Knowing how to navigate through their minds in the shortest possible route, they found themselves in a good space, in a short period of time.

​More and more they began to refer to her as a guru or a master. She had heard these terms used loosely in the Learning & Development world when she worked in corporate. She was adamant that she was referred to as a messenger, a conduit of change or something along those lines.

As Sandy got deeper into the NLP world with her repertoire of coaching clients increasing through the years, she began to achieve phenomenal results for her clients. Knowing how to navigate through their minds in the shortest possible route, they found themselves in a good space, in a short period of time.
More and more they began to refer to her as a guru or a master. She had heard these terms used loosely in the Learning & Development world when she worked in corporate. She was adamant that she was referred to as a messenger, a conduit of change or something along those lines.
Typically when clients referred to her as a master in her field it was because she had expertise to show for it. She understood where they were coming from. But she also felt it was rather erroneous and dis-empowering to take the credit for any change work achieved. She wanted clients to own their change. She was a mere facilitator.
So, when asked by prospective coaches how they could attain such skills the  answer was always the same. Perfect practice makes perfect. Practice coaching skills that you need to acquire first. There were many roads to this end game, Sandy’s obvious preference being to attend an NLP practitioner certification course.
Sandy chose NLP training as opposed to a coaching program because she felt the former provided learners with amazing coaching tools that were so easily applied to others. The brilliance of this methodology was that learners needed to apply to themselves first, then to others.
By the time learners had completed the NLP practitioner certification course, they would be adept with the “how to” attain mastery as a coach. It was important that coaches cleared their internal self so as to be able to share their journey with clients and understand how they felt when they made the change.
It is this confidence that catapulted Sandy to work through issues with her clients. Structurally, this also forced coaches to deep dive into NLP technology, as they practised being coach and client for every process.
Being a master coach was also dependent on the field of application they were in. Sandy had been trained in the corporate arena so her natural bent was to apply skills from her NLP training to applications needed in organisations;

• Conflict resolution between teams
• Modelling high performance teams
• Making fast and powerful decisions
• Using influential language

She was in great demand by C-suite leaders as business principles when applied to NLP models was where the power lay. They had experienced it and wanted more. The most successful master coaches rose to fast success because they had a solid background in some field.
This was how a master coach was created, meshing expertise and context of two fields together. Mastery wasn’t achieved immediately. In fact sandy recalled the early days of placing her NLP workshop manuals under her chair just in case she needed them. Smilingly, she attested to the fact that she had come a long way. As her confidence and sense of security built over her  journey, she emerged to become a master coach.
With years of amazing work as a business coach behind her, she ventured out to work with all types of mental illness, including suicide and depression. Never in Sandy’s wildest dreams did she ever expect to be shown this road but this was exactly how an NLP training led her to a profound and unexpected place.
A business coach without NLP technology would miss out on this huge segment of change work, which was actually extremely process-driven and procedural. Follow steps 1, 2 , 3 and results speak for themselves. The journey Sandy recounted in her mind was simple. It helped her gain mastery in her field fast as it gave rise to deeper understanding and easier application.
Having gained deep expertise in these fields Sandy then began to slice across vertical channels into the Asia Pacific Region, even as far as Nigeria. All good experience for a business coach which definitely aided with the path to mastery.
Sandy was amazed that her life purpose was being fulfilled. This mindful and heightened awareness way of thinking had produced so many benefits in accelerating decision making and deepening intuition.
She was far more effective today. She had learnt strategy to cut through the noise of life, with efficiency and volition. She had a sense of direction and purpose that catapulted her to goals which was her wish for everyone.