“Why can’t she just tell me what to do?”

I hear this line a little too often with business owners work with coaches, whether it’s a launch strategist or marketing coach or business coach.

Business owners just want to be told what to do.

I get it.

It’s not that they’re incapable of doing the mental heavy lifting.

It’s that, as a business owner, decision fatigue is REAL.

There are so many decisions to make.

When should I send that final, final sales email?

Will I make an exception to for that one favorite client to book outside of my normal hours?

How should I tell my assistant she’s dropping the ball?

What will I wear for today’s webinar?

How will I fit in today’s walk with the dogs?

Shoot, who’s going to pick up Riley from school?

When it comes to certain aspects of running our businesses, especially the ones that feel scary and require us to do the hard work, we just want to be told what to do.

I was recently coaching a client, Courtney, through her sales conversations.

She asked me a question regarding how to present her pricing when people ask, “how much does it cost to work with you?”

Courtney let me know that there were two options she was considering:

1. “My 3-month package is $595.”

2. “When I work with a client, we go deep to really uncover why your child isn’t sleeping, so that not only is little Jimmy going to sleep with ease and staying asleep all night, the whole family is back to a normal, dreamy sleep-filled routine. And the investment for that type of result is $595.”

I’ve been doing this long enough to know she should head down path two.

But, her question seemed odd.

This woman is super smart and has fantastic business instincts.

I knew that she likely already knew what I was going to say.

But what was giving her pause here… Did she have another question behind her initial question? Did she just need a gut check?

Instead of simply giving her the answer, I asked her what she really wanted to do in this situation.

Her answer was exactly what I was hoping for, “I know I should present it like outlined in option two, but it doesn’t feel right. It is actually feels icky.”

Ding, ding, ding… we got to the heart of it.

She didn’t really have a tactical or logistical question.

She had bumped into mental gunk and needed support navigating through it.

Now we could really get to work to unpack what was going on. We could find a different way so that it feels better for her.

That’s why a coach can’t simply tell you what you want to do.

If I had done that with this client and jumped immediately into advice-giving mode, Courtney may have never raised the “ick” issue.

She likely would have just gone down that path, hated it because there was an unsupportive thought back there, maybe not booked as many clients, and probably would have been abandoned this technique.

And being able to confidently answer “how much does it cost to work with you?” is a BIG sales principle to understand and get comfy, cozy with.

So abandoning it would have impacted so many sales conversations now and down the road.

This is exactly why coaches can’t tell you what to do. Why we ask so many questions a lot of time.

We’re helping you to see your own brain and bring a level of awareness that’s lingering in your subconscious, bring forward that awareness and clarity about what you’re doing.

Because we know that when you’re clear and confident, you are unstoppable.

What’s the ONE business question you have? Maybe something that’s been lingering back there a while?

Massive or micro – post below and let’s get to it (yes, I’m offering business coaching just for you right below).

 

Photo by Mimi Thian on Unsplash