Module 6 The Coach in Your Corner

Many people can point to a person or people in their lives who helped them personally or professionally. Even top athletes continue to use coaches when they are at the top of their games. Coaches help people to achieve their goals in a supportive and targeted way.

Have you had a person in your life who helped you achieve something that might have been out of your reach otherwise? Or maybe, your coach helped you achieve an important goal faster than you might have achieved it without the help.

Prompt: The Coach in Your Corner

Blog about an important coach you have had in your life. What were you trying to achieve? How did this person help? In what ways was your performance accelerated?

Alternately, blog about the importance of having a coach in your corner. How could you use a coach to help you achieve your goals? You will have an opportunity to work with a certified coach for the next 6 months. How will use you use this gift to advance yourself?

Submit the link/url to your blog by selecting Submit Assignment. For guidance on using Canvas ePortfolio, review the Reflection Blog Assignments page.


The Coach In My Corner

Blog about an important coach you have had in your life. What were you trying to achieve? How did this person help? In what ways was your performance accelerated? 

When most of us think of coaching, we think back to an athletic coach who had a profound impact on our lives. This is usually someone who encouraged us and helped us find something within ourselves that we couldn't see. They served as a source of inspiration, confidence, and compassion - more than anything...they truly cared. 



Many people often shy away from coaching because they do not feel they would be good enough. Though, when I think back to great coaches of mine throughout my lifetime, they were not necessarily the best athlete or leader, but they possessed immense passion for the subject at hand and for those they coached. Something as simple as knowing someone's first name, where they live, their favorite foods and music, and their aspirations...these often meant more than any type of advice they could give. Great coaches tend to be great leaders because they make people feel a sense of that same passion and fire - they inspire others to find the greatness within themselves.




Coaching helps people realize their potential. Moreover, according to Yarborough (2018), coaching, in respect to leadership, is similar to counseling and psychotherapy where the "focus is on on the ways people behave, how they think, and how they experience emotions." Leadership coaching is focused on the present and future development and growth of an individual. 

The idea of coaching is to help the coachee achieve their goals and objectives without providing a direct solution or pathway. In essence, coaching requires huge sums of emotional intelligence in understanding an individual's hopes, aspirations, strengths, talents, values, passions, emotions, and inconsistencies, and catalyzing their thinking toward the solution (Bluepoint, 2013). A coach does not solve someone's problem, but rather helps them work through it. This requires a coach to represent themselves in a credible, caring, and trustworthy manner.

Personally, I have had important coaches in several facets in life such as athletics and professionally, however, there was one person in particular who stands out with my newfound understanding of what being a coach actually means. This is someone I never really considered a coach, but when I consider how he walked through my problems and helped me discover a way forward, I realize how he really is one. 

So, story time...

While at the United States Air Force Academy, I was entering my senior year with a struggling academic record. I was determined to turn my trajectory around improve my performance to my personal standards of excellence. The problem was that no one believed in me - not my commander, not my classmates, not my instructors...in fact, I had some instructors who degraded me and even yelled at me for poor performance. I vividly remember during freshman year when a chemistry teacher actually put me all alone for a group exam when everyone else had partners; that didn't feel great. Truthfully, I was having a difficult time balancing the integration and mixing of school and military training; it wasn't that I didn't want to try. Other times, I did not understand the material and genuinely needed help - I can admit that I wasn't the smartest person in college.



Eventually, I started to get accustomed to wearing a uniform to class and my grades were improving every semester. At this moment entering senior year I realized that I could mathematically graduate with a 3.00 GPA if I finished my two semesters with 3.70. Nearly everyone I spoke with said that based on my past performance it was basically impossible...until I met one of the most important coaches I have had in my life is Lieutenant Colonel Kenny Smith (then Captain Smith). 

Lieutenant Colonel Smith changed my life more than he knows when I came into his office and allowed me to talk with him one on one. Our discussion went on for over an hour where he genuinely got to know me, my passions, my current state, and my goals and aspirations. I told him about my goal for a 3.00 GPA at graduation and he acknowledged that it would be an uphill battle, but one that is achievable. He believed in me - my potential. He even said that he was in a similar position when beginning his senior year as a cadet and had the same goal. Most of all, he helped me believe in myself.


The most pivotal aspect of our discussion wasn't that he didn't shut me down, but that he provided accountability for my goal. We would meet regularly and discuss where I was with my academic standing, and he would continue to encourage me to push. He didn't necessarily do my homework for me, or tell me how to get better grades, but instead he just believed in me. He allowed me to come to terms with my academic state, realize that a 3.00 GPA is a fine one and that it was not a reflection on my character as a human being. He reminded me that it is okay to fail, but it is not okay to give up. He gave me hope and inspiration which accelerated my performance. Most of all - he gave me his time and truly cared.

I pushed hard through my final year at the academy and was on track after my first semester to reach my goal. Just one semester to go. Unfortunately, I ended up finishing my academics right at a 2.99 GPA, which at the time was somewhat heartbreaking. But, Lieutenant Colonel Smith reemphasized that graduation was not the end of the race...that there still is a lot of runway left in life to continue to turn things around. To this day, I am still motivated by the hope he gives me. Perhaps that is why I am working overtime with my academics now, and why I am applying to the Advanced Academic Degree (AAD) program, a scholarship program within the Air Force. My drive for success has led to the winning of several awards throughout my career as well. No matter what happens, I will always look back to that one hour discussion and remember how it so dramatically changed my life for the better.

Thank you, Lieutenant Colonel Smith. 

As a leader, it is now my turn to carry the torch and work to build positive coaching cultures wherever I go because I understand how powerful a single moment can be for any given person.


Forever grateful,

Chad


References:

Bluepoint Leadership Development. (2013, August 27). The three core coaching skills [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bYZZQigqZQs

 

Yarborough, J. (2018, March 25). The role of coaching in leadership development. New Directions for Student Leadership., 2018(158), 49–61. https://doi.org/10.1002/yd.20287

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