LIMITED OFFER – ONLY £45/$72

Helping you to unleash your full potential and be happy, fulfilled, successful and stress-free in your job at school.

Boost Your Confidence & Effectiveness In Preparation For The New School Year In September

Exclusively for Summer 2009, the Plain Sailing Coaching Programmes for Teachers and Support Staff are now available for a limited 6 week period during the holidays/vacation.

FOR ONLY £45 you will get 15 online coaching sessions with full interaction from an experienced coach and teacher. The sessions can be completed at your own leisure over the 6 weeks and are available online 24/7.

BE EMPOWERED WITH THE LATEST TOOLS AND STRATEGIES TO HELP YOU:

• cope with the stressful demands and pressures of working in a school;
• gain extra motivation and inspiration to fulfil your roles and responsibilities;
• improve your communication and interpersonal skills;
• manage and prioritise your time more effectively;
• develop healthy and effective relationships with other members of staff, pupils and parents;
• develop a healthier work/life balance;
• identify and eradicate any limiting beliefs that have been holding you back;
• uncover solutions for overcoming low levels of self-esteem and self-confidence…..and much more.

OUTLINE OF THE COACHING PROGRAMME

Stage 1: Introduction to the Journey

An introduction to Plain Sailing Core Programme followed by an overview of the programme and to Coaching Interactive.

Stage 2: Your Background

This will enable your coach to get to know you and the issues currently facing you in school and then tailor suitable interactive sessions for you.

Stage 3: Preparation

This will allow you to thoroughly explore the values and beliefs that are important to you both in education and in your wider life. This will lead to possible options for action.

Stage 4: My Life Mapping Session

You will create a map of your current life in relation to your roles and responsibilities in school. By examining what is important to you and assessing your current status in each area, you will be able to clearly define your dreams and the meaning of the fulfilment of those dreams. You will then be guided to consider what to do, in order to achieve your goals.

Stage 5: Your Strengths, Skills & Attributes

By identifying your strengths you will learn how to work with and leverage those strengths in order to fulfil your dreams.

Stage 6: Your Goals

You will get in touch with your calling, the reason why you are here, and identify what makes you truly happy.

Stage 7: Your Personal Values and Beliefs

You will be guided to help identify your core values and beliefs in education and in your job. Once these are clarified, you can make better decisions in order to reach your goals.

Stage 8: Defining & Fulfilling Your Vision

Your vision, beliefs and goals are examined and analysed. Then a plan of action starts to be formulated.

Stage 9: Setting Goals and Objectives

Choose the area you wish to focus on first, and then build a programme with goals and objectives for short, medium or long term. These can be linked to any targets that have already been set for you.

Stage 10: The GROW Web Session

Choose your first target and learn how to expand the options available to you.

Stage 11: Progress Report

You will be guided to routinely assess and report your progress to yourself and your coach.

Stage 12: Review

Complete the questionnaire and converse with your coach on the process you have undergone and the impact it has had. An invitation will follow to further grow using a specific coaching programme tailored for you by your coach.

Stage 13: Using the GROW Model and My Life Map as Ongoing Coaching Tools

It is important to continue growing by re-visiting the GROW Model and your My Life and go through the whole process again for different areas of concern in your job at school.

CLICK HERE TO FIND OUT MORE AND REGISTER

CLICK HERE TO LEARN MORE ABOUT THE POWER OF ONLINE COACHING

CLICK HERE TO WATCH A PRESENTATION ABOUT INTERACTIVE COACHING

So why is it that we rarely have the chance to reflect? Think about how many times you have been in a situation where you have really struggled to put your thoughts together in a cohesive way.  Have you ever been in a situation where you felt rushed because of time constraints, and then when you tried to verbalise your thoughts, all the words came out in the wrong way?

To give some examples of when either of these could occur, think job interviews, an important meeting, a presentation to an audience, or an appointment with a doctor or a solicitor. Bearing all of these scenarios in mind, how often have you been put on the spot to give an answer or make a decision, but because of the pressure you were under, what you said was not the best you could have chosen?

To take this even further, how many times have you come away from one of these scenarios and then suddenly everything you should have said miraculously comes into your head? Maybe there have been times when you wish you had planned better by thinking through beforehand about what you wanted to ask or say.

The main point being made here is that in our fast-moving lives, full of stress and a great deal of information overload, we rarely find good quality time to reflect. In simply meeting the day-to-day demands of our everyday lives, all too often there is no time left over for reflection about where our lives are leading or, even more important, where it is supposed to lead. It is so easy to lose sight of long-term goals when you are busy dealing with more immediate challenges. Even in our schools today, timetables are so full with subject content involving the learning of knowledge, that children are rarely given time, or taught, to think and to reflect. These skills are vital for a whole range of activities in our rapidly changing world, such as: problem-solving, evaluating, assessing, adapting and modifying – to name just a few.

So why is the ability to reflect so important and what exactly does it involve? The verb ‘to reflect’ originates from the Latin word ‘reflectere’ – meaning to bend back. By a simpler definition, to reflect involves thinking and/or expressing carefully considered thoughts. If we look at the noun ‘reflection’, its sense comes out much stronger – it means a thought or opinion resulting from careful consideration during mental concentration. To give an example in relation to the earlier scenarios, you could say after an interview: “Upon reflection, I wish I had expressed my opinions and ideas more clearly.” In many ways, that sentence highlights the major problem – there was no time for reflection during the event, and this is very common in our lives.

Effective and excellent coaching should always involve a great deal of thinking and reflecting. These are vital ingredients for a coach to be able to take the coachee forward and help them find solutions and pathways to facilitate the necessary changes required. It’s a two-way process – the coach frequently reflects on the required action and strategies appropriate for the coachee, and the coachee reflects a lot on how they are going to take the action and what obstacles or barriers they might encounter along the way.

Up unto now, coaching has traditionally been carried out on a one-on-one basis – either face-to-face or over the telephone. Modern technology, as rapidly changing as it is, even now allows us to talk over the internet with a headset and speakers. The next step on from this was only ever going to be a short matter of time away – namely eLearning based programmes with automated responses and/or feedback via email. And now, Coaching Interactive has arrived to bring affordable and reflective coaching to the masses, wherever they are and at whatever time.

The beauty of interactive online coaching is that, unlike traditional one-on-one coaching, it allows more quality time for reflection in a choice of environments – many of which are much more conducive to reflective thinking. Going back to the scenarios outlined earlier in this chapter, most of those situations contain factors which inhibit reflective thinking – such as limited time, feelings of anxiety or nervousness, being intimidated, and simply not feeling comfortable in a highly pressurised environment. Coaching Interactive enables the coachee  to work through coaching programmes in the comfort of their own home and at a time that is most suited to them. In fact, you can take as much time as you need before committing to answering a question – and if you change your mind, you can go back to it and make amendments.

The coaching environment is a key element of effective coaching and getting productive results from a client. In this light, there are certain characteristics of environments that can promote and support reflective thought. The table below illustrates the extent to which Coaching Interactive meets these characteristics.

Characteristics of environments supporting reflective thinking	Coaching Interactive……..
Provide enough wait-time to reflect before responding.	enables clients to take as much time as they want to type answers to questions and to save drafts that can be returned to and edited as many times as is necessary.
Prompt thoughts by asking questions that seek reasons and evidence.	Programmes have questionnaires built into them with many open-ended questions to enable the client to really analyse their thoughts.
Provide good explanations to guide thought processes.	Programmes are carefully structured in a step-by-step approach. Each step is very clearly explained in easy to understand language.
Provide a less-structured environment that prompts a person to explore what they really think is important.	provides many opportunities for clients to give their views and opinions on issues affecting their lives, for example by identifying and exploring their values and beliefs.
Provide a reflective journal, as an aid to the process of recording and analysing actions, thoughts and feelings.	provides a built-in system of storing data such as questionnaires, emails, tasks and the online calendar – all of which form a personal journal for the client.

The Reflective Journal is a method that most coaches introduce to their clients and is most effective as support for the whole coaching process. The written word, or in this case the typed word, is an excellent way of reflecting. By recording your experiences, thoughts and feelings in a systematic way, it enables you to analyse what you have written and as a consequence gain more insight. Increased insight is another very important part of being coached, especially in terms of planning life goals and how you are going to get to where you want to be. It is also the ideal way of identifying the barriers and obstacles you may encounter along the way, and which potentially may jeopardise your progress towards achieving your goals and aspirations.

Many people who keep daily diaries find this an excellent way to reflect on a range of everyday problems and situations – perhaps by asking themselves: What went well? What didn’t? Why? How do I feel about it? By writing these things down, thoughts and emotions are allowed to gradually come to the surface. You could say that reflective writing is essentially a kind of loose processing of thoughts and feelings about an incident, a situation, an event, or any experience at all.

All the data a client enters by answering questions in any of the programmes on Coaching Interactive is stored within their journal and can be returned to and amended over and over again. Time restrictions within traditional one-on-one coaching sessions do not allow as much for this level of re-visiting and re-thinking. It is the perfect way of fine-tuning your thoughts and reflections, facilitating a much greater chance of success and achievement. This level of repetition, often by going over something several times, helps to give a broader view and check nothing has been missed. Again, this is an experience we are so rarely afforded in our lives – whether it is as a student in the classroom or as a potential employee in the interview. This type of online reflection is an extremely useful way of getting the best out of someone, which is one of the main priorities for any coach.

The coach too, during interactive coaching, can record notes in response to a client’s answers to the questionnaires and refer to these when planning future sessions. The coach can also set tasks for the coachee and the calendar system acts as reminder of what needs to be done. All of these processes contribute to building up a reflective journal for each coachee. It can really help confidence by being able to look back over a journal and see progress, how difficulties were dealt with, and how the ideas have moved on.

Another very important element of reflection is that it turns experience into meaningful learning, helps us to make sense of the world around us and to learn from previous experience. How many times have you looked back on an event, thought about what happened and then considered what you would do differently in the future? These experiences can sometimes become blurred unless they are written down. When you are in an interview it is extremely hard to stand back and reflect when you are so caught up in the nerves of the interview. ‘Standing back’ helps give a better view or perspective on an experience, issue or action.

Coaching Interactive provides a structured step-by-step process to help you think about the issues in your life and what can be learned from them. Many of the questions are designed to help you reflect on events, situations and feelings in your life. This reflective process is illustrated in the following table.

1.     Identify the experience, situation, or event which occurred.	For example, a failed relationship.
2.     Describe the experience or situation.	What happened? Who was involved? What did you do? Why did you do what did you do? How did this affect you?
3.     Analyse the experience or situation.	What were you thinking or feeling? What was good and bad about the experience? What skills were used or developed? What were the consequences of your actions for yourself and others?
4.     Learn from the experience or situation.	What else could you have done? If it happened again what would you do differently? How can you improve your knowledge and skills? How can you use what you learned from the experience in your future practice?

Perhaps one of the greatest benefits of online coaching is that the level of reflection it allows enables the coachee to express deeper honesty. Reflection is often associated with ’striving for truth’, and online it is much easier for people to acknowledge things that they find difficult to admit in the normal course of events. Face-to-face coaching or one-on-one coaching over the telephone can often lead to feelings of being put on the spot or embarrassment. Are clients always totally honest in these situations? Do they not sometimes feel awkward about telling the coach certain things that they think will make them look silly? These issues are much less likely to arise online, as there is a certain level of anonymity attached to it and far less fear of being judged.

Ultimately, reflecting about your life through an online coaching programme can also bring much greater clarity, like seeing events literally reflected in a mirror. This can help at any stage of planning, carrying out and reviewing activities. It also enables more balanced judgements to be made by taking everything into account, and not just the obvious. If you forget what you said in the previous session, you have the option to look back and review your statements and observations.

Finally to conclude, it would be useful to examine the thoughts of John Dewey, who is one of the most renowned writers about reflective thinking. He said:

“We all acknowledge, in words at least, that ability to think is highly important; it is regarded as the distinguishing power that marks man from the lower animals. But since our ordinary notions of how and why thinking is important are vague, it is worthwhile to state explicitly the values possessed by reflective thought. In the first place, it emancipates us from merely impulsive and merely routine activity. Put in positive terms, thinking enables us to direct our activities with foresight and to plan according to ends-in-view, or to come into command of what is now distant and lacking. By putting the consequences of different ways and lines of action before the mind, it enables us to know what we are about when we act. It converts action that is merely appetitive, blind and impulsive into intelligent action.” (p.212, John Dewey on Education, University of Chicago Press, 1974)

Dewey makes several key points here that not only highlight the benefits of reflective thinking, but also how online coaching provides greater opportunities for this to take place. For example, he mentions “merely impulsive and routine activity” – this surely illustrates how people generally go about their lives, especially when faced with a challenge. In an interview, most of the answers we give are impulsive as there is little time to truly reflect. However, in answering important questions about yourself and your life through an online questionnaire, you are able to take your time and perfect your responses by changing it as often as you wish – giving a much more honest and accurate answer.

Dewey explains how thinking “enables us to direct our activities with foresight and to plan accordingly to ends-in-view”. How many people in their everyday lives plan with great foresight? Generally, they have ideas floating around in their heads about what they would like to do or achieve, but how rigorously is this planned for? Many people are afraid to plan and set goals because they fear failure. What they don’t realise is that achieving the goal isn’t half as important as setting it and then taking massive action towards its attainment. Coaching Interactive enables the coachee to focus through reflection and prepare for taking action – “intelligent action”, as Dewey calls it. We all know that the harder you prepare, the greater the chances of success.

Lastly, to return to Confucius – we are all constantly searching for greater wisdom. Wisdom that will help enhance our lives so that we can be as happy, successful and productive in all our endeavours, as is possible.  At last, the convenience of the internet, skilled coaches and powerful online tools, are combined to enable anybody to learn wisdom through structured and effective reflection.

Why not try a FREE interactive online coaching session now?Just go to the home page and click on the blue banner.

Let me know how you get on with it.

]]> http://plainsailinginschools.com/about-coaching/the-power-of-interactive-online-coaching/feed 0 http://plainsailinginschools.com/about-coaching/what-exactly-can-a-life-coach-do-for-you http://plainsailinginschools.com/about-coaching/what-exactly-can-a-life-coach-do-for-you#comments Wed, 06 May 2009 23:01:23 +0000 Ian Barrett http://plainsailinginschools.com/v1/?p=260 Life coaching is about getting the very best out of someone. It has become one of the most popular methods of self-development around, and is used in all areas of life.

I want you to try to imagine a relationship where the total focus is on you and you alone, on what you want in life, and on discovering strategies for helping you achieve it.

Now imagine someone listening only to you, not only to the words, but also to what’s behind them. Someone who listens to the very best in you, even when you are unable to hear it yourself!

Next imagine someone who is always there for you, to guide you, support you, motivate and inspire you on your journey to achieving your dreams and aspirations. Someone who will hold you accountable and keep you moving forward.

Can you also try to imagine someone who is totally curious about your dreams, what makes you tick, what you value, what your passions in life are. A  person who will help you clarify your goals and provide the tools for action to help you get the results you want.
Imagine what it would be like if someone knew your values and life purpose and held you true to them. Someone who would encourage you to press on, someone to celebrate your victories and help you learn from your setbacks.

Also, try to imagine someone who listens to you without judgment and allows you to show emotion. Imagine you get to talk to this person every week, even when you’ve made a mess of things or when you’ve had a great success. This is the place you visit regularly and consistently…to consolidate, to integrate and to push on.

Ultimately, coach can help you find a way to realise your full potential through a process of uncovering and then eliminating destructive behavioural and thinking patterns in your life. Any goal can be achieved through coaching  by empowering you with specific tools and scientifically tested techniques that work. Coaching is a solution-focused approach to personal development that will help you make lasting changes in your life.

When you consider your own life, how readily to you spend money on holidays, clothes and cars….but how often do you spend money on your own wellbeing? Having a coach is making an investment in yourself – an investment that could totally transform your life.

The great philosopher Galileo once said “You cannot teach a man anything. You can only help him discover it within himself.” This quote is profound as it sums up coaching in its purest form. Life Coaching is about living your life in keeping with what’s important to you. It enables you to:

• take stock and get clarity
• regain control and
• achieve balance in your life.

Coaching addresses all manner of issues:

• Where am I now?
• Who am I?
• Where am I going?
• What do I want?
• How do I resolve this particular issue?
• How do I sort out my often confusing and stressful life?
• Which career path should I pursue?

When explorers set off on an exhilarating journey, they may well take a guide or indeed a map. When they complete the journey and celebrate their achievement, they know they are responsible and have achieved their dream. But they also know that they probably wouldn’t have done it without the help of the guide or map. The guide did not make the journey for them, but it was there at every stage to encourage, motivate, help with the navigation and remind the explorer why they took the journey in the first place and kept them on course.
Similarly, having a coach is all about YOU and assisting YOU in finding the key, to see through the fog and to give you the tools and insight so that YOU can achieve everything you wish to achieve.
Finally, take the elastic band analogy. An elastic band stretched has energy going all ways. When you let it go, you don’t know in which direction it will fly. So, it is that energy and direction that life coaches harness and identify, encouraging the client to let go and to use those powerful and positive forces to their benefit rather than their detriment. The positive power and magic of coaching is without doubt immeasurable.

We all know that to get good results we have to take new actions, and of course all our actions start from a decision: the power of decision is the power of change. After all, it is our decisions, not the conditions of our lives that determine our destiny. So, what would happen if you could always make the right decisions to help you feel happier, earn a better living, become more successful, have a better relationship, or improve virtually any area of your life?

Maybe you need to make a decision to give up smoking or drinking. Maybe you want to find a way to lose weight and get fitter. Maybe you need to find a new job or make your business more successful. Maybe it is a decision to study and develop some new skills to allow you to earn more. Maybe you simply want to start each day with a better attitude, no longer blame others and figure out some new action to make your life better. The trouble is that most people find it incredibly hard to make some of these decisions on their own.

Do you know what the major force is that controls your decisions? The force that influences how you think and feel all the time, and determines how you feel about everything that occurs in your life? That force is your beliefs. The problem is that the majority of people have a whole load of self-limiting beliefs that can almost cripple them, and they have no idea how to eradicate them and create new empowering beliefs.

Most people have something they want to change in their lives, but they do not know how to do it. The obvious way to change things is to change what you are focusing on. Focus controls how you see the world and what you do about it. Your focus can literally save your life. But again, it can be hard on your own to find the discipline, motivation, tools and techniques to steer your focus in the right direction.

When you hear about successful people achieving extraordinary, seemingly impossible goals, do you always assume that they were just fortunate? Or that you could never possibly be as successful? Most people are afraid to set goals because they fear failure. What they do not realise is that achieving the goal is not half as important as setting it and then taking massive action towards its attainment. Remember, the harder you prepare, the luckier you will get!

We all need to set inspiring goals to give our lives more focus and move in the direction we want to go. We also need to develop action steps to achieve our goals within a carefully planned and structured timetable. If you think you need some help with deciding to make important changes then please keep tuned to this site for more practical ideas and support.