David Wood | Inner Firewalking

About David Wood

For 20 years David has helped entrepreneurs around the globe to grow their results, by growing themselves. A former consulting actuary to Fortune 50 companies in New York, David quit corporate life to pursue his inner journey, which now deeply influences his work. A digital nomad, David is currently dancing salsa, paragliding, and coaching his rock star entrepreneur clients from Colombia. His specialty is doubling your productivity and profits, while halving your stress. If you become a highly authentic and inspirational leader in the process, well….that can’t be helped.

The Coaching Market

The following is an excerpt from the CoachStart Manual.

Ten years ago, no one had heard of life, business, or corporate coaching. Today, it is featured in The New York Times, Fortune Magazine, Oprah, and CNN. And still, most of the world’s population has not heard of it. Demand for coaching is expected to continue to grow and may accelerate. What will happen when the first major movie featuring a life coach hits the street? Corporations are jumping on the band wagon: they want to hire corporate coaches, but even greater is their desire to have their managers trained in coaching techniques, and to develop a “coaching culture” within their organization.

There are an estimated 10,000 part-time and full-time coaches worldwide (ref: ICF). The number of people entering the emerging field of personal and business coaching has doubled in size each of the past three years (ref: CoachVille™). Several hundred articles, TV and radio shows have been done in the past three years. Coaching has been written about in Newsweek, Business Week, Fortune, Money, USA Today, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, Fast Company, New Age Journal, Kiplinger’s Personal Finance, Bloomberg Personal, Newsday, etc.

The number of corporations using coaching is increasing. Fortune magazine has referred to coaching as: “one of the hottest things in human resources” and “a grassroots movement that is spreading in some of the unlikeliest corners of corporate America, including IBM, AT&T, and Kodak.”

Coaching is strongest in the US, followed by the UK, Japan, Canada, Australia, Singapore, and New Zealand. Coaching is reaching more and more countries all the time; my newsletter subscribers now come from more than 90 countries.

Improvements in technology including teleconferences, cheap international phone calls, and the reach of the internet are making it even easier for coaches to build a successful practice with low overhead.

Ginger Cockerham on Dealing With Challenging Coaching Situations

The following is taken from David’s interview with Ginger Cockerham in 10 Super Coaches.

What if a client brings up a serious life problem – and I don’t have a clue about how to help her/him?

I learned to distinguish between coaching and therapy and referred clients quickly who needed therapy. With the rest of my clients, I recognized that it was not my job to solve my client’s problems – it was my job to be their coach and support and encourage them as they discovered their own solutions.

How can I possibly convince a company that coaching will impact the culture and the bottom line with no established research to substantiate that?

I did pilot programs that would provide results substantiated by their internal records.

Mike Turner On Building a Life Coaching Practice

The following is taken from David’s interview with Mike Turner in 10 Super Coaches.

What was the most disheartening for you while building your practice?

What was most disheartening was not getting enough clients – and wondering if I should persevere or go back to being a consultant. I coped with this by working my fairly small network more and by seeking out a couple of organizations which were active in the coaching field and trying to develop affiliate relationships with them.

Although my early attempts to develop such relationships didn’t lead to any work, spending time developing the relationships did mean I was around people who were active as coaches and this sustained my confidence that my work would eventually expand – as it eventually did.

What was the most interesting or exciting thing for you about building your practice?

The point at which I realized that my practice was self-sustaining and that I no longer felt a day to day anxiety about whether I would be able to pay the bills that month!

Bug Simulator: Bughouse Notation Training Audios

Tyrions Apprentice | White | Level 1

Tyrions Apprentice | White | Level 2

JKiller | White | Level 4

There Really Are Thousands of People Doing This

The following is an excerpt from the book Get Paid For Who You Are.

Don’t just take my word for it. there’s an internet website called www.killerstart-ups.com that reviews fifteen new internet start-ups every single working day. That’s about 4,000 start- ups every year — just the ones this site reviews — with subjects ranging from financial investments to resources for educators to evaluating tv shows to culinary tips.

The prospects are as limitless as the number of hobbies and interests you can think up. One website, www.itsthoughtful.com is all about a community of people who want to get ideas for gifts that matter to those they care about. Someone had to think up the idea, start researching gifts, and start connecting others who are interested in the same thing. for that matter, someone had to think of starting a website reviewing new internet start-ups!

What’s your passion, hobby, skill or experience? Can it be turned into a revenue stream for you? Yes it can, whether you like scrapbooking, deep sea diving, nifty new gadgets, lawn care, becoming a better parent, personal development, financial planning, or hiking in national parks. Whatever you like or love is something you can spend more time doing and make money while doing it!

The Three R’s of Business Success #3: Relevance

The following is an excerpt from Judy Feld’s Three R’s of Business Success, as part of 10 Super Coaches.

Relevance: Have you targeted your message to your best customers, and is it clear how you serve them and meet their needs?

Have you identified the niche or market segment that is most likely to buy your product or service? Does your message resonate with these people, and do you know them well?
What are you an expert in? What is your specialty? Make sure your marketing materials clearly indicate what is unique about your offerings.
Do you publish testimonials from your most satisfied clients or customers?
Have you documented some client/customer success stories? Are they relevant to the market you are trying to reach?
Do you have confidence in your own ability to serve your customer well, and can you articulate the specific benefits to a potential buyer? Confidence is key.

Posts by David Wood