Alright coaches! Buckle in, we are about to get real here — out of love and the desire to build meaningful, long-term, successful and impactful relationships with all of you and all of our members. 💗
Mento is still a new business and every coach and member matters to our success as a business and whether or not we get the next round of funding. Mento offers a lot to new coaches — coach trainings, 1-on-1 support, lowering the barrier to coaching (we do the marketing, matching, customer generation, book keeping, etc. for you on top of offering a intensive coach training)! The two things we need from you are:
1. For you coach to the best of your ability (which is why we have our Coaching 101 and Coaching 201 trainings, as well as office hours, weekly coaching sessions, etc). We are here to help you grow and develop — we also need you to take a proactive role in your own growth as coach, too!
2. For you to give your members the best experience possible. This last point requires a white-glove, client-service mentality from you to make sure our members are part of a delightful and formative experience at Mento.
Tara has spent the last 8 weeks walking you through what it means to be an All Star coach. Now, we want to take three minutes to call out the behaviors we want to avoid as much as possible as we have found that they are hard for Mento to salvage. We are doing this in the spirit of transparency!
Do your best to avoid:
- Missing or rescheduling a member’s first session
- Last minute session rescheduling or cancellation
- Frequently rescheduling sessions with the same member
- Missing multiple sessions with the same member
- Asking a member to accommodate schedules and then rescheduling
- Not making up missed sessions for vacations or sick days
- Expressing frustration or annoyance with member when they re-schedule or are late.
- Making a member feel like you’re too busy for them.
- Blaming members instead of bringing a growth mindset to their own coaching or relationships.
We need our coaches to be there and show up for our members.
One thing we want to draw special attention to is if a member is showing up late or re-scheduling. This behavior is often a sign that something else is going on in their life that’s preventing them from investing in themselves or perhaps they’re not finding the time together to be as valuable. Leading with empathy and a genuine curiosity to help get the relationship back on track and make sure they feel supported is the role of Coach. It is not to judge or blame!
We understand that life happens (vacations, illness, flat tires, etc.), and we also understand that our best coaches are able to navigate the demands of life and coaching with grace, respect, and empathy. The best thing that you can do is give your members the maximum notice, offer sincere apologies, and of course get your next session on the books, too. Coaches often find it helpful, as do we, to let us know so that we can support you in the communications with members and ensure we’re moving forward smoothly!
So what happens if any of the above do happen? In the immediate, please Slack @Alex Yu ASAP in your coaching success channel. Our coaches are never missing sessions just because they don’t feel like showing up that day. Usually something is up. Let us support you and support your member as quickly as we can.
We have been asked a few times about the long-term consequences of a coach missing a session or rescheduling multiple times and the answer is that it deteriorates trust between you and your member and you and Mento. It will make our team less inclined to match you in the future if we don’t trust that you can consistently and continually show up for you members or trust that you understand how important maintaining members is to us. Without members, there is no Mento. Without Mento, we can’t hire and train incredible individuals to be coaches. No one wants that! To avoid this, let’s all work together to provide the best service to our members and be the only place people want to go to get coaching. Let’s also lean on each other for support!
If you’re having a challenge with a member or feeling overwhelmed by something going on in your life, reach out for support! Grab time with Tara, your Mentor Coach, or to anyone on our team for help. We are here for you in work, life, coaching — and everything in between.