Explore, Engage, Excel!

1. What is coaching?

Coaching is recognised today as the leading technique for performance improvement and development of people’s potential whether it is on a personal level, or professional level.

The most recognised form of coaching comes from the sporting world, having evolved over thousands of years. There may be a contradiction in having someone who can't do what you can do, as well as you can do it, help you to improve. A tennis coach can’t play professional tennis as the world’s number one tennis player can, yet the coach plays a vital role in improving the tennis player’s game.

Adviser coaching is all about developing advisers' potential in their client facing skills and in running a successful business. It is about providing advisers with a clear idea of where they are now as reflected in their skills, where they would like to be and how to bridge this gap. We can assist by clarifying the skill gap and knowledge necessary for each individual to become their best. Coaching is recognised today as the leading technique for performance improvement and development of talent, no matter what stage of your career advisers are at.

Coaching is not the same as counseling or therapy. Coaching is all about developing the individual’s potential and improving their performance by looking into the future-their desired state and not at the past performance or behaviour as counseling does. Seeing a coach is not indicative of a performance problem.  More often than not, it is the high-potential individuals seeking out coaching and those practices that want to improve their profitability and performance as a whole by making an investment in coaching for their people.

 2. Why do I need a coach?

Coaching is an individualised but collaborative process that has time limits and focused goals. It's designed to help you solve problems, increase your strategic thinking, improve your communication skills, create a politically savvy, positive self-image and develop ongoing career goals. Like its sports metaphor, business coaching is results oriented; there are systems of accountability incorporated into the process to move you forward or deepen your insights. And because you are accountable to your coach, you are more likely to implement new behaviour and therefore experience more rapid change and improvement.

 3. What areas can an AdviserQuest coach work with me to improve?

• Creating a clear message for your target clients, to attract more warm leads
• Wanting to double your conversion rates and increase your profits by improving your business process or your own presentation skills
•  Removing the ‘blockages’ that may be holding you back from taking your business to the next level
• Making improvements to your service offerings and wanting to ensure results
• Time Management: If you would like to create more time in your day and work more efficiently
• Want to generate more targeted leads and referrals but don’t know how
• Would like to deepen your current client relationships to increase profitability
• Have a client engagement process in place to convert more of your prospects easily ad effortlessly
• And pretty much any area that is related to your business or client facing skills.

Our coaching process can be broken down into 3 stages that allows advisers to explore, engage and excel through any challenges to achieve their goals to improve performance. Coaching is usually a conversation between the coach and the adviser, which can be conducted on the telephone or as a face-to-face meeting.

The first stage of coaching or the ‘Explore’ phase is the start of the coaching process. Here the coach and adviser start  getting to know each other and getting familiar with the issue or challenge at hand which will be the focus of the coaching session. Before the first coaching session the adviser would complete an inventory of where they are at currently. This inventory is in the form of a questionnaire that the adviser completes and provides the coach before the initial meeting. In this ‘Explore’ phase the coach needs to get a good understanding of the adviser’s current situation. It also allows the coach to get a very good understanding of the background and the situation related to the issue or goal to be worked on.

Once the inventory is complete, the coach and adviser then ‘Engage’ by then having a discussion about the adviser’s desired outcome or the goals. Through conversation and by asking in-depth questions the coach will clarify what the advisers desired goal or objective is and coming up with the ‘how’ to achieve the desired results.

The ‘Excel’ phase or the third phase of the coaching process focuses on the individual successfully achieving their outcome as a result of the coaching conversation. This outcome may be a new self awareness of the situation, options created for moving forward when there were none previously, or a solution to a challenging situation that may not have been obvious before.In the ‘Excel’ phase ongoing support is vital to achieving true change and implements the new behaviours necessary to achieve the desired outcomes. Changing deep-seated habitual behaviours takes commitment, practice, and feedback, and these steps take time and support. This is where the adviser stays accountable to the coach and stays open to ongoing feedback.

The ‘Excel’ phase involves providing ongoing feedback on goals, giving relapse-prevention support, doing follow-up coaching, facilitating workplace interactions such as sitting in on adviser client meetings (if client engagement is the goal), and ensuring that the individuals remain focused and motivated. The coach can also offer advisers tailored exercises, resource materials, and other tools to support the goals on their action plan.

The ultimate goal of the coaching is to achieve behavioural change. The focus of the ‘Excel’ phase is also to measure, in the context of the personal goals that have been established; to what extent they have been achieved and have improved individual performance and overall practice profitability. To assess progress, the advisers might meet with the coach three to six months after the coaching has ended. In addition, tools such as follow-up 360-degree assessment interviews can be held to determine the impact of the coaching on the participant's performance and on those he or she works with.

 5. What is involved in a coaching session?

Coaching sessions are either conducted with you face to face or on the phone. Coaching sessions are generally 45minutes to 90 minutes in duration and involve your coach leading you through a focused pre prepared agenda based on the goal that you and your coach have identified to work on. Your coach will ask you questions and get you to participate in any other exercises necessary to uncover the solutions you need to move you forward. Your coach will give you suggestions and assist you in articulating your solution in detail. They will also help you to create a step-by-step action plan so that you are clear on what steps to take going forward to change your behaviour and therefore your results. They will be there with you to implement the action steps over the set time period by keeping you accountable to the process and the action plan that you have both agreed on.

 6. How does a coach work with me?

Your coach is your partner. They are not your mentor or manager. Coaching is partnering with clients in a thought-provoking and creative process that inspires them to maximize their personal and professional potential. The ongoing partnership creates a safe environment for the client to grow.

Coaches are trained to listen, to observe and to customize their approach to individual client needs. They seek to elicit solutions and strategies from the client; they believe the client is naturally creative and resourceful. The coach's job is to provide support to enhance the skills, resources, and creativity that the client already has.

 7. How much do you charge for your coaching services?

Your coach will work with you over a minimum of 6 months to help you make the changes necessary to help you get to the next level.  From weekly coaching calls and goal setting sessions, to creating actions plans and implementing these together, you will develop new behaviours and adopt improved strategies to apply to your business long after the coaching is complete.

Your monthly investment of $590 + GST  in your AdviserQuest coach for a minimum period of 6 months ensures that your coach will dedicate a minimum of 3 hours a month working with you face to face and you also have access to your coach via phone and email 5 days a week. Being a member of our coaching program you can also participate in our weekly members only tele-seminars and receive up to date and cutting edge educational material, books and audio guides as we create them on topics related to lead generation, client engagement and client retention strategies.

 8. Why at least 6 months?

If you have been in business for more than a few weeks you have seen at least one or two so called quick fixes. Most consultants seem to think that they can solve all your problems in a few hours or few days. At AdviserQuest we believe that long term success depends on learning the behaviours necessary to create your new outcomes. Changing behaviour and learning new ways of doing things takes time and is more than just about scratching the surface and pointing out what needs improving. We will show you and do this with you and work along side you to ensure that we create your desired outcomes and success together.

7. What other services do you offer?

In addition to our coaching program, AdviserQuest offers a variety of workshops and seminars to support your transformation in becoming a true financial planning professional, one who is highly skilled in the 'people' side of financial planning as well as an expert in the technical. We recommend that you utilise our programs as complementary to your technical continuing professional development which is an important part of your growth and development as an adviser. We also offer seminars and can also help you with creating your own educational materials for your dealer group to run programs in-house.

8.What credentials does my AdviserQuest Coach have?

The training, coaching and mentoring we offer have been designed exclusively with you, the adviser, in mind. All of our trainers, coaches and facilitators are qualified and have been trained and accredited as advisers and professional coaches. They are all advisers themselves and have practiced as financial planners out in the real world. So they know exactly what pains you experience and they are familiar with your day to day challenges. Whatever your challenge in running a more profitable successful business, wherever you want to focus on in your professional development we will be there to assist you every step of the way.

9. What do you expect from Advisers who become your coaching clients?

Sometimes Advisers want change but they they're not currently open to changing their beliefs, behaviors and actions. If that's the case coaching won't work, and it's better to wait until you're more open to change to try coaching.

When you are ready for coaching we expect you to:

• be relied upon to be on time for all calls and appointments
• Be open to change and new ways of doing things suggested by your coach.
• Be fully willing to do the work and let the coach do the coaching.
• keep your word without struggling or sabotaging yourself and your outcomes
• Give the coach the benefit of the doubt and "try on" new concepts or different ways of doing things.
• speak straight (tell the whole truth) to the coach
• Give feedback when you feel that you are not getting what you need or expect from the coach, you will share this as soon as you sense it and demand that you get what you want and need from the relationship.
• Stop or change the self-defeating behaviors which limit my success
• Have adequate funds to pay for coaching and will not regret or suffer about the fee. you see coaching as a worthwhile investment in your professional success
• Share the credit for your success with your coach.

10. What can I expect from my coach?

 AdviserQuest coaches practice a ‘collaborative’ coaching style. This is a supportive style of coaching where the adviser being coached is called upon to stay involved and generate their own thoughts, ideas and insights which has an incredibly liberating effect on the individual and speeds up behavioural change.

 Your coach will:

• Maintain a commitment to always support you
• Build a coaching relationship on truth openness and trust
• Hold you accountable and responsible for the results you are generating
• Focus on YOU and your outcomes and not their own

11. About Confidentiality

Your coach will:

• Maintain the strictest levels of confidentiality with all of your information. We will have a clear agreement or contract from you before releasing information to another person, unless required by law.
• Have a clear agreement upon how coaching information will be exchanged among coach, client, and any other party.
• Always clarify confidentiality policies with the student’s coaches at AdviserQuest when acting as a trainer of student coaches.
• Have associated coaches and other persons whom AdviserQuest may utilize to service you or your business in any way in a paid or volunteer capacity make clear agreements or contracts to adhere to the ICF Code of Ethics Part 2, Section 4: Confidentiality/Privacy standards and the entire ICF Code of Ethics to the extent applicable.

12.Do you accept referrals?

At AdviserQuest our business is client-centric, that means it is driven by our client needs and focuses on strong relationships. Therefore our practice is mainly build on referrals. If you are benefiting from your relationship with your coach we would appreciate you telling your financial planning colleagues about us so that we may be able to assist them in the same way.

13. Are there any guarantees?

All of our coaches and consultants give 100% of themselves when they work with you. And we are confident that our industry focused workshops, coaching and mentoring programs will achieve the results that we have agreed on with you. In the unlikely event that any individual or business that we assist does not achieve the documented results agreed on, we will continue to work with you beyond the agreed framework, until these results are achieved.

We guarantee your results and your satisfaction. If you have followed our guidelines and methodologies as instructed and any of our programs still fail to significantly improve and enhance your skills, giving you the expected results, then we are more than happy to provide you with a complete refund in your investment with us.

14. What sort of Return on Investment (ROI) can I expect from coaching?

When a your practice makes a capital expenditure, it typically expects a return on that capital. This return on capital is also known as a “ROI”.

Coaching is a capital expenditure. This expenditure should produce results and these results should be quantitative and qualitative. This may seem difficult at first, but with a little creativity it is very possible.If you coach cannot demonstrate ROI, and then find another coach who can. Do not believe any executive coach or business coach who tells you that determining potential ROI is not possible.

The basic equation to use is:

CLIENT RESULTS minus COST OF COACHING multiplied by 100% divided by THE COST OF COACHING = YOUR ROI

Example: Coaching that results in increasing an advisers conversion rates with prospects from 3 in 10, to 6 in 10 will results in 50% increase in conversion rates.

If each client converted is worth $10,000 per annum and the coast of coaching is $1500 for the sessions required to increase this conversion rate then:

$10,000- $1,500 x 100% / $1500= 566 % ROI

Contact AdviserQuest today to find out how we can assist you.

Click "Contact Us" to use our online contact form or phone 1300 886 907