Ep #60: 8 Traits of High Earning Coaches

Hey coach. When you look at successful coaches, especially online, do you find yourself wondering what does she have and how can I get some of that? I'm Kendall and I'm here to tell you that success, it leaves clues. So tune in to today's episode where I'm sharing with you the eight traits of high earning coaches because I know without a doubt that you have unsung superpowers that you can start tapping into to create that income and impact you desire as a coach.

Hearing the eight success traits I walk you through in this episode will show you where to put your self-development focus so that you can rise more rapidly in your coaching business. It's all here for you in this episode of The Money Coach School Podcast. Let's dive in.

Welcome to The Money Coach School Podcast. To really excel at coaching women, you have to be skilled, confident, and even fearless at money coaching. If you're passionate about women holding genuine money power and love supporting women entrepreneurs, then this is the show for you. Now, here's your host, money feminist Kendall SummerHawk.

Hello, beautiful coach. Today's episode is one of those that is about the unsung superpower you possess as a coach, and that is how you self-identify, meaning your self-concept. You know, things like strategy and tactics and business models, those are all external choices we make that come from our sense of identity, which means paying attention to how we're self-identifying can have deep long-term lasting influence over your success as a coach, your mastery of your coaching skills, how much money you make in your coaching business and how you grow your business.

Now, this is not that you have to become someone you're not because that's silly and it wouldn't work. I believe as coaches, we have innate aspects to ourselves that are already present and all that's needed is the right attention to deepen, expand, and empower these aspects of ourselves so that we become more of who we are, not less. But so often it's easy to not see or skip over or discount aspects of who we are, of our identity. And I want to make sure that that does not happen for you.

So today I thought it would be so helpful for you to hear eight traits of high earning coaches so that you can recognize and choose any or all of these traits to empower for yourself. Now, the intention here with this episode, the result is that you're able to experience results more quickly and to give yourself permission to empower those aspects within yourself rather than ignoring them or discounting them or dampening yourself down in any way.

To be clear, a trait is a quality or a characteristic. I believe that there is more than one way to enhance or empower a trait. And what matters is embracing it and empowering it your way. So let's take a look at eight traits of high-earning coaches. And as I go through each of these with you, you can turn this into a very powerful coaching exercise just by doing two things.

Number one, for each trait, rate yourself a one through a 10, with one being this is a trait you have not seen yourself having or have not given any real energy or priority to up until now. And 10 being like, oh yes, I've got this one nailed. And number two for each trait, ask yourself this coaching question. What would it look like for me to make this a 10? What would I be doing differently or more frequently? All right, that's actually three coaching questions, but you get the idea.

All right, now with that being said, let's dive into these eight traits of hiring coaches. And a quick note, these are not in any priority order. All eight have equal importance.

Trait number one, high-earning coaches don't judge today's results against their potential in the future. So what this looks like in practical terms is understanding that income and impact success is never overnight. It's a series of stepping stones that you keep moving forward on and that keep elevating you. So for example, the first few years of my coaching business, I did tons of public speaking.

Most of it was for teeny tiny audiences. I mean like five people, seven people, 10 people, and often it was in living rooms. It was humbling to say the least, but I learned so much. And later when I set my goal on being on a big stage with a particular big name, I knew it could happen. I had no idea how, but I knew it could happen. And you know what? It did happen about a year later. So I went from speaking in a living room for five people, to being on stage with a big name, and then another, and then another, over and over again in front of hundreds of people every time I spoke. No, it wasn't a leap. It was stepping stones. And I did not judge that I was at first speaking for these teeny, tiny audiences, I didn't judge that against my potential to one day speak for very, very large audiences.

High earning coaches understand that this is a long game. They keep the faith that this is what they're meant to do and they don't quit because today's successes may be teeny tiny or be taking a while to achieve. If you make today's result mean something negative or limiting about your future, then you're going to give up instead of staying committed. And trust me, income and impact happen because of commitment.

Trait number two, high earning coaches slowly specialize. So at first specializing or niching down is not only not necessary, it can actually be a detriment because so many coaches churn and churn over what their niche is, which takes them out of just having conversations with potential clients and coaching. I made my first million dollar year with a niche that was no more specific than just coaching women entrepreneurs. That was it. But later on, I specialized in pricing and then onto money.

Here's another example. In our Money Breakthrough Business Coach Certified Coach Training, one of our graduates, Nettie, she specializes in signature system, which is something that we train on in that certification. Her branding is transforming your God-given gifts into an elite signature system, you can communicate with confidence, package and price effectively, and sell with grace and ease. How awesome is that, right? And she just won an award as a top coach in her country, but where she started was just coaching faith-filled women entrepreneurs. That was it. So specialize, yes, but don't rush it. Allow it to evolve as you gain experience.

Trait number three, hiring coaches get really good at coaching. I mean, that's what we're here to do. And that means not winging it, not being filled with self-doubt or self-criticism after a coaching session. It means having a framework you coach clients through, like the one we provide in the Money Breakthrough Business Coach Certification for Business, and also in Sacred Money Archetype Certified Coach Training on the topic of money.

So getting really good happens for you with practice. Sure, but more than that, it's having a coaching methodology that you can learn and practice. It's not a bunch of random coaching questions downloaded from the internet. You'll never get really good doing that. You have to know when you're leading a coaching session, number one, how to lead the session so that it produces a result and doesn't just meander or wander or whatever.

And number two, how to hear both where your client has a gap or a blind spot, and also what her strengths are that you can emphasize so that she's making empowered decisions, living up to her potential and taking empowered action. And of course, being able to accomplish that in 30-minute coaching sessions, which is our hallmark.

Now, I don't want that to sound daunting for you, but this is the path of a hiring coach. We get results for our clients, period. There is literally nothing a client can bring to a coaching call that I can't coach on. And that is the level of confidence in your coaching that you want to aspire to and practice attaining. And this is the level of confidence in the women I train in the Courageous Coaching certification. So Courageous Coaching is my standalone life coaching certification, which I will link to in the show notes.

Now, this is not about bravado confidence. I know you hear a lot of confidence in me. It's not bravado, it's real. And it's because I have a coaching method that gives me this confidence. And of course, that is the courageous coaching method. So I'll definitely link to that in the show notes.

All right, trait number four. High earning coaches practice a growth mindset. Now this is straight from the work of Dr. Carol Dweck who wrote the book, Mindset. A growth mindset means open to learning, open to making mistakes, open to learning from these mistakes, open to change. And I want you to contrast that to a fixed mindset, which focuses relentlessly on getting it right or perfection, and as a result shuts down learning and creates a lot of stress and anxiety. I don't know any fixed mindset person who doesn't experience a lot of anxiety.

A fixed mindset is the belief that your abilities are innate and unchangeable. This perspective leads someone to view success or failure as a reflection of who they are, which of course limits personal growth. A growth mindset is the belief that your talents and abilities can be developed through skill building and practice. Yay, love that. People with a growth mindset view challenges as learning opportunities. They believe they can improve with enough work . They are motivated to learn and grow and seem to be able to do it. mistakes as chances to learn and an opportunity to develop their skills and they seek out new perspectives.

Now the path of success I think you already know it's rocky, it has a lot of curves to it, it has obstacles, it has challenges. A growth mindset keeps you not only moving forward but seeing the journey as something empowering.

Trait number five, high-earning coaches are brave. Growth means change, and change means taking risks. Creating income and impact is never a streamlined path. It's not a sure thing, but hiring coaches navigate that by taking an idea, trusting their intuition, and going for it. And that takes courage, and that means you're being brave. You may feel afraid, but you're still being brave. You know, brave is not the absence of fear. It's just taking action despite feeling fear. I'm brave just about every day. I feel brave. What that means is that every day I feel fear and I take action. It's both and.

Trait number six, high earning coaches rebound quickly. Every setback or unexpected result is used as learning. Rebounding quickly means instead of experiencing a disappointment or a challenge or a setback and letting it tank you for weeks, you look at the learning, you evaluate, You make new decisions and you try again. And that process happens quickly. It could be just a few hours. It could be a few days, but weeks, no way. That is time you cannot get back. And let's be honest, you have people to coach. You have workshops to plan, groups to lead, launches to plan, whatever it is that's on your list.

What rebounding quickly requires is absolutely not denying your feelings, not pushing your feelings aside, but instead processing your emotions, evaluating why things worked out the way that they did, grabbing onto that learning, and staying committed to your desire to create income and impact and your desire to coach.

All right, trait number seven. High-earning coaches get really good at boundaries. I love, love, love, I adore talking about boundaries. This is what frees you and what makes your life and your business really sing, and what makes you strong in your character. So for me, the boundaries as a high earning coach that I've gotten really good at are boundaries about pricing, meaning what we charge and how we get paid. Boundaries regarding my time so that I have all that yummy freedom with my horses every day. I mean, I used to spend an hour, an hour and a half, now I spend three to four hours every day with my horses. Boundaries in how vendors perform for us and boundaries in how we are respected by colleagues and clients alike.

So nearly every day in your coaching business, something can come up to push on your boundaries, and that's okay. I use my coaching skills to work through it with myself and work through it with whoever else is involved. And there's no need to be harsh or bitchy. You can uphold boundaries with calm, clear conviction that takes very little energy. It takes practice, but not a lot of energy.

Trait number eight, high-earning coaches don't wait for something to change. They initiate change. So as coaches, I believe we are naturally born to lead. And as leaders, we are self-responsible. Now this isn't always comfortable and believe me, there are days where I wanna say, can someone else just be in charge today, please? But the truth is, no one else is gonna be in charge. No one is coming to save you. We are coaches, we are self-responsible, we initiate. We use our coaching abilities, not to muscle through changes, but to create alignment with our values and the challenge, so between those two things, our values and the challenge at hand. This is how we stay true to ourselves and how we deepen our connection to who we are, no matter what happens. And it's how to not abdicate your power.

So there you have it, eight traits of hiring coaches. I'm curious how many you rated yourself fairly high on, like an eight or a nine or a 10 even, even if you're in the process of never ending self-improvement with it. And which ones do you see where you can lean into and do some skill-building around? I would love to hear your feedback about this episode. You can send me an e-mail, podcast@kendalsommerhawk.com, or better yet, post a comment on my Instagram account with this podcast, that Instagram is @kendalsommerhawk. Tell me which of these eight traits you really are taking to heart on your journey of income and impact.

And I wanna close out by reminding you, Coaching changes lives, starting with yours. All right, thank you for listening. I always say thank you for your loyalty because loyalty is so important to me and you listening is showing me you're loyal and I appreciate you for that. And I appreciate you for being on your coaching journey and on your money reinvention journey with me. me. And I will see you next week, my beautiful soul, in our next episode.

If you enjoyed this podcast, make sure you follow so you never miss an episode. Also I would so love and appreciate if you would leave a five star review. Your review supports women just like you and discovering all of the juicy tips and insights I'm sharing here on how to coach women on money.

Thank you so much for tuning into this week's episode of The Money Coach School Podcast. If you enjoyed this podcast, make sure you follow so you never miss an episode. Also, I would so love and appreciate if you would leave a 5-star review. Your review supports women just like you in discovering all of the juicy tips and insights I’m sharing here on how to coach women on money.

And if you want to learn how to excel at coaching women on money, definitely go to KendallSummerHawk.com and check out the wealth of money coach trainings that we have for you. Thanks so much for being part of this money coaching movement and for tuning into the show every week.