Elaine is co-founder of Project23, a culture and DEI consultancy passionate about people - and of Coaches of Colour, a coaching company whose goal is to offer Black and Brown people the opportunity to work with incredible and professional coaches of colour.
AKS: 0:00 Welcome to A Listening Life, the podcast for coaches who are finding it really hard work to build a sustainable, profitable business, full of clients. I am Aly King-Smith sharing inspiration stories and lessons learned from some of my successful peers and colleagues who have managed to crack the code and break through. Today I am chatting with Elaine de la Cruz, who is co-founder of Project 23 and an expert in diversity, equality and inclusion.
EDLC: 0:25 Selling isn’t about the transaction. Selling as a salesperson is about the experience and learning and gathering up everything that I am learning for the next call or the next conversation. Let them know what your purpose is. Let them feel your energy that’s driving that purpose and that passion, because I think that’s what people remember and what people feel. The cut through that you want to achieve will come from you being new because there is no other cut through like you.
AKS: 0:56 A Listening Life is a business dedicated to helping coaches who are tired of trying to grow their business into something that makes them happy and brings-in the money. Podcast, events, mentoring and courses. Find us on Instagram at a Listening-Life and through the website listening-life.co.uk. Today I am chatting with Elaine de la Cruz, who is co-founder of Project23 and an expert in diversity, equality and inclusion. She trained as a coach to inform the way she and her partner at Project23 delivered their work. She since co-founded Coaches of Colour which exists to provide excellent coaching for black and brown people. What better example of someone building a business from a start of purpose, lived experience, care and knowledge. Elaine also has a background in sales and a firm belief that great coaches deserve to be paid properly and on time. So we are so grateful to have her with us at a Listening Life with so much insight to share. This was me, Aly King-Smith, talking online with Elaine de-la Cruz in September 2022. I hope it’s super useful.
Sit in your time-machine and travel us back to the moment when you suddenly started to think. I think I am onto something, I think this is a thing, I think it’s commercially viable. It’s going to work.
EDLC: 2:10 Time Capsules always slightly freaked me out a little bit because they make you reflect. And also you have got to kind of pinpoint when you think things happened. I essentially have two businesses, I would say, on one hand, Project 23 is a DEI consultancy. And there is absolutely an element of coaching through that in terms of our approach, our methodology, how we believe that in order to create inclusive cultures and workplaces or “Better quality, better equity,” There has to be intrinsic motivation. So we became coaches as part of our training to begin with, knowing that we were never going to be consultants who just came in and spoke at people, we needed to bring people along with us. Or rather than bring people along with us help people to find their way. Because we tend to only work with people who want to improve, there’s a natural filter. So that’s one business where we essentially help organizations to build inclusive cultures. I think knowing that there was a business there was part of our life experience. Both Gary and I, Gary Rainer who’s the co-founder of Project 23, along with myself, we did a long stint in our advertising careers. Personally, from my point of view, I was often the only women of colour in a room. I thought maybe naively at the time, I thought that I could make it, that I was somewhat immune, I wasn’t really conscious of it, to be honest. But in hindsight, I think I thought I was immune to inequalities. And it was just a matter of listening to my mum’s voice of saying, “Work harder, be better, be great”, “push”,yeah push right break through the ceiling. But I started to realize that I wasn’t immune to it. And as I looked across the industry, you start to realize that there isn’t much diversity, I really was working for five, middle aged, middle class white men who would worked together for 17 odd years. So you start knowing an industry, you start to see the industry and think this could do better, you start to speak to others and just become more aware. I have got to say I was pretty sharp, but actually, in hindsight, I was probably quite naive. I just wasn’t as aware in my 30s as perhaps I would love like to be in terms of the lack of diversity or the inequalities that exist. So that was where our passion was. So when we left the industry, we knew that it was about creating brilliant, fun, inclusive, productive cultures. And we knew that we were good at that. And there was a DEI thing in there and that was our passion, so it was about wanting to make change rather than thinking we had something.
AKS: 5:04 Sounds like you had a really powerful way of using coaching as the how to deliver the what. So you’d got the what and then the coaching was how you delivered it, the stance that you took the approach.
EDLC: 5:13 Yes. And it’s interesting, actually, because neither of us had been coached at that point. We hadn’t experienced coaching. On our kind of journey of working out the how and the method. We knew that this was important. We knew that it was important that this intrinsic motivation piece, and I had started to speak to more people, including people who have been coached. And I have got to say, I think in hindsight, I think the reason I didn’t really know about coaching, even though it was probably one notch away from board level at my previous career, I think there’s an element of privilege that comes with knowing about coaching or being able to access it. That wasn’t the lens I went into it with. But I found out about coaching, someone introduced me to someone else in this journey of starting a new business. And there was a chap called Gary Cole, who is the founder of Archipelo coaching.
AKS: 6:09 I am talking to him this afternoon.
EDLC: 6:13 There you go. And because he’s ex media as well, and I had lunch with him, and you get this, don’t you, when you start a business, which I’d never experienced it before and quite in such a way, where people are generous.
AKS: 6:26 Yes, particularly Gary Cole.
EDLC: 6:29 And you are a little bit... Like when you come from a commercial background, like I do, a bit like, what does this person want? Why are we doing this? He was so generous in terms of... Just his story, really. And he introduced me to barefoot coaching, and said, “You should just speak to them.” And then that was it. So from barefoot coaching, we did the teaser session. And we were suckers really, we were always going to... Once we had a teaser session, we were always going to do the course. So that became part of how the work we offer. So there are many DEI consultants out there, many amazing ones. And not all of them take a coaching approach in the same way that we do. But I suppose that’s part of one of those kind of key Project 23 segments that make up the way that we do things that we want, not exclusively, not always, but there is absolutely an element of coaching throughout. And when I say coaching, I mean, asking individuals to think for themselves, allowing space for them to come up with the responses or answers that they want.
AKS: 7:33 The other business that you mentioned, is that a coaching business? Or is that something completely different?
EDLC: 7:37 Yes. So Coaches of Colour came about probably because of a series of events, I would say. So Project23 was out there, we are doing DEI work, we have been going about four years. Within this time, we have obviously had a pandemic, which nearly wiped us out. But then also one of the other tragic events that happened during that time, which changed the course of the way the world sees diversity and inclusion was the murder of George Floyd. And with that, obviously, came the resurgence and 2020 of Black Lives Matter, which, we all observed, and some of us were wanting to drive that and support that, or advocate for the black community and black voices within that during the work. One of the things that I started to see in my kind of social media algorithm and feed was commentary around support for the black community. And some of that commentary was around therapy. And just notes and comments about, “If you are looking for a therapist during this time.” Because it was a tough time, obviously. “Look for a black therapist.” And that spoke to me because it seemed to make so much sense to have an understanding of the trauma associated with being a black person in today’s world, in any world, it kind of makes sense. It made sense to me that you would want to speak to someone who would have some idea of that. So that was one thing. And there was obviously a commentary around sometimes the lack of being able to access those people easily. But it automatically spoke to me and jumped to previous experiences that I would had with my own therapist. So I have had three therapists over my time, all of whom were brilliant women, and have supported and helped me and they were all white women. But each one of those therapist, I can remember a moment where there was just a slight bit of jarring in a lack of understanding of my culture. I remember someone telling me response I should give my mum and I just thought and I said to her, I laughed and I thought, “There’s no way on earth, I can say that to my mum.” She’s a grown woman, she would probably still have stern words perhaps, bring me to tears or something. And she corrected herself, she started to understand it. But in that moment, there was a slight jar and I think it clammed me up slightly. So it really spoke to me, when I was seeing this on my feed. If you then couple that... Again, over the course of the time when I have been a coach, I love being part of the coaching community, I am proud to be part of the coaching community. But I did notice from the beginning pretty much that there was a lack of diversity within coaching, probably because the work I do once you see it, once you have a lens of DEI, it’s very difficult to unseen it. But also just in my experience of myself and the kind of voices that were coming up in me, maybe thinking I wasn’t good enough, I didn’t belong here. I didn’t speak like other people within this industry that I really respected and rated. But it led me to that conclusion.
AKS: 10:50 Yeah, it’s interesting, because last year, I was really actively hunting for some more coaches of colour to join the team at my organization. And it was really hard to find anyone who wasn’t almost the same age as me, almost the same hair colour as me, educated in the same kind of way, mostly female, and all white ... had to really hunt to find some coaches of colour. And I saw your coachesofcolour.com, was that the directory?
EDLC: 11:17 Yes, yes.
AKS: 11:19 I just think it’s genius. It’s so useful, not only for direct clients, but also for people like me running consultancies, looking for associates to deliver work.
EDLC: 11:27 Yeah, probably do it all the wrong way around, wouldn’t it? The book would say, and here we are talking about how to create business, the book would definitely say that you explain what coaches of colour is first, before you can launch into any anecdotal story like I did. So Coaches of Colour is, we are here to provide excellent coaching for black and brown people. Like any other coaching business, I would say in that respect, that is about the quality of coaching. And we want to provide that coaching for those people from Coaches Of Colour. Because we believe that even though often our ethnicity or race is in the background, actually, it’s in the background until it’s in the foreground. And once it’s in the foreground, it’s important, somewhat essential that someone on the other side who you are speaking to, who’s there to facilitate your thinking, who’s there to support you, has an understanding, or at least not any doubt about your experience, as a person of colour, particularly in the workplace, where often the clients that we speak to are the minority, are the underrepresented. And so there is a different experience as a person of colour in the workplace than there is for our majority white colleagues.
AKS: 12:46 Yes. So I am going to have to be careful because I would love to launch into more into that conversation. It’s so deeply important and fascinating. I am going to pull myself back on purpose to the commercial conversation for our enlisting life thinking around that. So what I can hear is, you have got a really easy to find for yourself purpose, which is to change the needle in the world on DEI And then you have got two different projects, the two different businesses, serving that purpose, and you are taking them both to market. So this is for people who say to me, “Well, I have got this idea, but I don’t know what to do with it next.” So you woke up with a mission during lockdown to serve that purpose. “I want to do something,” How do you get to the point where you have got clients from there, or you’ve got paying people?
EDLC: 13:39 I think the purpose... Just picking up on what you said, I think the purpose is shaped and molded over time. For me personally, and I kind of think is different. And all the different founders and co-founders I have ever met. I think it’s different for different people. Some people do wake up, and they are like, “I am on a mission.” You have this perhaps a little bit more like me. I have kind of known what I am good at. I have a previous career. I know I am able to talk to people. I enjoy talking to people and communicating. I have an idea of what’s out there and what’s not out there. So that’s my basis, I think. And then I have definitely a will and a desire, as you said a purpose to want to do things better. And I think with that you are able then to start seeing where the holes are of what’s available and what’s out there for people. Because for me, I think there’s an element of a purpose, but you have got to kind of think of it as in what do people want and what do people need? And how am I going to communicate how we have what they might want or what they might need? And even beyond that, what if people don’t realize that they need it? Yes, I think with Coaches of Colour particularly, there’s still a job as coaches know - you are still having to explain what coaching is a lot of the time, especially if you want to broaden our market as a coaching industry, we still have to explain what it is. So you have to create a need for that in a story or the way that we communicate with people. And then you have got to say why Coaches of Colour is the one. And then you have got to say why our coaches are the one. So in terms of how we make the switch of, we have we have something, I have an idea of what we want and a purpose. And how do you then start to get clients? I think it is as simple as going out there and talking to people. We need to talk to people about our own views, our own observations, which is what we did. So it’s about going out there and saying, initially, this is what we are thinking about doing. What do you think about that? Or who were your coaches? What coaches do you use? With Coaches of Colour, we had a vision quite early on. So it was less about what kind of coaches do you use and your directory of coaches? And how do we get in there? And more about kind of mic dropping, this is what we want to do. We have got coaches of colour. And often a lot of people are kind of like, “Oh, right, yeah, that makes sense straight away.” Because there is such a clear kind of hole. You understood it pretty much straight away, obviously, because you can see it for yourself. So for us, it’s about having the conversation with people and quite frankly, I think the fact that we have called ourselves coaches of colour, which is pretty unapologetic, particularly in certain markets, it starts a conversation, how does that come about? What are you doing? What do you plan to do about it? What kind of coaches are you going to have? And then obviously, people start to talk to you about what they want and what they need. And that’s what it is. So it’s about a series of conversations that start to build the momentum, this is how we have done it anyway, rather than an above the line, marketing campaign, or a social media campaign. It really has started quite organically with conversations.
AKS: 17:08 Yes, I had a lovely conversation with Pete Mosley, he talked about the power of experimentation and testing. And he sees too many new coaches, really go for something huge before they have had those conversations. They haven’t beta tested things, and they spend a lot of money on getting things out there that aren’t actually needed. Yeah.
EDLC: 17:25 And if I could be more strategic about it, because I think what’s difficult for me actually Aly is that I think we do... In my advertising career, I came from a commercial background, I ran sales teams, I was a salesperson in my early years. So a lot of the kind of how we have done it? How we found commercial viability is a little bit innate to me, rather than following a path, but actually, if I think about it, there is a more strategic path, which I think I owe the listeners, rather than just go and talk to people. So I think we have a base with Project23. And with, I am assuming everyone that’s listening, you will already have a base of people that you think will be interested in this, or that you think would be warmer or hotter with this. And those are the first people that we spoke to. The ones that we have good relationships with that will be honest and open with us. So they were colleagues, and like other startups, other companies, clients, coaches, and we have worked hard to create a network of a kind of a band of these people, if you like, that when we bounce ideas around. I am sure it’s the same for you.
AKS: 18:45 Yeah, it’s nice to hear you talk about warm contacts. Because I always say to people... I am similarly have a sales background, and I can’t work out what I know because of my sales background. Because part of the mission of a Listening Life is to drag out of my brain some of the stuff which is trainable to other people, which is helpful. So my advice when I am business mentoring people is to forget about the cold calls for ages. You don’t have to do anything cold until you have done all the warm. So who wishes you well, who cares about you and just hopes that you do okay in business, and there’s a whole load of those people in most people’s lives, from neighbours to friends, to relatives to people you did business with 10 years ago? Who would just have a nice conversation with you and wish you well, and start there. So different from picking up the phone and just calling someone.
EDLC: 19:35 And I think that is such great advice, actually. And I think there’s an autopilot piece in my head as well, where I know when I am going to someone who’s going to be harsh with me. And I want that and I need that. And I might road-test certain ideas that we have. I know when I am going to go to someone who’s naturally in line with me. They think the way I think and so that’s gonna be useful. And I will get something else from that person, I might try and brainstorm it and build. I am also going to go to someone who perhaps faces the outside world and challenge, perhaps they are the head of HR internally, they are in line with kind of people centric thinking. But they face a barrage of MDS and CEOs who are perhaps more about productivity and bottom line. And you want to road-test our ideas, or the narrative or the story with all these different types of people so that we can get the different type of feedback, particularly those people who think differently to you, I would say, because we are in a vacuum otherwise, aren’t we? With other people who are just going to build it in the shape that I already think, there’s nothing wrong with that necessarily, but we want to test it out and make it a bit more robust. I remember with Coaches of Colour, we went into one of our existing Project23 clients, and actually it was brilliant. They’re an existing client of ours and have been for about a year and a half. And since the pandemic, we don’t have an office in Central London and more because we are based in London. But every now and then we need an office in London. So we asked them if we can just borrow a meeting room for a while. So I and Marsha, Dix and Terry, who’s one of our amazing associates, and coaches for Coaches of Colour, we wanted to do a bit of brainstorming for Coaches of Colour,. So we borrowed a room, they were lovely, they hosted us for the day, towards the end of the day, one of the brilliant women came in and she was just, “What’s going on here then and asking us.” And she works on the LMD, the other learning and development team at this creative agency. Yes, very handy. And she was just loving it. As a woman of colour herself, she was just thinking this is great. And what she said was... and it was kind of obvious, but it was missing in terms of our crazy brainstorming, mindmapping. She said, “That everyone here wants to know what’s in it for me. And when you are talking about Coaches of Colour, Elaine, you need to be able to answer what’s in it for me, whether you are the potential for coaching, or the line manager or the CEO, or whoever that is, what’s in it for me?”
AKS: 22:24 For the board member who’s going to get the profit? Which level of what?
EDLC: 22:29 Exactly. And that’s become a central kind of crux of it, like a checkpoint for us and making sure that we are speaking to everyone, because we have Coaches of Colour. In my experience. So far, we are relatively early days, it’s less than a year since we have made it public and started to push it. In my experience, people of colour, particularly those who work in big organizations, when I say big, I mean over 100, they get it. They understand quite quickly what it is once they understand what coaching is. But the, “What’s in it for me,” piece speaks to the fact that we have to be able to say that this is win-win for everyone. Coaches of Colour is brilliant for me if I am a coachee of colour, because it might help me with my career or work life balance or whatever other things it might support me with. If I am the line manager, what’s in it for me is that, “Okay, I am looking for success or growth or productivity or creativity from my report.” So space for them to think is great. Perhaps as a line manager or a director or the business itself, lower churn, greater diversity further up the business to help people succeed, which in turn, obviously, helps the productivity, the success, the commercial viability of the business. So it’s important that everyone understands why this relatively new somewhat brazen concept is good for everybody. And we only got that because we road-tested the idea, someone outside of the room initially.
AKS: 24:03 Yeah. And what you are describing, as you are talking about is the old fashioned classic features and benefits conversations. The feature is the benefits are...
EDLC: 24:12 I love a fab.
AKS: 24:13 Yes. And it’s surprising how many coaches haven’t heard that concept of feature is just a factually true thing. So this is a pencil. And the benefit of a pencil is you can write and you can rub it out and you can carry it, it’s light, it’s in your handbag, I heard you say which means that the couple of times so that’s what you are constantly using in your conversations for when you are selling.
EDLC: 24:36 Yes. And I think it’s important to drive it even harder, because sometimes people need you to hold their hand to work out why coaching? Or why you? Or why the way that you do it? So yes, I have got a pencil. The feature is that you can write with it. The benefit is that I can take down my notes and what does that really give you then? Well, it means that you will capture those things that sometimes you forget, that enables you then to take a little hop step and jump to the thing that you are trying to get. And I think that’s completely in the coaches kind of repertoire, isn’t it? To create a visual. And I think in there, in terms of... I think it’s selling, let’s call it selling, in terms of creating a connection with our potential clients and what we offer. They are kind of looking for the unique strands. So I said, “Creating those moments that you might forget, or capturing those moments that you might forget.” And I am usually going to pull out the bag. If you have told me that you are quite forgetful sometimes or that ever happened before. That’s why I think coaches should make the best salespeople ever because we are trained to listen, really, really, really listen. But perhaps what we don’t do enough as coaches or those that are less comfortable with this kind of selling, or commercially building out process, is to connect what I have heard to what I have got. I don’t know if it feels quite selfish for people, or something. But I think you told me this, I have got the thing that’s going to help you. So let me just put that right in front of you. What do you think?
AKS: 26:18 It is making me think that actually uncomfortable selling is when there’s status at play. So the salesperson’s got a bag of tricks with a Ta-da! I’ve got this that you need – Del Boy – and I’m going to flog it, because I need to make some money. The other end of compassionate listening is a coach’s way of selling potentially, which is, “I am great at listening, I am great at empathy, I can hear your pain, I can see body language that means pain, I can notice the problem that you are talking to me about.” And then if I have the right solution to that, we can discuss it, openly with a status-less conversation. And that’s where great solutions get shared. I think in the coaching, sales conversation.
EDLC: 27:00 The visual that’s in my head is kind of like it’s a 360 piece. Because it’s not always like the deepest, most compassionate thing that we need to connect to, in order to draw someone to us, or in order to connect to them. Sometimes it’s in the banter at the beginning, isn’t it? They clearly like enjoying and having a... they want to have a laugh, or they want to ask you about yourself. And they want to do it in a light way. I think, we learn so much even when we are not having the coaching conversations. And perhaps that’s we are not always selling our coaching selves. With regards to the coaching conversation. Sometimes it’s about just chemistry, the clothes that you wear, the things that you notice about each other. The spark that you create, over the metaphorical cup of tea or glass of wine. And I don’t know, maybe your listeners will tell you I am not sure if the majority of coaches out there are kind of writing that vibe as well. And sometimes I wonder if we as coaches take ourselves a little bit too seriously in the coaching because they are serious conversation sometimes. But the process of connecting with a coaching company, or coach isn’t just coaching conversations.
AKS: 28:21 Absolutely. When I think about the longest standing trusting relationships that I have got, and that would be my tick box for I am succeeding is that we have clients asking us to go back again, after years of years, it was still working together. They usually because one of us help the other one out, there was a conversation when things got sticky. Somebody stayed a bit too late. I remember one piece of work I did for Adapters, a company I used to work for years ago. And we were told that we were brought back into a big, posh luxury car manufacturer because the guy had seen all our trainers clearing up the coffee cups after training sessions. So, you have to assume that all the training companies going in, are probably pretty good. And they are looking for that extra, what’s the thing to choose one company over another and they were choosing people that gave a damn about the room looking. All right. At the end...
EDLC: 29:10 It’s experience. Yeah, it’s experience and I am trying to look for a builder to build an extension at the moment, which has given me heebie jeebies. But you better believe that I am looking in the recommendations for people I know, recommendations where they said they always cleaned up after themselves.
AKS: 29:28 Yes. Didn’t trust the place?
EDLC: 29:30 Yeah. Not just because I have got a busy old life and I can’t be cleaning up after them every day. But because I think it means something to me. It means something to me if they care about the fact that this is our home. And I think that’s what our clients are looking for as well like who are our clients? What matters to them? Because there’s a values alignment piece, I think. For Coaches of Colour and Project23 values is a big part of the way that we work. And it communicates of our clients what they can expect from working with us. But I think there’s also opportunity for coaches to look up and understand the values of their clients, what matters to them in the way that they behave as a business or the things that are important to them. Is there anything in there that we also connect to or can hook to in terms of selling ourselves, or reaching out or just having conversations with them?
AKS: 30:32 That’s also linking back to what you just said about the qualities that coaches having the ability to pick that up, because it’s making me think, actually, when you are in an early sales conversation with someone, you haven’t even called into sales conversations, just we are getting to talk to each other, we should be able to tune in better than your average person on the street to the drivers that somebody’s letting leak out as they speak. So when I think about my organization would be with we are talking to stem organizations a great deal. One person talking about STEM might be really purpose led, it’s very important that every scientist has an incredible leader so that we can change the world of science, another person might be, “Have your coaches got technical backgrounds enough to be in front of our people.” And this will be a completely different driver that they are talking to me with. And it’s my job to listen brilliantly to what they care about, as we get started. Just dawning on me, as you are talking how great coaches are at that, and that we should be able to embrace that part of the sales process rather than terrified by it.
EDLC: 31:32 Because I think for me, it would be interesting to know what you think about this, too. I think there’s a piece where we listen. So when I say we, I mean, typically coaches and the reason for this podcast is we listen, but we are just maybe too shy or where we don’t want to make a faux pas, where we pull that listening, all those gems and nuggets that we have heard, and we pull them into, I am going to do inverted commas here for the people, speech marks for people listening only, to pull them like so that it’s useful to us. I think there might be a line where people think you are crossing unconsciously, where someone has shared something with you, because we are listening. And then to utilize what we have heard for our own benefits or feels like it’s only for our benefit. Rather than actually, you are just being a coach. And it’s useful for you because there might be a transaction that happens after. But actually, that transaction is only useful if it’s also going to be useful for your client. It can be guilt free. When I was... Did you ever learn DIPIDA, Aly?
AKS: 32:44 No.
EDLC: 32:45 As a salesperson?
AKS: 32:48 No, I feel as if I did, if you remind me what it stands for?
EDLC: 32:52 Oh, my God. DIPIDA is an acronym that many salespeople perhaps from a long time ago learned. And salespeople love an acronym. Is “Define.” So you are define what’s going on? Understand the situation, basically, all sorts of questions. That’s what define is. And that obviously coaches are excellent at. And then you have a whole piece of training about the types of questions that we can ask.
AKS: 33:18 Incisive questions, is that though?
EDLC: 33:20 Exactly right, then want to define and then there’s I, so D-I and you want to identify a solution, you want to identify what you can do, you essentially want to listen and identify what they might need. And then you essentially want to start to prove yourself, the P is to prove, prove your capability, I think it’s proof anyway, you want to seek agreement all the time, which is the A, so D-I-P-A. So you want to get people to say... Is that right? Do you think that’s okay?
AKS: 33:51 Yes.
EDLC: 33:52 And you are doing all these things, again, that coaching techniques, arguably, and then you want to kind of create desire to stimulate some desire for what you have? What’s the last one? Perhaps, is action? I think probably.
AKS: 34:07 Action, agreements, something like that?
EDLC: 34:09 Yes. You want to get them to say yes or no. In essentially, that kind of perhaps overly complicated acronym is, is about listening, understanding, matching you to them, and then asking them the question if they want to or not. And I think there’s something for coaches, where we are not so great on maths at the end, you know action piece and matching it to us. So I have heard lots from you. And now I am just going to explicitly and I think that’s the key, I am going to explicitly say, “Okay, so I think this is what you might want. I think this is what I can do.” Or heaven forbid, we say, “You know what, I am really confident that this might be useful for you and we offer x, y and z.” Do you know what I mean? What do you think? I think there’s something in the transition to selling ourselves.
AKS: 35:01 Yes. And I think if I talk from my own lens only, if I know that the thing I am selling is great. So if I am selling a quality product, whether it was before coaching or during coaching, but I know it’s really going to help, I don’t find any discomfort in that conversation at all. I think you would be interested to read or hear about this, because it would really help. The trickiness comes if it’s not a great product, or you are selling something you don’t believe in. So my sense for, if a coach is feeling unsure about that conversation, maybe they should be just checking out is this thing I am offering exactly what would genuinely help with that problem? And if it isn’t, how could I offer it differently? Because when I think about anybody I have ever said, yes to coaching, and I have regretted it afterwards. I definitely knew in that early conversation, there was a gut feeling of I am not sure. I don’t think I have ever looked back and thought, “Oh, I never would have guessed that, that wasn’t going to be a great match.” I think you can tell really early on. So if you are confident, you have got a great offer, that it’s priced fairly, that it will solve the problem, there is no pressure in that conversation. I guess it would be a win-win if we work together.
EDLC: 36:12 Only sell to people that you think should say yes. And obviously, there’s some preparation in that as well. Who is this organization? What are they currently using? how many employees do they have? What do you know of them? All these things, you can find out on a call or in a conversation too. But I think that’s a good rule of thumb, “Only sell something to people who should be saying yes.” And to be specific, I don’t think we have many conversations where... we are not going to sell something to them, actually, in terms of that last transaction, but we are selling the conversation, we are selling the thought provocation, we are selling, “This is who we are. And this is what we are about just in case.” We are selling the notion of having diverse conversations with different suppliers or different coaches. So, when I say only go into conversation and sell something that you think someone should say yes to, it’s not Coaches of Colour, or me as a coach that I am thinking they will say yes to, it’s, “I think this will be interesting to them, or I think no one’s ever said this to them before. Or I read that they are interested in this stuff. And I want to add to that conversation.” You got to be open about the fact that we don’t know where that conversation is gonna go. But if I have purpose within me in terms of what I am trying to achieve, or purpose within me in terms of how I would like this call to go, then that’s all good. I don’t need to make a sell every single time. Because what I will gain from that call, if there isn’t actually a coaching transaction is a little bit of knowledge or a lot of knowledge, or maybe just the experience of someone saying a big fat no, being rude. Yeah. And all those things are useful. Selling isn’t about the transaction, selling as a salesperson is about the experience and learning and gathering up everything that I am learning for the next call or the next conversation.
AKS: 38:25 Yeah, and also, your clear message will enable the person you have spoken to, if they liked you to tell someone else about it really easily. So it’s too frivolous to call what you are doing a niche. It’s a specialty, not a niche, isn’t it what you are doing, but if you have a specialty or a niche, and next time, that person if they liked you, hears about that, they will say, “Oh, I had a nice conversation with Elaine. I think you should speak to her.” And I think at least as much of our sales comes from people passing us on as it does from our own conversations.
EDLC: 38:55 Definitely. And there’s elements to that, where... Those conversations, I think they come quite naturally to me. And I always want to give like a tenor to the person or colleague that I am with, and they are like, “Wow, that was great. You were great.” And it’s like music to my ears. I am a sucker for the praise of other people or someone saying, “That was good. You did well there.” Part of me thinks is muscle memory nowadays, but I also enjoy those conversations. The thing is, I do think there are some magic elements that you can put into those kinds of conversations. For me personally, they are about, “Being yourself. Don’t try and be a salesperson. Don’t try and be anything but you. Don’t be more louder or extroverted or introverted than you usually are. But do try and let people see you feel your energy.” Who are you? And are you happy with that coming out and coming across? Let them know what your purpose is. Let them feel your energy that’s driving that purpose and that passion?]. Because I think that’s what people remember and what people feel whether it’s quite forceful and a bit of a whirlwind or if it’s high energy, or if it’s quiet and considered, I think people feel that like, what do you want to be as you go into those calls, it’s not just about what you want to say. Pete Mosley said that, actually. And I remember he said that in our barefoot training course, the last bit of preparation he does is, “How do you want to be?” And I think that’s what people really remember. So don’t be afraid to show yourself because essentially, that also runs through your business and your coaching approach as well. For me, I like it, because it acts as a filter for people that I won’t work with, or that won’t want to work with me. There is no other way for me to be me. But I like that in my mind that this is uncomfortable with this, because I am drawing in people who want to work with me and vice versa.
AKS: 41:00 And hopefully, you are going to win a piece of work over the long term, it’s going to be exhausting to be pretending is something different. And then win it, have to be that.
EDLC: 41:10 People do love a sales voice, don’t they? I think a mode, some people think that we need - particularly those that haven’t done this often or aren’t yet used to it, we think we need to go into a mode when really, the cut through that you want to achieve will come from you being you, because there is no other cut through like you.
AKS: 41:31 Now, absolutely, I would love to talk about this all day long. I am looking at the clock and we are ticking by, I am gonna have to call a pause. But I think just before we close, I am gonna just ask for a final reflection on if you had an extra something piece of advice for anyone listening to this, what would it be?
EDLC: 41:48 What I have learned, because someone told me actually and I have built upon that over time is that you don’t get success in a business like this, in a coaching business or business with purpose on your own. You should want to, it’s enjoyable, and you probably need to go out there and build a network of other like-minded entrepreneurs, founders, coaches, just people in the workplace generally, who also doing their own thing, learning, foraging out for great ideas that we will bounce them off of you, share their experiences as we build together, but also someone that you can give business to and share business ideas with, so that you can collaborate and do things together. If there’s anything that I think has been one of the kind of bedrock foundations of our success, it’s that we rise together. If a so called competitor in inverted commas over there is doing great, then that’s great for us. And if I can help other people in their journey, some of it is karma, but I think some of it is transactional, the way that small businesses work, then we should work together. And I will always try and kind of support other businesses to build theirs, I think it comes back around whether it’s from them or from someone else. So yeah, you don’t get there on your own. To get commercial viability, to create a business, especially one with purpose, you need to create a network of like-minded businesses.
AKS: 43:27 Thank you so much, Elaine for the depth and confidence in your conversation. I am especially drawn back to their thinking about where the coaches might be able to grow their confidence, and linking the things they have heard potential clients say they need and the things they know they can offer. If what we are offering genuinely hits a spot, then everyone’s happy. I wish you huge success too with coachesofcolour.com and have every confidence that the combination of a great true purpose, a confident sales and marketing strategy, and all the energy that you have cannot fail. Inspiring to talk to you for a Listening Life, Elaine. And thank you and good luck.
My huge thanks to producer Steve Folland and to Lauren Hills at HQ. A Listening Life is a business dedicated to helping coaches who are tired of trying to grow their business into something that makes them happy and brings-in the money. Podcasts and events, mentoring and courses. Find us on Instagram at a Listening-Life and through the podcast www.listening.life.co.uk
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