Facilitating is an art form. It can feel easy one day and challenging the next. After more than 15+ years of delivering courses and workshops both online and in-person, there are still times when being a facilitator is just plain difficult.

There are a lot of reasons for this. Everyone has their Achilles heel; I would love to share mine.

It’s likely you had a few notable growth spurts as a young person. You may have been one of the lucky ones who woke up one day four inches taller. Or, you may have had a slightly prolonged experience, feeling the growth occur little by little.

The phrase ‘growing pains’ means “neuralgic pains which occur in the limbs of some young children” and the important word here is ‘some’. Not everyone will experience the same sort of pains, or any pains at all.

Strengthening your biceps with weight training or pumping your heart on an outdoor run are two simple ways to activate your physical muscles. We want the same for your coaching muscle.

It’s a new year and we’re all being bombarded with the sentiment of ‘new year, new you’. More than any other time of year, people are focused on what they’re putting in their bodies and how they’re moving them, too.

In 2017, one of our cofounders, Quinn Simpson, wrote a blog for the 74 Million that articulated how transformational teachers are when they use coaching skills. The blog focused on the teacher and their relationships with students, but it didn’t explore in great enough detail how the classroom would transform when guided by a coach.

When was the last time you saw a waterfall in real life? If you’re like us, it’s sadly been a few years. So, let’s take a moment to remember their immense capacity.

A waterfall gushes down the side of a rock with unexplainable force. A waterfall carries momentum into the water below and trickles onwards. A waterfall has grace and strength. A waterfall is powerful.

The idea of ‘The Waterfall Effect’ has been contemplated by many. In Paul H Burton’s book, The Waterfall Effect: Six Principles for Productive Leadership, he describes the effect as the benefits that cascade down through an organisation, into the community and out to the client base. For us, the effect is seen in nearly every school we’ve worked with and seen in spades!

This blog was inspired by a very talented, vegan entrepreneur, Leanne, who has recently turned her life inside out and backwards, to find not only what fulfils her deeply but what also makes her healthy and happy.

If you’ve been coaching for any length of time, you likely have your favourite go-to questions; the ones that you use time and time again. You may think the question in your head is the best one to ask your coachee, but sometimes, you need to challenge yourself to swap one question for another to really open someone up.