Client Comments
“You’ve helped me decipher what I want, removing self-imposed limitations that stand in the way, and providing guidance and support to achieve it. You’re a "Make it Happen" kind of girl!“
“One of the things you do well is not try to answer the problem, but let me find the solution for myself. A lot of this is about asking the right questions and providing guidance and support. You’ve helped me to find ways to align what I like to do with what I’m good at. Bottom line, you help me live up to my potential.“
“You listen extremely well and hold the BEST view of me for myself, when I’m having trouble doing it or feel some obstacle. You trust the process and that I will eventually reach my goals.“
Client Stories in their own words
Case study #1
My career wasn’t going the way I had always thought it would - responsibilities, pay, promotions and that internal feeling of accomplishment. Things were OK, but talking about work wasn’t very much fun. Changing the situation seemed hard and maybe impossible - besides I wasn’t sure what I wanted to change it to.
I found myself falling into the trap of negativity and joining all the other people who were complaining about work. I was bored, distracted, and restless - definitely not excited about getting out of bed to go to work in the morning. Not to say that it was all bad - there were still moments when I felt like things were working, but those moments didn’t happened as much as I would like. Worst was the vague feeling that I was somehow settling in my career and not living up to the expectations I have of myself.
But I wasn’t exactly sure what the problem was (bad boss, wrong job, wrong company, wrong career???) And I couldn’t pinpoint the cause or a solution to get out of it.
I began working with Stacey. As I reflect on the progress I’ve made, I notice that I’ve:
- rediscovered my strengths and identified what I’m good at
- improved relationships with my boss and key colleagues and built strategic alliances with other company leaders
- become a better leader and decision-maker
- learned to trust my instincts as a guide
- launched several major, high profile initiatives in my company
- become excited about my career again
- took my work performance to a higher level
- learned that I have control over what happens to me at work, and to see possibilities instead of limitations
- set ambitious goals and achieved them
- lived up to my own potential!
Thirty-something manager
Mid-size company
Case study #2
I don’t know why coaching works. I’m not denying that it DOES work, but WHY it works is unclear to me. For example, if you decide to feel better about yourself and join a gym, you’ll get much better results if you consult with a personal trainer. The trainer is assumed an expert on physical fitness. So if you’re lifting weights or working out, you BELIEVE them when they tell you that you can lift 10 more pounds, for 30 seconds longer, twice in one session. What’s remarkable is that they’re usually right, but if they weren’t there pushing you to do it, you wouldn’t — or, at least, *I* wouldn’t bother to try. In other words, a coach gets you to do things you could have done yourself, if only you believed you could.
So the primary qualifications for a coach are a sense of expertise, which translates into a trust that they know your capabilities better than yourself, and a sensitivity to see whether or not you’ve reached your physical or psychological limits for the session. In the case of my coaching with Stacey Lane, I found her career and life coaching to have an abundance of all of these qualities.
After being laid off from my dying dot-bomb job in Texas, I found myself accepting a new position at a much more stable company, at a 20% increase in salary, in a new state (Utah) with a much lower cost of living. It seemed like the perfect opportunity.
Unfortunately, it was not perfect at all — not even close. The company was stable, but its management was not. One month my job was vital to the company’s welfare, the next month I would be threatened with a layoff. This went on for 8 months. Compounding my frustration was the fact that because the company was never sure whether they needed me or not, they never actually gave me any work to do. I was bored stiff. I was earning a lot of money, but had quickly discovered that almost all the amenities Utah offers are the polar opposite of everything I wanted out of life — there was nothing to spend my salary on! I was bored stiff OUTSIDE of work, too!
I decided to try Stacey Lane’s coaching services to see if I could get out of the rut I was in. Stacey got to know me well. She probed and found out what I really wanted to do. When I said that my dreams were only that — "dreams" — she refused to let me dismiss them. She pushed me hard, but never harder than I was able to go. She had confidence that I could achieve all that I wanted to achieve, and by having gotten to know me, she had the expertise to say so, as well. Stacey guided me through the process of suggesting the company let me go — which finally happened, to our mutual advantages. She encouraged me to live a little — and I did more traveling in 5 months than I had done in the last 10 years combined! She pursued my dream with me — and I followed that dream to successfully writing a feature film screenplay.
As it stands now, I know that Stacey will continue to stand with me as I move forward into new jobs and coaching me to realize my dream of selling my screenplay and becoming a full-time screenwriter. She believes I can do it, and she has been right so far — so why should I stop believing?
As I said, I don’t know how or why coaching works, I only know that it does — and in Stacey’s case, I know that I’ve been coached very well and it has worked spectacularly. Maybe I could lift 50 more lbs. at the gym, too — while that’s something I COULD do on my own, I don’t know that I WOULD. With Stacey as my coach, I’d be able to tell you that I already HAD.