Your first session with a life coach can be the starting point for incredible transformation, personally and professionally. Whether you’re looking to create positive changes in your personal life, improve work-life balance, or gain clarity in your professional life, asking the right questions is crucial to know if you're hiring the right coach!

Knowing what to ask can make the difference between a helpful conversation and a truly powerful coaching session that can launch you into change. And trust me, coaches want you to ask these up front because we care about whether we are the right fit for you! Let's talk about some powerful questions to ask during your first coaching session to ensure you're getting the most out of your time and setting a foundation for better results.

Why Asking the Right Coaching Questions Matters

Professional coaching isn’t about having someone hand you the answers—it’s about a coach leading you through the right coaching questions to find the right answ...

Leadership roles are often idealized because they highlight success. 

However, the truth is that great leaders are shaped significantly through moments of leadership failure!

These failures provide critical lessons in leadership skills, highlighting the impact of bad leadership on employee morale, company culture, and organizational success. One of the best ways to learn is by not only examining leadership wins but also leadership failures. Aspiring leaders can discover key ways to improve their leadership style, avoid poor performance, and cultivate a healthy, productive work environment if they just take the time to learn from others' mistakes. Here are just a few leadership failures you can learn from:

1. Steve Jobs: Collaboration and Humility

Steve Jobs' initial tenure at Apple offers valuable lessons on the importance of teamwork and effective communication. Despite his visionary ideas, Jobs' intense leadership style and ineffective collaboration with his team members and A...

There. I said it.

That might sound strange coming from a certified high-performance coach, but it’s the truth. And if you’re looking for someone to wave a magic wand and “fix” your life, coaching isn’t it.

Because coaching doesn’t change your life.
YOU do.

Too often, people hire a coach expecting a transformation just by proximity. Like hiring someone to sit beside you at the gym while you scroll your phone on the treadmill and call it a workout. You can invest in the idea of change without ever stepping into the responsibility of it.

But here’s what coaching actually is:
Coaching is an influence process.
It’s a guided partnership.
It’s powerful—but it’s not passive.

When done well, coaching leads to:

• Clarity about who you are and what matters

• Discovery of what’s holding you back

• Decision-making that aligns with your values

• Performance improvement rooted in intentional action

• And ultimately, better living that feels more like the life you were meant for

...

Leadership isn’t a title—it’s a mindset. You've likely heard the names of well-known leaders and good examples like John Maxwell, Helen Keller, Winston Churchill, Nelson Mandela, and more. They and many others understand that the true leadership role is more about influence than authority. Whether you're leading at a company, managing a team, or building a movement, the most effective way to lead often comes down to how you show up, how you communicate, and how you inspire others through a good example.

This list of quotes goes beyond just a list —they offer practical insights, personal reflections, and leadership development takeaways inspired by some of the greatest leaders in history. Whether you're an entrepreneur, executive, coach, or just someone with a desire to lead well, this is your reminder (and a fresh perspective) of what genuine leadership really looks like.

1. "The function of leadership is to produce more leaders, not more followers." – Ralph Nader

This quote defin...

If you want to hear more about this topic, be sure to listen to this older episode on a previous podcast! Listen to entire episode here

No matter how much you have to get done, we all work with the same time restrictions: 24 hours a day.

Sometimes, this amount of time can seem like an eternity–especially if you’re taking care of boring or menial tasks. But most of the time, we’re all hurrying around at the end of the day trying to get everything done before bedtime.

How often in that timeframe are you thinking about your future goals?

How many of your completed tasks are getting you closer to reaching your goals?

If you’re trying to grow your business, this adds an extra layer of pressure. But what if it wasn’t about working within the confines of 1,440 minutes? What if it was about how you used those minutes?

What if you could increase your productivity and get more done with the same amount of time that everyone else has?

A trick to getting things done i...

Effective communication is required in all types of relationships—whether between partners, friends, coworkers, employees, or new acquaintances. It forms the foundation of understanding and connection, influencing how smoothly relationships operate.

It's common knowledge that there's always room for improvement in how we communicate and receive messages. However, we often overlook our role as recipients of communication. Have you ever considered your responsibility in this exchange?

While we can't control how others communicate with us or with others, we DO have control over how we interpret and respond to their messages. The way we interpret communication is pivotal; it can significantly impact our understanding and the dynamics of our relationships. It's why two people can hear the same words but interpret them very differently based on their perspectives and assumptions.

To improve our communication skills and ensure alignment between what we say, what we mean, and how others per...

Do you find yourself constantly putting pressure on yourself to develop and/or be consistent with your habits?

It can be hard to juggle habits when productivity and self-improvement often go hand in hand. Many of us find ourselves in a constant cycle of starting, maintaining, and sometimes abandoning habits, all under the pressure of expectations. But what if there's a gentler approach to bettering your habits—one that emphasizes trust in ourselves and the evolving nature of our needs?

Imagine waking up each day completely trusting the habits you've chosen to grow. This is what we all want: habits that serve us, that align with our current circumstances, and that evolve as we do. For those deeply entrenched in the science and practice of habits, like myself, it's easy to become enamored with the idea of mastering and perfecting our habits. Yet, as I've discovered in my own journey, even well-established habits can become burdensome if we don't take time to reevaluate them from time t...

If you prefer podcasts, listen to my podcast episode on this same topic here. 

Every day presents us with numerous choices on how we spend our time. Yet, prioritizing "the right things" over just accomplishment is crucial. Defining these "right things" is key to effective decision-making.

It’s hard to know what decisions are worth investing our time in and which ones aren’t that important. We can spend our whole days executing tasks, but just because something is achievable, doesn’t mean it’s what is important. We can make dozens of decisions each day that have nothing to do with what's actually important for our long-term goals. Understanding this distinction is fundamental to effective decision-making.

Our days consist of a series of decisions. Some decisions drastically impact our lives, while others involve less long-term risk. For example, choosing what to eat for breakfast impacts your life a lot less than choosing to pay for that extra training or seminar that will help you...

Have you ever looked up from your phone and found that the time on the clock was way past what you expected? Time flew, but you felt like it was standing still as you mindlessly scrolled. You find yourself feeling guilty about how much time you spent, or overwhelmed by how much you have to get done in (now) a limited amount of time. You feel like time vanished, and you’re suddenly a victim -- a victim of your own self-sabotage and buffering. 

You got sucked into the “scroll."

Why is social media so addictive?

I want to say, “It’s okay. It happens!'' But the truth is, I’m just as disappointed in myself as you are when this happens. Not for being on my phone. But for BUFFERING with my phone. The bigger truth is, I can’t honestly say that I believe this form of time wasting IS healthy when used for unhealthy reasons. 

Scrolling is like a long, dark, black portal that sucks us in and keeps us searching for something, anything, with quite literally - as a result of the power of the i...

Listen to the full podcast episode to learn more tips on goal setting. You'll hear tips on how to approach leadership goals differently and why leadership growth is essential in creating a positive ripple effect in your organization. Subscribe here!

Setting goals isn't just about achieving business success—it's about transforming yourself into a more effective leader who inspires and supports your team.

Leadership extends beyond hitting targets; it's about personal growth and your impact on others. It's about the process more than the destination. Whether you're starting afresh at the beginning of a new year or mid-year, the principles in this blog post offer a timeless approach to goal setting that can elevate your leadership skills every day.

Rethinking Goals: Beyond Business Success

Many of us focus on achieving business goals—increasing revenue, launching products, and meeting KPIs. However, leadership goals go deeper. They focus on how you evolve as a leader, how you inspire...