What Do Your Clients Actually Want? | EP261
A client comes to you asking for a plan. Maybe they want to get out of debt, figure out how to say no to a family member asking for money, or solve some other problem that feels specific and measurable. As coaches, it can be tempting to start building the strategy right away. After all, they told us what they want.
But what happens when the thing they are asking for isn’t quite the thing they are actually trying to accomplish?
In this Financial Coaches Classic, Maria and Cody talk about slowing down long enough to understand what may be underneath a client’s request before moving into problem-solving. Maria shares the story of a client who repeatedly asked for help figuring out what to say when family members came to her for money. The immediate request was strategy: help me craft the email, help me say no, help me handle the next conversation. Over time, their coaching moved toward understanding why saying no was so difficult in the first place—and eventually the client recognized that she wanted to spend less time on the strategy and more time understanding herself.
Maria and Cody also explore how questions can keep that discovery with the client. Instead of immediately asking how to accomplish the stated goal, a coach might stay with something as simple as, “What makes that important to you?” Sometimes what a client says they want is only the first layer of the conversation. The work is not deciding what they really need for them. It is helping them stay with the question long enough to understand what they actually want.
🎧 Resources & Links Mentioned in This Episode
THE Financial Coaches Network
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Getting Started as a Financial Coach
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THE Financial Coaches Community
https://www.facebook.com/groups/nmhcoaches
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