Client profile
Theme tune
Girls Just Wanna Have Fun by Cyndi Lauper
Favourite TV shows
Big Brother; The X Factor; Celebrity Love Island
Catchphrases
“Cool!”; “Daaahhhhhling that’s fabulous!”
Ice-breaker
“Don’t you know who I am?”
Coaching this type of client will be an experience. They will not see this new relationship as performance improvement; you are their new best friend (NBF). This client lives life in a Hollywood reality show. They are hugely successful in marketing, event management, party/wedding planning or some other kind of “difficult to describe what I do” function.
Clearly, coaching must be in vogue, and you are the latest Prada handbag. You will have limited time on this assignment so supervision may help.
A typical session will be interrupted constantly by famous models having tantrums or a PA running in to say Leonardo is on line two. Movement on the coaching agenda may be somewhat slow.
Here are some CPD activities to help you coach your NBF.
Foundation: Air kissing
Learn to air kiss. Each session will start and end with an air kiss. Each interruption will be the same. As a coach, you need to be able to know the right number of air kisses (Dutch and Belgians do three, Spaniards two). It is also important to know if you are meant to finish with an air kiss or a simple “ciao”. The AGROW model may be helpful here: Air kiss, Goals, Reality, Options, Will I air kiss again?
Intermediate: Hello
This client mingles with “names”, so make sure you know who’s who. All good coaches will research their client’s work environment so take out subscriptions to Heat, Hello!, Closer and, for international clients, The National Enquirer.
Practitioner: Suppression
Inevitably you will meet one of your all-time heroes when working with this client. If you want to retain your dignity and self-respect, practise suppressing the urge to say, “Oh my god, it’s Brad and Angelina! I lurve them!” in a squeaky voice, then giggling like an idiot.
Master: Body language
You have a honed competence in reading body language. You will know that a client is recalling an experience or inventing a view. You will be wise to all avoidance tricks and feed this back to your client with finesse.
Botox, however, adds a whole new dimension. Learning to read a face that moves less than John Sergeant’s feet is a very sophisticated skill-set and one that requires perfect observation and concentration.
Volume 4, Issue 1