The acronym that stands for the death of capitalism can also be a time of reflection, regrouping and rediscovery of self rather than the pursuance of business opportunities.
What I am about to write is probably meaningless to a poor person in the Third World who already is living at the level that us unemployed professionals in the Western world will reach in about 6 to 12 months time if the situation pans out as drastically as pundits think it will. So to us professionals who have a lot to give and no one to give it to what can we do to help ourselves?
Hope. Without hope there is nothing to work with. You must trust in your abilities and capabilities regardless of whether it is being utilised by someone else right now. You can still utilise your abilities if you are unemployed if you are using it for yourself and the greater good. I am not talking about volunteering here but discovering yourself and what you like to do best. Find that and work at it and develop it to the next level. If it is writing, then do that. If it is making furniture then design a new piece and make it. Whatever floats your boat. You are not wasting time even though the time you are using you are not being paid for. Disconnect your sense of self worth from holding down a job and earning money. You are bigger than that and in any case that's an Anglo-Saxon thing and pretty much worthless.
The system is broken. Help yourself as best as you can. Capitalism is bankrupt both figuratively and morally. Always has been, always will be. Why it has taken this long to figure that out is beyond my comprehension. Marx said it but no one believed him. It couldn't be destroyed from without. It had to be destroyed from within by those who knew it best. By those who were driven by its obscene greed and dehumanising corrupting wealth. If you do not accept this premise, then you're not a thought driven person and read no further. Having said that, it is a system that so far, for those of us professionals at the periphery of the gravy train, that has provided comparative wealth and well being. But it cannot go on. Business is about boom and bust but this bust is more cataclysmic that all the previous busts put together because the crisis is one of confidence. There is no confidence in the system, in the people, in the safeguards in the so-called risk managers who are all a bankrupt lot anyway. It is no longer about money. No matter how much money is pump primed into the system, if there is no confidence, there will be no restoration of prosperity.
Reconnect with the earth, with the soil, with the cycles of the season, with the rising and setting of the sun and the moon. You have life. These are the realities of living. It is not about being able to buy whatever we want on credit when we want it. If you want something, make it, barter it, swap it. Divorce yourself from the cash economy if you can by growing your own vegetables, your own fruit. Make your own compotes and preserves. Food tastes better when you grow it yourself. This is not going to work for those in the Northern Hemisphere right now enduring blizzards and those in the Southern Hemisphere enduring 45C+ temperatures and bushfires. If you live in more temperate zones, follow this advice. As I said above, this advice is useless for someone in the Third World as I would expect they would be doing this already.
The environment is totally f_____d up. The blizzards in the Northen Hemisphere have only been matched in their ferocity with the heatwaves in the Southern Hemisphere. So probably if you wanted to grow your own food, because of the drought in Southern Australia at least, you can't do so but there are ways of getting around it like using water tanks and other storage systems. Global warming is causing these extremes so at the same time as we're trying to fight the GFC we're hamstrung by extreme weather conditions ruining crops and livelihoods.
Survive the next 12 months in the hope all will be better in 2010. Do whatever it takes to survive including branching out into any areas that you may have skills or experience in. In my case I am a life coach, a personal trainer and a soccer coach so I keep myself busy. That is the key, keep yourself occupied in areas which may not pay off right now but might pay off later. This keeps the hope alive.
Keep the ideas coming. Have a brainstorming session every couple of days with yourself. What are some of the ideas for survival beyond what is being offered by the government and charities? What can you do for yourself right now? What is my network? What do people need right now but can't afford? Meet the need now, the payment will come later. The collapse in confidence and demand has created areas of devastation in industries, housing, employment opportunities but there is latent or pent up demand that will be released when the economy improves. Be there when that happens. Where is there demand currently that is depressed by the GFC? Match that demand with your skill set. If there is no match, find a match/create a match by acquiring those skills. Whatever happens people will need to eat, people need a place to sleep and people will be born and will die. These are the universals that you can build a future around.
Whatever your age, keep in good physical shape. Have some goals. These could be weight related or they could be event related. For example I want to do a half marathon in six months time so I need to get ready now. Some people set themselves extreme goals like walking to the North which require a dedicated fury and approx 18 months to prepare for but you don't need to go that far. Set yourself a six month goal. Work at it daily/twice daily and watch out for injuries (don't rush it).
You are your best marketing tool. Be ready for the next role now. In other words, act as if you have the next role already. Exhibit the behaviours and tendencies associated with that. That is, run your life professionally. Take care of the body, take care of the financials by putting in place a robust budget that will survive the next 12 months. Take care of your relationships. With your partner, with your kids, with your parents, with your family. It all matters especially right now.
Expenditure review and reduction. I have over the last few years really focused on this but I will here reiterate the main points. You are now in survival mode therefore look at eliminating all the following expenditure: takeaway food (eat fresh vegetables, cheaper cuts of meat and seasonal fruit instead and prepare it yourself); restaurant meals; all expenditure related to mobile phones, mobile internet, SMS and cable television (these are all useless unless they assist you with finding paid employment/engagements); anything that you can do yourself but have paid someone to do for you (this can cover servicing your car yourself to getting a family member to cut your hair); cutback on credit and only buy something when you have the cash for it, I wrote about this a number of years [2005] ago but it as relevant now (if not more) as it was back then.
Focus on what has worked for you in the past. Right now the problem (i.e the GFC) is not something that you can do much about. But making yourself stronger physically, mentally, spiritually is within your power. Develop a routine or fall back into the routine you had when you were working/busy/running your business. Most of all feel proud of who you are and of your achievements. The worst thing you can do is let your head drop.
Join a support group. Make up your own. The key to a mutual support group is that each of you brings something unique to the group: for example one of you may bring the physical fitness side to the group, one may bring small business skills, another corporate recruitment experience, another may be great at fixing cars or working with wood, another person may be a great cook or wine connoisseur. Recruit a group with these individual skills, meet and disseminate your skills in turn. Above all support, trust and love each other for that is what a support group is about.
If the GFC is not to turn into a catastrophe (I know it has already done so for many) then don't panic. Stay calm by a combination of physical exercise and relaxation techniques. Plan your next 6-12 months with as much information as you now have. Plan every day as if you're in a war. You are and it's a war you must win.
Look around your house for all the tools, materials and spare parts you have lying idle. I know during the boom I bought and bought stuff from all kinds of places related to the house and car. Well now is the time to put all these tools to good use. They are there and you now have the time to put them to good use. If you have the money, go out and buy a few pots of paint. Use them to freshen up your house. It will make you feel better.
For the moment forget about job openings they are few and far between. So concentrate on what skills you may have to supply to other people like you. You may do it on a pro bono (i.e free) basis to start with just to get the word of mouth out about your skills and talent. As your reputation increases you may get more recognition and further your chances of being paid for your services. You decide what is good for you to pursue. Anything is better than lying around the house (i.e if you have one) and feeling sorry for yourself.
There are lots of things you can do that are free: going to the beach is free, swimming there is free, running in the park/on the beach is free, exercising at home is free, going to free art exhibitions and free music recitals esp. for up and coming artists is another activity you can do for nothing. Learn to fix your car or at least carry out the basic maintenance yourself. Do all the little maintenance jobs around the house yourself.
Life Coaching Tips and Techniques No. 144
Will you survive the recession?
In these times of economic stress and associated worry surviving will be difficult much less flourishing. We know from previous experience and history that psychopaths will thrive in these times because chaos is their fuel and at the moment they don't even need to create it, they just need to ride the whirlwind. Assuming you're not a psychopath then how do you survive perhaps even thrive?
If you are out of work and have been trying to find work without success, then try to keep busy doing other things. If you have another profession or calling revive that and do that. This is when the advice previously given of developing alternative methods of revenue (besides working for someone) comes in handy. I practice what I preach. Not only am I a project manager with 20 years experience but I have also developed a small business doing life coaching and personal training.
I will only give advice that I myself follow.
I know things are bad out there as I heard an ex husband pleading with his former wife on a public phone for $20 for cigarettes . He wasn't just pleading but begging. He said 'I can't live for the next few days without cigarettes and don't do this to me'. At first she refused and he became frantic but after he kept repeating 'I'm coming and put in the mail box' about 5-7 times she finally must have relented as he was on his way. On the other hand he would probably have gone even if she had said no. He seemed that kind of desperate creature. He had the look of someone demented and disturbed.
Some recession survival tips
Prune your techno/gadget expenditure. Hopefully you have been monitoring your expenditure at a reasonably low level over the last few years to know where/how to cut back. There are always ways to cut back. For example look at things like fixed line rental (kill the fixed line and just use a mobile), mobile phones (go from a plan to prepaid for a start and reduce number of mobiles in the home to a minimum), SMS, internet access (maybe go to a cheaper plan) or use free internet available in some cafes, cable TV, paying for downloads (never ever pay for downloading anything - there is always a free and legal alternative) and other wasted (in my opinion) internet download related expenditure. If you have a second fixed line, kill it. Do not under any circumstances SMS your favourite singer/dancer etc. to a number given by organisers of these shows. These are a complete waste of money and purely a fabrication to get you to SMS. There are other ways to cut down on your communication costs by using VOIP services which you should explore in more detail. These are not life and death expenditures necessary for survival.
Look at other types of expenditure (discretionary/non discretionary). Look at all your insurances. Do you need them all and at the level currently set. For example in Australia you can insure your car in case of accident for damage just to the other car involved. This works if your car is not worth much and can be written off. Look at all options for reducing fees paid for financial services. Do you really need so many accounts? For example in our family we have a joint account and each of the partners have their own account plus the children have an account each plus the company has an account plus the super fund has an account plus we have multiple share trading accounts. Each and everyone of these accounts attracts fees. These must be rationalised. Now is not the time for keeping accounts that serve no purpose. Close them now and save yourself heaps in fees. Consolidate all your super funds into one account.
Raise prices if you can. If you have an income producing asset (for example a house, a business, a sideline, whatever) raise prices if your market will bear it. If you have a rental property, put the rent up. If you sell services or products and you know your markets and customers put up your prices to as much as the customer will bear.
Garage sale. If you have lots of 'junk' about the house, organise a garage sale. Instead of throwing things away, you're making a little bit of cash and reducing your burden and clutter at the same time.
Entertainment expenses. Stop eating out and eating takeaway/takeout food. Eliminate junk food from your diet altogether. Buy fresh food, fruit and vegetables and cook those yourself. Get a recipe book if you can't cook. A recession is a good time to go on a diet. It just seems the right time to tighten your belt (excuse the pun). Find free entertainment such as walks, running and swimming at the beach, game of soccer in the park with local kids, bushwalks, join a running club for a nominal fee and run for fun. Avoid anything where you need to pay for someone else to entertain you. Learn to entertain yourself for free. If you're into classical music, there are lots of free concerts (as least in Australia). Get a ticket and go. Do not go anywhere where you have to purchase alcohol. If you need to drink, buy bottle and bring it home to have with your dinner. Much more civilised that way than drinking in a bar/pub.
Fitness and Wellness Expenses. Stop your gym membership immediately and setup your own mini gym in your house. You will still need cardio and if your house is big enough then buy a good second hand treadmill. As an alternative if you live next to a park and in Australia who doesn't (even city dwellers have parks close to them) run in the park every morning for free and come home and do your gym work for free. The key thing here (this is coming from a personal trainer) is to have a program put together for you by a PT that understands your goals and can fulfil them. Once the plan is in place, then you're free as a bird to exercise as you see fit.
Social interaction. In western societies a lot of interaction/mingling/picking up occurs in bars, pubs, nite clubs and the like. If you need these places but can't afford it then try to meet people in other ways. Use the internet. There are free dating sites out there. For every web site charging for a service there are two others where it is free. Meet in a safe place at least the first time you meet. Do not believe anything at face value on the internet until you meet the person in question. There are only so many thin, gorgeous, beautiful models out there looking for poor, out of work, overweight middle-aged guys. If it sounds too good to be true then it is.
Utilities such as water, electricity, gas, petrol, car expenses. What drives your consumption? Turn off all unwanted appliances in the house before you go to bed. There is no need to them to be on. This includes all stereos, DVDs, computers and the like. Nothing needs to be on except the fridge and freezer. In your car, remove everything that is not needed from the inside and the boot. For example there is no need for me (as a personal trainer) to carry 40kilos of weights unless I am going to see a client and returning from a client. Make sure your car is properly maintained at all times. Now this may prove costly in labour not parts. Why not do a car maintenance course or teach yourself how to change the oil and replace the brake pads? Buy a car manual. Get to know and love your car. Maintenance is cheaper than repair caused by poor or no maintenance. You'll save yourself hundreds of dollars by doing the same maintenance yourself and not having to pay for repairs due to neglect. Keep a log of all car repairs and create one especially for the braking system (please ask me for a template for both - it's free). That way you know exactly where the car is at in terms of its state of repair and what is due to be done on it. Instead of making small trips in the car to shops and the like walk there and back. You'll save money and the exercise is free.
Get fit, lost weight and tone up. Now is the best time to focus on your body image. I'm not able to provide a cure for obesity. No one can do that. But I can provide a few tips. Getting fit is a lifestyle change that will (has to) last forever. At least it has to be if the change you seek is to be permanent. Otherwise you'll lose the weight but put more back on again. Make your fitness regime part of your daily routine. Eat healthily but not just one day a week. Make it 5 days out of 7. You still need a treat every now and then so don't deny yourself that pleasure.
Mental stability. If you have issues with depression, anxiety etc. get the treatment you need. Do not self medicate with alcohol, tobacco, drugs and over exercising. Exercise can be a medication for the good but when people over train or train for more than 2 hours a day without adequate rest and nourishment then it becomes a problem.
Work/business. If no work is available in your field, then fall back on your hobby. Mine is fitness and I have funded my hobby by spending 8 weeks of my lefe and $5000 to become a registered trainer. This is in essence putting money away for the bad times (which is now). In your case, if you have been reading the articles on this web site, you will know that I place priority on creating a second front, a hobby that you can ramp up when your major activity dries up. Well now is the time to ramp up your small manufacturing hobby, for example. If you find yourself in the unfortunate position of not having a sideline and you have all your eggs in the one basket then you're in for a rough time for a fairly long time. Even now it's probably not too late to do something about it. Look for courses in a new area of interest and get retrained. Also realise with every recession certain jobs, certain ntypes of jobs become extinct never to be resurrected. If your current position is one of those, then time is now to look at something else. When the market for bullwhips (for horse drawn carriages) dried up, the smart ones retooled to produce leather car seats or brake pads. The ones who didn't died immediately.
About Gilbert Labour. I'm a project manager, personal trainer, soccer coach and fitness instructor. I am also affected by the recession with work drying up in all these areas and with good reason (the collapse of demand). The causes of this will be debated for years to come but out of control greed magnified by deep seated and irrational fear cannot be a good driver for any system. But I believe that the recession is survivable if you keep your cool and see this as an opportunity to work hard and improve yourself. Every recession is followed by a boom. Follow the advice above and be ready to take part in the boom.
Life Coaching Tips and Techniques No. 143
OBESITY - THE EPIDEMIC OF CHOICE
The only way to beat obesity is to put your life on hold right now as if you've been told you have cancer and devote the next six months to saving your life. Nothing else matters at this time except you.
Thousands of books have been written on this subject. Countless research papers have postulated on its cause and treatment mostly on a mass scale like a study on a new epidemiology. But these studies and papers do not make it personal for that is what it is. A personal battle, a lifelong battle for health and happiness.
The following tips and advice has been written by a qualified personal trainer, experienced life coach, licensed soccer coach and someone who has spent the last 6 years living the ethos of daily exercise and good nutrition.
Fighting your personal obesity is not just about diet, exercise and nutrition. It is about taking a personal interest in your health. This means putting time, effort and money into staying fit and at a healthy weight permanently. It is not about gym memberships which are next to useless.
It is about understanding the point of no return. That is getting to the point that you're no longer able to exercise to assist in your weight loss. Once you're past this point, you're pretty helpless and really waiting to die.
Obesity is not one problem. It is a number of problems that integrated become the obesity problem. The multiple causes can include emotional, psychological, physical, physiological and mental factors. This multiplicity makes treating obesity with just diet and exercise futile. Because at every single eruption of the original problem(s), the person will binge eat.
An obese person has a special affinity with food. Food becomes both a master and a slave. In the guise of slave food has a functional even beneficial effect but when it turns to master food becomes a poison, an addiction, the fix, the high. This is its true role in the obese person. It is this nexus between food and the 'high' it provides that must be broken. In essence the bond between master and slave must be broken so that the slave is set free and not burdened by the master.
Obesity is another form of suicide. Staying obese is committing suicide slowly. You need to understand the role that food plays in your life. The crucial role that it fulfills by medicating your emotional pain. In this role food becomes addictive and contributes to the original problem rather than solving it. That is, it solves one problem but creates a much bigger problem in its wake. Much better to treat the initial emotional pain with counseling and medication than to self treat with food.
Obesity is about fighting for life, fighting for every breath with the merest form of activity. Walking suddenly becomes a strenuous life threatening activity. Walking an incline or walking at pace or walking in heat becomes impossible. This is the fate for those who continue to use food beyond its true purpose. Everything that is good for you can be bad for you in excess even exercise.
Obesity is an exercise in lack of self control. It is a study of the results of the lack of self control. When the imagination runs wild, when the will runs wild, when the normal bounds of satiety are breached, this is the result.
The way back from obesity is a long and very arduous one. As a result, it is one that is not travelled by many people. Hence it will be a lonely and painful (emotional and physical) road you will travel if (when?) you go there.
The only way back from obesity that is guaranteed to work is to treat it as if it was a life threatening disease like cancer or heart disease (which it is). Drop everything in your life right now. Put your affairs in order. Keep your debtors at bay for six months. Devote every day of this six months as if it was your last day. Work out every day for two hours in the morning and one hour in the evening.
Develop a calorie controlled approach to eating. If you have emotional/psychological problems see a psychiatrist for treatment and counseling. If you have medical problems with exercising and especially if you're over 45, see your doctor. If you need assistance at the beginning, get yourself a personal trainer for the first 4 weeks to develop your program and put you into a routine. Do nothing else for the next six months except this. Once you're into the routine and you get fitter, do some sports or join a running club.
At the end of six months I will guarantee you, you will not want to go back to your former life or work or personal relationships. You will look and feel fresher and will want a new life to go with it. That is the payback with putting your life on hold for six months whilst you deal with your problem. Think of obesity as an addiction like alcoholism. It will be just as hard to break free and require just as much work as beating alcoholism.
Life Coaching Tips and Techniques No. 142
40s to 20s and back
If you're in your forties and in the doldrums, do something very simple to get your life moving again
Create a list of the 10 things you wanted to achieve in your twenties. This can be either goals you wanted to achieve at the time (A) or in hindsight (H) now think should have been on this list. Differentiate between the two. In terms of purpose this is not the key difference we want to tease out of the list but it is useful.
Now make this list up (for example) ---
List 1
Be financially independent at 40 (A)
Make a living as a creative artist eg. dancer, musician, writer (A)
Not end up in boring suburbia tied down with kids and mortgage (A)
Be a professional soccer player (H)
Be a soccer coach (H)
Be a personal trainer (H)
Be a fisherman (A)
Have a six pack, be super fit and 80 kilos (H)
Own a boat (A)
Be attractive to the opposite sex (A)
You get the idea. Some of these goals were thought of in your twenties and others in your thirties and forties. The key thing about this list is it must be the things you have yet to achieve in life but which have been nagging you to complete. There must be a reason why 1) they are still not done and 2) why the not doing is nagging you. Some of these goals are persistent over the years whilst others have relevance now (at the time of writing) and are resolved or not as the case may be but come back in other guises.
The next thing to do is look at this list and remove from it anything that is currently beyond your physical capabilities considering your age and physical condition. Remember people are now healthier than they have ever been due to advances in medical science but obviously it s not realistic to contemplate a professional career as a dancer or footballer in your forties. Now having removed from this list the things that fall into this category you are left with the following -
List 2
Be financially independent at 40 (A) - still valid though you might now be closer to 50 and now another 5-10 years out from making it a reality
Make a living as a creative artist eg. dancer, musician, writer (A) - dancer not valid but
musician and writer still valid if you have the talent and perseverance
Not end up in boring suburbia tied down with kids and mortgage (A) - valid but escape from the bounds that love you difficult if not impossible
Be a professional soccer player (H) - not valid
Be a soccer coach (H) - still valid
Be a personal trainer (H) - still valid
Be a fisherman (A) - still valid but a risk
Have a six pack, be super fit and 80 kilos (H) - still valid
Own a boat (A) - still valid
Be attractive to the opposite sex (A) - still valid
If you have a look at the amended list, there are very few things that are not open to you in your 40s that were open to you in your 20s. In essence anything that relies on youth such as professional sport, professional dancing. Everything else in your list should still be valid. There are some things that aren't in the list above but may be in your list such as ---
Regret about losing a lost love. Is there anything to beat this misery of a poor decision?
The migrant experience and pining away for your homeland. What can you do about that? Go back?
You get the picture. Some things are tangible (like becoming a sports person) but a lot like regret has not physical presence except in your soul. In my view when making up your list stick to things that have permanence in the real world. This list is not useful for fighting battles in your mind only.
With your second list, prioritise it and get to work in the knowledge that working away at your list you are working on things that are fundamental to your existence. But don't underestimate the effort required to achieve even one item on the list.
For example becoming a personal trainer (which I am) will take several thousand dollars and a few months out of your life. Not to mention having to learn the origin and insertion point of all major muscle groups. But if this is what you want to do, do it and make it your destiny. Make this a private thing for you to achieve.
Another example "Have a six pack, be super fit and 80 kilos". That could take you 1-2 years to achieve safely and healthily. Not just of working out once a week but working out every day for two years - two hours a day.
Everything in this list should be of that category. Something which is tough to complete and will take all you've got and then some. If it doesn't fit that category then it doesn't belong there.
About Gilbert Labour
Mr Labour is expanding his coaching business into the personal training (PT) space and focusing more on individuals in the corporate area that require PT services and career transition coaching.
He is the holder Cert III in Fitness (Gym Instructor) and Certificate IV (Personal Trainer) as well as holding the Master Trainer qualification. He is also a Certified Instructor with the international registration body of fitness instructors (FISAF). He is also the holder of a Senior First Aid certificate. You may contact
him on mobile 0406164801 or via email.
Mr Labour is a strategist, consultant, adviser, speaker and presenter on corporate restructuring, psychopathy in the workplace, life and executive coaching, project and program management, Six Sigma and Lean process improvement.
He combines all these skills in a unique combination, utilising Six Sigma and project management, to provide modern enlightened companies with truly innovative advice that will create a sustainable competitive advantage. Mr Labour exercises his skills and influence with compassion and deep understanding of the human condition especially where restructures result in overwhelming change and job loss.
He specialises in the following industries: legal and accountancy, telecommunications, transportation and aviation, banking and finance, insurance, government, IT and outsourcing and believes that his experience in these verticals is applicable across all industries, countries, languages, cultures and businesses generally. He has 30 years corporate experience in these industries.
He has been extensively involved in process improvement initiatives within project and production environments. He has delivered Six Sigma Green and Black Belt process improvement programs that provide bottom line improvement whilst maintaining and enhancing employee morale.
He is also a pioneer in the field of coaching and project management having presented a landmark paper on this topic at PMISA 2004 (World Conference on Project Management) in South Africa in May, 04. His paper entitled Sane Proect Management, a Life and Executive Coaching Approach has created both a new field in project management and a new area of interest and research for coaching and coaches around the world.
For PMISA 2006 (World Conference on Project Management) he has written a paper entitled Project Management and Six Sigma - a convergent and divergent model for solving business problems. He seeks to develop a theoretical and practical model to extract readily applicable business approaches from both divergence and convergence of these two disciplines.
Life Coaching Tips and Techniques No. 141
Obesity - a few comments
The size and shape of the body is the shape and size of the pain being comforted by the food. The large the body the greater the pain.
Obesity extracts a huge cost for those living with it. Just mere existence is punishing. The tasks allocated to the heart, lungs, cooling system to keep the massive body functional is plainly visible to all. Obesity is like a huge suppurating emotional abscess. It is like wearing your emotional problems on your sleeve. It is like taking what is hurting you deep inside and bringing it to the surface for all to see. It is a weird concept obesity. What you really want to happen is for your pain and suffering to be well hidden. For people who are obese it is of course that pain that is driving the out of control eating. The size and shape of the body is the shape and size of the pain being comforted by the food. The large the body the greater the pain.
Life Coaching Tips and Techniques No. 140
On Love and Depression
In love but unhappy
What does that mean? Does it mean you're in love with someone, someone special, but due to circumstances (either within or outside your control) you do not feel secure in that relationship and as a result of the insecurity your contentment has evaporated? Love and unhappiness a re mere words and shorthand for feelings that come and go or are there permanently (perhaps) or feelings that are good depending on the circumstances of the moment. Love is not a permanent state.
I think the problem in a nutshell is this. If you're in love with a sex addict, a psychopath, an alcoholic, a gambling addict, a manic depressive, a drug addict or someone suffering from obesity then you may genuinely love them but the strands required for your happiness are shredded. There is no happiness possible when the other person, by definition, is so unhappy themselves. You cannot find contentment with a discontented person.
Love is indiscriminate so you cannot pick and choose who you will fall in love with it just happens and that is the problem. It is difficult to screen your prospective partner for the above afflictions. In most cases you don't find out till after the relationship is cemented.
Being in love with a sex addict, a psychopath or an alcoholic is an emotional trap. A trap of your own doing. You are trapped by your love in a win less relationship. There is no joy only pain and heartache. The best thing you can do for yourself is leave that person. At least that way you control the degree of pain you inflict on yourself and when.
If you leave now the pain starts immediately (the shock) and is intense for a period and slowly dissipates. If you stay the pain is chronic not acute, lasts for as long as the relationship lasts (for the rest of your life?) and you live a life of desperation, fear and despair in the meantime.
Depression leading to suicide
Danger signs in a loved one
Most of the time you only know of someone's despair after they have committed or attempted suicide but there is a way of reading the danger signs
Every smile casts a shadow
Living with someone/loving someone who has depression means being constantly (for the life of the relationship) on the lookout for the danger signs of a major depressive episode and taking preventive action to avoid a catastrophic outcome.
The recent suicide of a very beautiful, talented and successful media personality has shocked her friends, colleagues etc. but in reality if they had the right degree of perception and foresight they might have seen it coming. Is despair, anguish, suffering and misery visible when someone is doing their best to hide it from everybody including those closest to them? Yes it is visible loud and clear. For those wishing to look a little deeper than usual. For people who are unemotional types and lack perception and sensitivity it is impossible to see the danger signs. For those with more sensitivity and especially highly intelligent types the danger signs are very prominent. These include ---
A certain aloofness a detachment from reality. When people are in emotional pain, in turmoil they have an expression on their face of real pain (when no one is looking). Look for the expression and smell of fear.
They lives their lives in limbo. In other words they can never start something because something is not quite in place, is missing or needs to be started/completed before the new task started. This is mere sophistry. You should be able to see through that circumlocution.
The mark of emotional turmoil is a certain withdrawing into one's self. Interactions might still be as before but not as real. The warmth is faked. The smile forced. The merriment is alcohol induced and no more. The smile is cloaked in a shadow. Look for the shadow not for the smile. Every smile casts a shadow.
Decisiveness in the face of terrible circumstances/situation. "I know where I'm going and what I'm doing". But the decisiveness and confidence in the future is misplaced misguided even. Does not agree with the reality. This can also be expressed very subtly or otherwise in escape scenarios eg. "I'm getting way from this place so I don't care".
A foreboding of terrible times ahead. How is that communicated? Lack of discussion about the future esp. related to events/happenings where an element of selection by an outside force is involved. A despair with the world at the
lack of recognition of your genius, talent or ability.
Don't look for a reason for your loved one's despair. There are many reasons and no reasons. Look for the facial expression, break from habits, talk of a bright and certain future (in the face of mounting evidence that not all is well).
Fantastic outcomes to current problems where none in reality exists especially from the problem gambler.
Life Coaching Tips and Techniques No. 138
Obesity
Ideas and approaches from a life coach and personal trainer Part II
As an experienced Gym Instructor/Personal Trainer (Fitness NSW Registration 13672) and life coach with a lifetime's obsession with sport, dancing and fitness I am amazed that people who are obese don't do something about it.
For me being active is natural indeed it is a way of life, a living if you will which I make off the sweat of others. But there are reasons why you would want to stay obese (see below).
The purpose of this article is not to get you (if you're an obese person) off your arse and into the gym and into the arms/clutches of a personal trainer (if only) but to provide an obese person with a method for solving their problem using a combination of physical (personal training/gym training) and mental approaches (life coaching) and everything in between.
There are a number of areas that need addressing to attack such an intractable and extremely difficult problem as obesity. They can be grouped under the following big picture categories ---
Emotional and other mood disorders
Eating habits/disorders
Reasons for persistent obesity
Substance abuse problems (primarily alcohol, cigarettes, legal and illegal drugs of all types and varieties)
A pattern of destructive behaviours (such as uncontrolled gambling, illicit liaisons)
Pattern of exercise and physical activities
Work related stress
A list of do's and don'ts to start with
Things you should indulge less in (preferably Nil)
Alcohol
Smoking
Illegal drugs
Abuse legal drugs
Drink coffee and tea
Reduce consumption of chocolate, nuts, biscuits, soft drink, products with too much sugar, ice cream, cakes, pies, desserts
Do not snack between meals
Things you should do more of
Develop a platform for training by spending the first six months in conditioning/endurance training. This will reduce your chance of injury when you start running/jogging.
Depending on your capacity, start your six month preparation by doing resistance training preferably sitting down (which takes the weight off your hips, knees and ankle joint). Exercises such as shoulder press, chest press and row on a machine are ideal. The idea is not to lose weight but to introduce your body to physical work.
Train 5 days out of 7 (preferably 7 out of 7). This doesn't have to be with a personal trainer all the time. Make it 20% with a personal trainer and the other 80% by yourself. So for every hour with a personal trainer spend 5 hours training by yourself.
Engage a personal trainer to provide you with safe training methods for obese clients
Work with a life coach to get your life (personal, work, family, relationships, business) in some structured and integrated order
Be more physically active. If you live in a country where the climate is not conducive to outdoor activities join a gym. Are there health risks with an obese person starting an exercise program? The short answer is there are more health risks with an obese person NOT starting an exercise program.
Remember exercise (personal training, gym) is not the only tool at your disposal. Become more active by reducing your reliance on your car and public transport. Walk more. Sit less.
Take part in sport (suitable for your age and fitness level)
Emotional and other mood disorders
How you feel on a day to day basis especially if there is wide fluctuation either way (up or down) over a period of days/weeks render you less liable to follow a structured approach to your nutrition and exercise. Depression, mania and lack of focus is the enemy of routine, structure and process. You must start thinking of yourself as an unruly power that needs self-directed control over your moods, emotions and feelings generally. Some mood disorders do improve with a fitness program but if in doubt see your medical practitioner for a mental health consultation.
Eating habits/disorders
These are an effect not a cause per se of obesity. Though you would think obesity is caused by overeating, eating the wrongs foods at the wrong time and other poor nutrition habits. Obesity is caused by the factors that lead you to overeat. So you need to reach back further than just the unsuppressed appetite to get to the root cause of the behaviours that ultimately leads to hapless obesity.
Reasons for persistent obesity
Being obese is not a 24 hour virus. It is not something that comes on the day before and leaves the day after. It is something that has literally been building up over years. The internal manifestation of obesity (emotional turmoil, lack of self esteem, poor self confidence) probably have been there since (a probably damaging) childhood. As long as the internal manifestation stays that way and the problem not out in the open, so to speak, identification and addressing of it is difficult.
So in a sense obesity is a blessing in that it is the very visible tip of the iceberg. It is the sole visible part of a very big problem. When looked at in this context obesity is only a small a tiny part of the problem. Therefore strategies that address just the overeating and lack of exercise by counter measures such as diets and exercise are only really addressing 1/10th (1/100th even) of the real deep lying problem.
There are reasons why people are obese besides the fact that they have not addressed the superficial cause of it (i.e overeating, lack of exercise, indulging in alcohol, tobacco and other dependence causing substances).
Obesity literally and figuratively means you're not going anywhere. This may suit a relationship where one of the partners suffers from paranoid jealousy. The other partner to soothe their raw nerves becomes obese. It is almost as if they're saying "you have nothing to worry about I'm not going anywhere". This reason for obesity is really the wrong solution for a problem the obese person doesn't own in the first place.
Obesity is a good middle point between making a decision and not making a decision. In other words it is a place for ditherers. It functions very similarly to an illness that comes on at the appropriate time (i.e where a decision is needed from you but you cannot make it for whatever reason) and stays for the duration required.
Leading certain 'unhealthy' lifestyles will inevitably lead to obesity. So those who embark and endure these lifestyles are bound to be obese. An example is someone who is middle aged, smokes, drinks alcohol and take no exercise whatsoever whilst still eating the portions they did as a teenager.
People married to psychopaths can reduce the effects of their exposure to the terrifying attacks and injuries of psychopathy by being obese. Obesity then here is a shield, a defence against daily, brutal, persistent, personal attacks on their character and humanity.
Substance abuse problems (primarily alcohol, cigarettes, legal and illegal drugs of all types and varieties)
Substance abuse (other than food) is a vast field of research and practice. For the purposes of obesity anything that detracts from your ability to fight your disease (which is what obesity is) is a problem.
Pattern of exercise and physical activities
Exercise and movement generally is about developing, forming and maintaining habits. Regular daily exercise is the ideal. The problem is that being obese starting an exercise program is very difficult and a journey fraught with injuries if not illness. There as a first step if you are obese you should seek and obtain a medical practitioner's clearance.
Work related stress
What happens when you temporarily (you hope) lose your mojo. Lose your will to succeed at work. When sitting behind a desk is torture, when every moment is a pure hell. It's probably not that bad but you get the drift. When you put your foot on the accelerator and there is no juice in the tank. You're out of gas.
Tips to top up your gas tank
This is probably not something that is happening in isolation it is probably affecting other areas of your life. Look wider for the problem not just your work environment. We're not even at a stage when we can consider solutions yet. Look at areas that may be distracting you.
About Gilbert Labour
Mr Labour is expanding his coaching business into the personal training (PT) space and focusing more on individuals in the corporate area that require PT services and career transition coaching.
He is the holder Cert III in Fitness (Gym Instructor) and Certificate IV (Personal Trainer) as well as holding the Master Trainer qualification. He is also a Certified Instructor with the international registration body of fitness instructors (FISAF). He is also the holder of a Senior First Aid certificate. You may contact
him on mobile 0406164801 or via email.
Mr Labour has recently completed a new book Corporate Psychopathy - Death in the Workplace. This resource provides a key starting point for people working in corporate environments who are suffering under the regime of an out of control psychopath. It provides robust proven strategies for overcoming the mental and physical problems caused by a psychopath. This book is available direct from Mr Labour for $29.95 plus postage and handling. In addition for each book sold, $5 will be going to Coaches with Borders for developing work and life skills for the poor in Mauritius.
Mr Labour is a strategist, consultant, adviser, speaker and presenter on corporate restructuring, psychopathy in the workplace, life and executive coaching, project and program management, Six Sigma and Lean process improvement.
He combines all these skills in a unique combination, utilising Six Sigma and project management, to provide modern enlightened companies with truly innovative advice that will create a sustainable competitive advantage. Mr Labour exercises his skills and influence with compassion and deep understanding of the human condition especially where restructures result in overwhelming change and job loss.
He specialises in the following industries: legal and accountancy, telecommunications, transportation and aviation, banking and finance, insurance, government, IT and outsourcing and believes that his experience in these verticals is applicable across all industries, countries, languages, cultures and businesses generally. He has 30 years corporate experience in these industries.
Every single industry he specialises in (telcos, aviation, retail banking, insurance, outsourcing) faces fundamental challenges to continued survival and prosperity in the 21st Century and Mr Labour is well placed to provide a multi-disciplinary approach to uncovering insights for competitive advantage.
He sees the management of strategic, compliance and operational risk as one of the key issues facing executive managers on a daily basis. But not all companies can take advantage of formal Basel II and Sarbannes-Oxley (SOX) governance models.
For those companies that are not in the financial industry but still require strong governance around the management of operational risk, Mr Labour is an expert on creating strategies for managing operational risk supported by strong programme management structures to ensure compliance.
He has been extensively involved in process improvement initiatives within project and production environments. He has delivered Six Sigma Green and Black Belt process improvement programs that provide bottom line improvement whilst maintaining and enhancing employee morale.
He also owns and runs one of the world's most comprehensive web resources on the topic of life and executive coaching containing over 1500 pages of advice and more than 250 articles on life and executive coaching. He has also been quoted in learned papers, newspaper and magazine articles.
He has written a book on life coaching which provides an introduction to life coaching for the general public. He has also written a book on executive coaching, Executive Coaching for Process Improvement Excellence, that provides daily insights for top managers looking to succeed in today's fast paced environment.
He is also a pioneer in the field of coaching and project management having presented a landmark paper on this topic at PMISA 2004 (World Conference on Project Management) in South Africa in May, 04. His paper entitled Sane Project Management, a Life and Executive Coaching Approach has created both a new field in project management and a new area of interest and research for coaching and coaches around the world.
For PMISA 2006 (World Conference on Project Management) he has written a paper entitled Project Management and Six Sigma - a convergent and divergent model for solving business problems. He seeks to develop a theoretical and practical model to extract readily applicable business approaches from both divergence and convergence of these two disciplines.
He will explore whether coaching can facilitate the extraction of some of the benefits of this convergence? This will be continuing an exploration of the connection between coaching and project management that he first developed and presented at PMISA 2004.
Mr Labour acknowledges that in today's highly competitive and rapidly changing business environment, a busy consultant, life coach or executive coach must evince a compelling value proposition, as much for himself as for his product and service.
His unique value proposition is bringing to bear, on difficult even intractable business problems, a brilliant mix of both quantitative and qualitative approaches, embracing Six Sigma, Lean, project management, executive coaching, operational and line management.
He has a refreshing engaging and vibrant perspective on life and business in the corporate world. He is able to engage with any company in the world, within his industry expertise and beyond, and provide an assessment of the issues and problems that management suspects exists. He does this on a pro-active basis and confidentially.
He is also able to execute or be involved in the execution of any recommendations resulting from these engagements. He has previously managed large programs of work involving major restructuring, outsourcing and downsizing.
He forecasts a greater demand for people with his unique blend of skills in the future especially where established, staid inefficient companies in otherwise dynamic industries face head-on competition from more efficient home grown companies and those companies thriving in the tiger economies of China and India with their vast pool of cheap, educated and trained local talent.
Life Coaching Tips and Techniques No. 137
Obesity (A Life Coaching/Personal Training Approach)
Obesity is a personal choice not a condition or an illness
Obesity is an emotional pain limiting strategy
The use of food in this way leads to not one problem with one solution but two problems with no solution
This article is written for an obese person who doesn't know where to turn to for a solution to their problem. As both a life coach and personal trainer, I take a multi-faceted approach to obesity by focusing on motivation generally and correct exercise technique and volume. The more tools one has generally speaking the more ways you can tailor the solution to a problem. What does a combined life coaching/personal training approach to obesity do for us?
Obesity is not simply an aesthetic problem. It is not about beauty or lack of it.
Obesity is not just a health problem. It is not about being healthy or not.
Obesity is first and foremost a life style restricting choice. It stops you from being as active as you want to be. It stops from participating in sporting activities, adventure holidays and anything requiring even a trivial level of fitness.
It also provides a convenient brake on emotional interactions or more correctly on the fallout from dysfunctional emotional interactions. In this instance obesity is an emotional pain limiting strategy.
It is ironic that it fulfils that function because the level of societal disapproval of obesity in all its ramifications would tend to limit its usefulness in that context. But that it is so used in an indication that the level of emotional pain is so distressing that obesity and its emotional baggage is preferable to it.
Of course the root cause of this problem is the use of food as a self medication to appease the emotional gods. In this case, food is overmedicated in the mistaken belief that if some food is good, more food is better. But the use of food in this way leads to not one problem with one solution but two problems with no solution.
This is a few pointers incorporating ideas and approaches from life coaching and personal training to combat obesity.
You can never do enough exercise (resistance and aerobic conditioning) to combat overeating but exercise helps in establishing and stabilising you at a base weight from which the effort to beat the problem can start from. Therefore an exercise program does not necessarily require an eating plan.
If you are commencing for the first time an exercise program combining resistance and aerobic conditioning in a obese state, you must begin a three month pre-exercise program that strengthens the parts of your body involved in the type of physical activities you will be taking up. This is especially required if you re going to take up things like jogging or running. This is essential to prevent sports and overuse injuries.
When you are ready to commence your program (after finishing your pre-exercise program and you are injury free) then a complementary diet program is key to getting results (and helping you to improve your aerobic performance). If you doubt this advice, try running 1km with a one kilo weight in your hand. Now imagine your body carrying an extra 50 kilos and you trying to run the same 1km. Imagine the stresses you are putting on your body with each extra kilo you're carrying.
If you call in outside expertise who should you call? A life coach, a personal trainer, a dietician? Well if you don't want to call in the professionals, ask yourself why and determine in a conversation with yourself why you are the way you are. Now ask yourself again who should I call on to get results? There is no way you can be a life coach, personal trainer and dietician to yourself. Get help in that order: mindset change then body change then what you put through our mouth.
I am life coach who is also a personal trainer so can take care of you in the first with the first two requirements. If you are obese calling me to help is the best step to a new life that you can take. You cannot do it on your own. Call me on 0406164801 to change your life forever.
About Gilbert Labour
Mr Labour is expanding his coaching business into the personal training (PT) space and focusing more on individuals in the corporate area that require PT services and career transition coaching.
He is the holder Cert III in Fitness (Gym Instructor) and Certificate IV (Personal Trainer) as well as holding the Master Trainer qualification. He is also a Certified Instructor with the international registration body of fitness instructors (FISAF). He is also the holder of a Senior First Aid certificate. You may contact
him on mobile 0406164801 or via email.
Mr Labour has recently completed a new book Corporate Psychopathy - Death in the Workplace. This resource provides a key starting point for people working in corporate environments who are suffering under the regime of an out of control psychopath. It provides robust proven strategies for overcoming the mental and physical problems caused by a psychopath. This book is available direct from Mr Labour for $29.95 plus postage and handling. In addition for each book sold, $5 will be going to Coaches with Borders for developing work and life skills for the poor in Mauritius.
Mr Labour is a strategist, consultant, adviser, speaker and presenter on corporate restructuring, psychopathy in the workplace, life and executive coaching, project and program management, Six Sigma and Lean process improvement.
He combines all these skills in a unique combination, utilising Six Sigma and project management, to provide modern enlightened companies with truly innovative advice that will create a sustainable competitive advantage. Mr Labour exercises his skills and influence with compassion and deep understanding of the human condition especially where restructures result in overwhelming change and job loss.
He specialises in the following industries: legal and accountancy, telecommunications, transportation and aviation, banking and finance, insurance, government, IT and outsourcing and believes that his experience in these verticals is applicable across all industries, countries, languages, cultures and businesses generally. He has 30 years corporate experience in these industries.
Every single industry he specialises in (telcos, aviation, retail banking, insurance, outsourcing) faces fundamental challenges to continued survival and prosperity in the 21st Century and Mr Labour is well placed to provide a multi-disciplinary approach to uncovering insights for competitive advantage.
He sees the management of strategic, compliance and operational risk as one of the key issues facing executive managers on a daily basis. But not all companies can take advantage of formal Basel II and Sarbannes-Oxley (SOX) governance models.
For those companies that are not in the financial industry but still require strong governance around the management of operational risk, Mr Labour is an expert on creating strategies for managing operational risk supported by strong programme management structures to ensure compliance.
He has been extensively involved in process improvement initiatives within project and production environments. He has delivered Six Sigma Green and Black Belt process improvement programs that provide bottom line improvement whilst maintaining and enhancing employee morale.
He also owns and runs one of the world's most comprehensive web resources on the topic of life and executive coaching containing over 1500 pages of advice and more than 250 articles on life and executive coaching. He has also been quoted in learned papers, newspaper and magazine articles.
He has written a book on life coaching which provides an introduction to life coaching for the general public. He has also written a book on executive coaching, Executive Coaching for Process Improvement Excellence, that provides daily insights for top managers looking to succeed in today's fast paced environment.
He is also a pioneer in the field of coaching and project management having presented a landmark paper on this topic at PMISA 2004 (World Conference on Project Management) in South Africa in May, 04. His paper entitled Sane Project Management, a Life and Executive Coaching Approach has created both a new field in project management and a new area of interest and research for coaching and coaches around the world.
For PMISA 2006 (World Conference on Project Management) he has written a paper entitled Project Management and Six Sigma - a convergent and divergent model for solving business problems. He seeks to develop a theoretical and practical model to extract readily applicable business approaches from both divergence and convergence of these two disciplines.
He will explore whether coaching can facilitate the extraction of some of the benefits of this convergence? This will be continuing an exploration of the connection between coaching and project management that he first developed and presented at PMISA 2004.
Mr Labour acknowledges that in today's highly competitive and rapidly changing business environment, a busy consultant, life coach or executive coach must evince a compelling value proposition, as much for himself as for his product and service.
His unique value proposition is bringing to bear, on difficult even intractable business problems, a brilliant mix of both quantitative and qualitative approaches, embracing Six Sigma, Lean, project management, executive coaching, operational and line management.
He has a refreshing engaging and vibrant perspective on life and business in the corporate world. He is able to engage with any company in the world, within his industry expertise and beyond, and provide an assessment of the issues and problems that management suspects exists. He does this on a pro-active basis and confidentially.
He is also able to execute or be involved in the execution of any recommendations resulting from these engagements. He has previously managed large programs of work involving major restructuring, outsourcing and downsizing.
He forecasts a greater demand for people with his unique blend of skills in the future especially where established, staid inefficient companies in otherwise dynamic industries face head-on competition from more efficient home grown companies and those companies thriving in the tiger economies of China and India with their vast pool of cheap, educated and trained local talent.
Life Coaching Tips and Techniques No. 136
The measure of happiness
A tidbit on happiness. Happiness is the one subject I can safely say will never be conquered or subjugated and become formulaic. But there are ways of thinking about it that infinitesimally increase our knowledge and get us closer to finding and sustaining happiness.
Just before I fall asleep each night I try to find a space (a similar space each night) where I can be blissfully happy and self sufficient. Now this space is something which I create from my imagination but which correlates reasonably closely with what in reality would be a place where I would be blissfully happy in (but am not in right now nor probably will ever be in given my current circumstances). So there are two spaces here one truly mythical and never meant to be reached in reality and one reasonably close to reality but which equally will never be reached in real life. So what does this actually mean?
Well there is a third reality and that is the reality that I actually live in day in day out and even that reality is warped by my consumption of substances that alter ever so slightly or strongly the objective reality that an observer looking at me would perceive. So in effect there are four realities in my life. So we can say when I lie down in my bed and try to sleep the images and vision I conjure up are four times removed from a universal objective reality.
Let me label that lie down in bed reality as R1, the blissful place that R1 tries to mimic as R2, the reality I perceive as R3 and the universal objective reality as R4. I can then infer the following propositions ->
Happiness increases when the distance between R1 and R3 shortens therefore happiness can defined mathematically as when R1=R3. The inverse is also true, that is, unhappiness increases when the distance between R1 and R3 lengthens. This is a pretty logical statement to make and difficult to argue with.
Happiness requires that you create R1 and R2 (and that they are some distance from R3) and that they exist for you in some way or other. Without these two happiness is not possible. Therefore sociopaths who don't have R1 and R2 are dreadfully unhappy but probably don't know it or if they do, don't know the reason why they are. In theory happiness is R1=R3 but in reality
R1 will never equal R3 because you are continually creating distance between R1 and R3 to reach your state of happiness which ironically is R1=R3. This captures perfectly the irony of life and the human condition.
Happiness therefore (R1=R3) is only a theoretical construct just like the above equations are theoretical constructs. It is not a state of existence but something which we approach and as we approach we veer from and as we veer from we approach.
Sociopathy and psychopathy increases as the distance between R3 and R4 increases. In fact it can be said that the distance between R3 and R4 in these circumstances is infinite and they will never meet. Sociopaths and psychopaths only know R3 and mistake R3 for R4. They have no emotionally connected perception of R1 & R2 though they may have an intellectual appreciation for the distinction. They can't help thinking this way. They are not sick or diseased they just are that way and nothing will change that fact. The only question is are they that way because of genetics and/or environment and how to calculate the contribution of each to the end result.
When R1 begins to take over R3 obsessions begin to rule the individual. They operate in a pre-programmed trance. They enter in a similar zone to those gamers that play straight for 72 hours and then drop down dead of exhaustion and dehydration. This mechanism provides a key safely valve for escaping from unbearable stress and situations.
When R4 begins to take over the psyche (and overrule R1 and R2), the result is increased anxiety and depression. This is a classic situation encountered by those individuals who perceive themselves as perfect and always want to be perfect.
A reasonable state of happiness exists when the distance between R2 and R3 is not greater than the distance between R1 and R3. It is a state of homeostasis (R1-R3 > R2-R3) not a true state of happiness (R1=R3).
Bottom line what does all this mean? It just means that happiness is difficult to define precisely but we all know it when we are feeling it. The problem is recapturing that feeling when we're not feeling so happy without having to make wholesale changes to our lives that may not all work out. Finding all the pre-conditions for a happy state and having all lined up at the same time is difficult
and requires a lot of personal organisation and coordination. Usimg some of the approaches of life coaching can provide you with a head start to that organisation. It is not the total answer but part of your tool box for happiness.
About Gilbert Labour
Mr Labour is expanding his coaching business into the personal training (PT) space and focusing more on individuals in the corporate area that require PT services and career transition coaching.
He is the holder Cert III in Fitness (Gym Instructor) and Certificate IV (Personal Trainer) as well as holding the Master Trainer qualification. He is also a Certified Instructor with the international registration body of fitness instructors (FISAF). He is also the holder of a Senior First Aid certificate. You may contact
him on mobile 0406164801 or via email.
Mr Labour has recently completed a new book Corporate Psychopathy - Death in the Workplace. This resource provides a key starting point for people working in corporate environments who are suffering under the regime of an out of control psychopath. It provides robust proven strategies for overcoming the mental and physical problems caused by a psychopath. This book is available direct from Mr Labour for $29.95 plus postage and handling. In addition for each book sold, $5 will be going to Coaches with Borders for developing work and life skills for the poor in Mauritius.
Mr Labour is a strategist, consultant, adviser, speaker and presenter on corporate restructuring, psychopathy in the workplace, life and executive coaching, project and program management, Six Sigma and Lean process improvement.
He combines all these skills in a unique combination, utilising Six Sigma and project management, to provide modern enlightened companies with truly innovative advice that will create a sustainable competitive advantage. Mr Labour exercises his skills and influence with compassion and deep understanding of the human condition especially where restructures result in overwhelming change and job loss.
He specialises in the following industries: legal and accountancy, telecommunications, transportation and aviation, banking and finance, insurance, government, IT and outsourcing and believes that his experience in these verticals is applicable across all industries, countries, languages, cultures and businesses generally. He has 30 years corporate experience in these industries.
Every single industry he specialises in (telcos, aviation, retail banking, insurance, outsourcing) faces fundamental challenges to continued survival and prosperity in the 21st Century and Mr Labour is well placed to provide a multi-disciplinary approach to uncovering insights for competitive advantage.
He sees the management of strategic, compliance and operational risk as one of the key issues facing executive managers on a daily basis. But not all companies can take advantage of formal Basel II and Sarbannes-Oxley (SOX) governance models.
For those companies that are not in the financial industry but still require strong governance around the management of operational risk, Mr Labour is an expert on creating strategies for managing operational risk supported by strong programme management structures to ensure compliance.
He has been extensively involved in process improvement initiatives within project and production environments. He has delivered Six Sigma Green and Black Belt process improvement programs that provide bottom line improvement whilst maintaining and enhancing employee morale.
He also owns and runs one of the world's most comprehensive web resources on the topic of life and executive coaching containing over 1500 pages of advice and more than 250 articles on life and executive coaching. He has also been quoted in learned papers, newspaper and magazine articles.
He has written a book on life coaching which provides an introduction to life coaching for the general public. He has also written a book on executive coaching, Executive Coaching for Process Improvement Excellence, that provides daily insights for top managers looking to succeed in today's fast paced environment.
He is also a pioneer in the field of coaching and project management having presented a landmark paper on this topic at PMISA 2004 (World Conference on Project Management) in South Africa in May, 04. His paper entitled Sane Project Management, a Life and Executive Coaching Approach has created both a new field in project management and a new area of interest and research for coaching and coaches around the world.
For PMISA 2006 (World Conference on Project Management) he has written a paper entitled Project Management and Six Sigma - a convergent and divergent model for solving business problems. He seeks to develop a theoretical and practical model to extract readily applicable business approaches from both divergence and convergence of these two disciplines.
He will explore whether coaching can facilitate the extraction of some of the benefits of this convergence? This will be continuing an exploration of the connection between coaching and project management that he first developed and presented at PMISA 2004.
Mr Labour acknowledges that in today's highly competitive and rapidly changing business environment, a busy consultant, life coach or executive coach must evince a compelling value proposition, as much for himself as for his product and service.
His unique value proposition is bringing to bear, on difficult even intractable business problems, a brilliant mix of both quantitative and qualitative approaches, embracing Six Sigma, Lean, project management, executive coaching, operational and line management.
He has a refreshing engaging and vibrant perspective on life and business in the corporate world. He is able to engage with any company in the world, within his industry expertise and beyond, and provide an assessment of the issues and problems that management suspects exists. He does this on a pro-active basis and confidentially.
He is also able to execute or be involved in the execution of any recommendations resulting from these engagements. He has previously managed large programs of work involving major restructuring, outsourcing and downsizing.
He forecasts a greater demand for people with his unique blend of skills in the future especially where established, staid inefficient companies in otherwise dynamic industries face head-on competition from more efficient home grown companies and those companies thriving in the tiger economies of China and India with their vast pool of cheap, educated and trained local talent.
Life Coaching Tips and Techniques No. 135
Funding the next major goal/hurdle with energy
Face your fears and conquer them to create new energy
Something that you will give yourself heart and soul up to, something that you will drain your precious emotional battery for, something that you will risk a failure for
After you have reached a goal, completed a major milestone in your life the wind will billow out of your sails and you'll feel flat waiting for the next major challenge to grab you or for you to grab it.
The question is do you force it by putting yourself in the way of the trade winds or wait for the wind to change and come you way? Neither.
In an ideal situation your next goal should already be primed and ready to go. But unfortunately life is not like that.
You cannot simply transfer the constructive emotional energy (CEE) from one goal to another. Each allowance of CEE almost seems to be tailor made to fit with a particular goal. Once that goal is achieved, that allowance dies with it.
Meaning not only do you need to find a new goal but also the CEE to go with it. Without CEE the goal is sails without wind without energy. Similarly CEE without goals is pointless, energy in search of a dream.
CEE is that feeling where you're invincible, magisterial, peerless, merciless if you wanted to but hopefully you're merciful. A person with CEE without mercy is simply a psychopath.
The answer is have another goal in reserve whilst you're on your current goal. You can run two in parallel if you're capable but usually one at a time, a major goal, is enough.
Now because the energetic wave powering the former goal cannot be transferred to the new goal the idea to create a whirlpool of new energy to transfer to the new goal.
You do this by pushing yourself physically and mentally especially doing something that you haven't done before and which is very challenging. The more challenging the better and the more potential energy created. That is the key, face your fears and conquer them to create new energy.
About Gilbert Labour
Mr Labour has recently completed a book illuminated by his life and executive coaching experience Corporate Psychopathy - Death in the Workplace. It is a study of corporate psychopathy and the price people, who are exposed to its brutal and vicious force, pay.
Mr Labour is a strategist, consultant, adviser, speaker and presenter on corporate restructuring, psychopathy in the workplace, life and executive coaching, project and program management, Six Sigma and Lean process improvement.
He combines all these skills in a unique combination, utilising Six Sigma and project management, to provide modern enlightened companies with truly innovative advice that will create a sustainable competitive advantage. Mr Labour exercises his skills and influence with compassion and deep understanding of the human condition especially where restructures result in overwhelming change and job loss.
He specialises in the following industries: legal and accountancy, telecommunications, transportation and aviation, banking and finance, insurance, government, IT and outsourcing and believes that his experience in these verticals is applicable across all industries, countries, languages, cultures and businesses generally. He has 30 years corporate experience in these industries.
Every single industry he specialises in (telcos, aviation, retail banking, insurance, outsourcing) faces fundamental challenges to continued survival and prosperity in the 21st Century and Mr Labour is well placed to provide a multi-disciplinary approach to uncovering insights for competitive advantage.
He sees the management of strategic, compliance and operational risk as one of the key issues facing executive managers on a daily basis. But not all companies can take advantage of formal Basel II and Sarbannes-Oxley (SOX) governance models.
For those companies that are not in the financial industry but still require strong governance around the management of operational risk, Mr Labour is an expert on creating strategies for managing operational risk supported by strong programme management structures to ensure compliance.
He has been extensively involved in process improvement initiatives within project and production environments. He has delivered Six Sigma Green and Black Belt process improvement programs that provide bottom line improvement whilst maintaining and enhancing employee morale.
He also owns and runs one of the world's most comprehensive web resources on the topic of life and executive coaching containing over 1500 pages of advice and more than 250 articles on life and executive coaching. He has also been quoted in learned papers, newspaper and magazine articles.
He has written a book on life coaching which provides an introduction to life coaching for the general public. He has also written a book on executive coaching, Executive Coaching for Process Improvement Excellence, that provides daily insights for top managers looking to succeed in today's fast paced environment.
He is also a pioneer in the field of coaching and project management having presented a landmark paper on this topic at PMISA 2004 (World Conference on Project Management) in South Africa in May, 04. His paper entitled Sane Project Management, a Life and Executive Coaching Approach has created both a new field in project management and a new area of interest and research for coaching and coaches around the world.
For PMISA 2006 (World Conference on Project Management) he has written a paper entitled Project Management and Six Sigma - a convergent and divergent model for solving business problems. He seeks to develop a theoretical and practical model to extract readily applicable business approaches from both divergence and convergence of these two disciplines.
He will explore whether coaching can facilitate the extraction of some of the benefits of this convergence? This will be continuing an exploration of the connection between coaching and project management that he first developed and presented at PMISA 2004.
Mr Labour acknowledges that in today's highly competitive and rapidly changing business environment, a busy consultant, life coach or executive coach must evince a compelling value proposition, as much for himself as for his product and service.
His unique value proposition is bringing to bear, on difficult even intractable business problems, a brilliant mix of both quantitative and qualitative approaches, embracing Six Sigma, Lean, project management, executive coaching, operational and line management.
He has a refreshing engaging and vibrant perspective on life and business in the corporate world. He is able to engage with any company in the world, within his industry expertise and beyond, and provide an assessment of the issues and problems that management suspects exists. He does this on a pro-active basis and confidentially.
He is also able to execute or be involved in the execution of any recommendations resulting from these engagements. He has previously managed large programs of work involving major restructuring, outsourcing and downsizing.
He forecasts a greater demand for people with his unique blend of skills in the future especially where established, staid inefficient companies in otherwise dynamic industries face head-on competition from more efficient home grown companies and those companies thriving in the tiger economies of China and India with their vast pool of cheap, educated and trained local talent.
Life Coaching Tips and Techniques No. 134
SMS - Short Man Syndrome
What is SMS? It is the desire of short men be combative in their dealings with taller men. Even if these dealings are not in their nature combative they will find the angle, the wedge that separates them rather than the common purpose that unites them. They waste inordinate amount of time, skill and effort finding the tiny flaws in tall men that they can exploit. Sometimes these flaws are so tiny or so insignificant to their overall enterprise that that is a stretch (excuse the pun) even for them.
What can you do in your dealings with shorter men who are combative to smooth the 'differences over'? Can you paper them over especially if they are in a position of power over you, at least nominally within an organisational context for exmaple?
Ignore them and hope they will go away. If at the same as their pygmy status in stature is also matched by their puny intellects then that is probably a safe way to go. Short men with high intellects are dangerous because they combine an emotional problem with a drive to fix it within the organisational context. The problem is coupled with the wrong solution. In other words a breeding ground for nascent psychopathic behavior.
Work with them logically working through the supposed differences in approach. Almost always never works because the cause of SMS is not structural or process oriented but is purely emotional in origin. It is not about the short man not growing up physically but about not growing up emotionally. It is about a lack of courage and moral fibre not inches.
You will find that those who suffer from SMS in a corporate environment are very officious and wanting to dot every i and cross every t. This almost obsessive pre-occupation with form is curiously matched by chaos in their personal life as they march through fields of tall women never once stopping to admire the view.
Regardless of someone's height or lack thereof there is no getting away from a giant emotional chip on their shoulder when it surfaces. It is very visible and known to everyone but it will not fix itself. Fixing this problem will take time, effort and courage to acknowledge it exists.
SMS tend to be generally useless until they have reached an accommodation with their ego v their height. Until the emotional problem is fixed, they're useless to themselves and others. Whilst the problem exists they are always trying to prove themselves. Prove what and to whom? Their potency, certainly to themselves but perhaps also to others.
They tend to jump to conclusions very quickly without all the evidence being in. Even if deep down they know they're wrong they will still jump in. They seem to have some sort of death wish. Death to their reputation that is.
About Gilbert Labour
Mr Labour is a strategist, consultant, adviser, speaker and presenter on corporate restructuring, psychopathy in the workplace, life and executive coaching, project and program management, Six Sigma and Lean process improvement.
He combines all these skills in a unique combination, utilising Six Sigma and project management, to provide modern enlightened companies with truly innovative advice that will create a sustainable competitive advantage. Mr Labour exercises his skills and influence with compassion and deep understanding of the human condition especially where restructures result in overwhelming change and job loss.
He specialises in the following industries: legal and accountancy, telecommunications, transportation and aviation, banking and finance, insurance, government, IT and outsourcing and believes that his experience in these verticals is applicable across all industries, countries, languages, cultures and businesses generally. He has 30 years corporate experience in these industries.
Every single industry he specialises in (telcos, aviation, retail banking, insurance, outsourcing) faces fundamental challenges to continued survival and prosperity in the 21st Century and Mr Labour is well placed to provide a multi-disciplinary approach to uncovering insights for competitive advantage.
He sees the management of strategic, compliance and operational risk as one of the key issues facing executive managers on a daily basis. But not all companies can take advantage of formal Basel II and Sarbannes-Oxley (SOX) governance models.
For those companies that are not in the financial industry but still require strong governance around the management of operational risk, Mr Labour is an expert on creating strategies for managing operational risk supported by strong programme management structures to ensure compliance.
He has been extensively involved in process improvement initiatives within project and production environments. He has delivered Six Sigma Green and Black Belt process improvement programs that provide bottom line improvement whilst maintaining and enhancing employee morale.
He also owns and runs one of the world's most comprehensive web resources on the topic of life and executive coaching containing over 1500 pages of advice and more than 250 articles on life and executive coaching. He has also been quoted in learned papers, newspaper and magazine articles.
He has written a book on life coaching which provides an introduction to life coaching for the general public. He has also written a book on executive coaching, Executive Coaching for Process Improvement Excellence, that provides daily insights for top managers looking to succeed in today's fast paced environment.
He is also a pioneer in the field of coaching and project management having presented a landmark paper on this topic at PMISA 2004 (World Conference on Project Management) in South Africa in May, 04. His paper entitled Sane Project Management, a Life and Executive Coaching Approach has created both a new field in project management and a new area of interest and research for coaching and coaches around the world.
For PMISA 2006 (World Conference on Project Management) he has written a paper entitled Project Management and Six Sigma - a convergent and divergent model for solving business problems. He seeks to develop a theoretical and practical model to extract readily applicable business approaches from both divergence and convergence of these two disciplines.
He will explore whether coaching can facilitate the extraction of some of the benefits of this convergence? This will be continuing an exploration of the connection between coaching and project management that he first developed and presented at PMISA 2004.
Mr Labour acknowledges that in today's highly competitive and rapidly changing business environment, a busy consultant, life coach or executive coach must evince a compelling value proposition, as much for himself as for his product and service.
His unique value proposition is bringing to bear, on difficult even intractable business problems, a brilliant mix of both quantitative and qualitative approaches, embracing Six Sigma, Lean, project management, executive coaching, operational and line management.
He has a refreshing engaging and vibrant perspective on life and business in the corporate world. He is able to engage with any company in the world, within his industry expertise and beyond, and provide an assessment of the issues and problems that management suspects exists. He does this on a pro-active basis and confidentially.
He is also able to execute or be involved in the execution of any recommendations resulting from these engagements. He has previously managed large programs of work involving major restructuring, outsourcing and downsizing.
He forecasts a greater demand for people with his unique blend of skills in the future especially where established, staid inefficient companies in otherwise dynamic industries face head-on competition from more efficient home grown companies and those companies thriving in the tiger economies of China and India with their vast pool of cheap, educated and trained local talent.
Life Coaching Tips and Techniques No. 133
A change for the better?
When there has been a major change in your life say changing jobs or leaving a partner for another or quitting something suddenly unexpectedly you expect whatever you're going to is better than what you left behind. Otherwise why make the change? That is the main rationale of major change. But when something goes wrong (as they inevitably will) with any aspect of that change or choice (or non choice) as the case may be, things can get worse than they were before the unforced/forced changed. When that happens it is very hard not to panic and fall into despair. You're essentially caught in a no man's land of leaving a former destination but not yet arrived at the new destination. If you're the kind of person who has a very active regret engine, this kind of thing can drive you insane.
Life is full of changes, every day is (or should be) a transition to something better. Think of each day as an opportunity to change your life for the better. Not just surviving each day (which is an achievement in itself) but using that day to transform yourself, your business, your job, improve our skills, to develop your hobby into a business.
The normal planning function that should be a part of your life if you are a high performance person would normally fall away if you are under great stress or duress. Planning is not suitable for this time. Panic rules. It is normally a time of quick deliverables and execution (if that happens sometimes paralysis sets in). But it is precisely why you need to deliver on your high level plans before the stressful times. It takes the pressure off you if you have used this time fruitfully to open up a second income stream for example.
Plan and execute before the need arises for that deliverable. In other words for example develop your personal business whilst you're still in your job so that any necessary transition is all that is needed in the case of losing your job (or being made redundant) or merely perhaps even a lifestyle choice (a sea change).
A friend of mine is in the waiting room/departure lounge (a place from which you are either made redundant or redeployed) after 27 years service with a company. He is terrified, petrified of the outside world. He should be he has never set foot anywhere else. My recommendation: take and money and run (to the nearest retraining centre). Get yourself some in demand skills as quickly as you can. After 27 years he has reached a ceiling and is no longer growing. I also advise him that after he leaves he will feel sad, depressed, uncertain, anxious as regular work provides a much needed structure for men the lack of which leads to mental health issues, obesity, relationship problems and general dissatisfaction with life. It is all related to having to start from scratch somewhere else after having paid your dues for 27 years.
Why are Project Managers (PMs) paid so much? Because there is a large element of uncertainty in determining the path to deliver a project or program? In others words generally a project (by definition) is something that hasn't been done before therefore is new to the organisation and there is great uncertainty of the duration and major milestones and achievements of the journey.
Projects and PM's lurching from crisis to crisis. Why? First question where in the project is this occurring? In pre-planning, planning or implementation or business transition? If in pre-planning you could say the idea is not robust enough or the organisational's appetite for this kind of project is not keen enough. If in planning you could say that the idea is simply no good or too hard to implement for whatever reason. If in implementation you could say not enough planning (and of the right type and quality especially a rigorous proof of concept) was done. If in business transition you could say that the business were not consulted or consulted enough or consulted by the right kind of people to explain the changes to them. What is the root cause of these problems? Simply that the transformation of information from one phase to another was not controlled enough, disseminated enough, understood enough to allow all interested parties access to information as it changed from one state to another.
When something goes catastrophically wrong why do people turn off their mobiles, don't answer their land line (if they have one) and don't reply to emails. They stay indoors they don't interact they just exist for a while. In essence why are they running to ground? Self preservation they think. Self protection. To get away from the masses persecuting them. In my view running to ground in essence gives your punishing superego the time and space to discipline you to death. It is the last thing you should do but really the first thing you do anyway. This period being in the eye of the storm lasts for a several weeks then begins to resolve itself. Of course seeking help during this time will be helpful for your long term rehabilitation.
Music is great therapy. I play percussion in a salsa band and find a practice session or performance very relaxing in a spiritual sense. I think the reason is because it has to do with timing or rather time and rhythm. When everyday life is discordant and has lost its rhythm and chaos reigns music provides both a physical and spiritual framework which is universal, mathematical and provides a secure refuge for whatever is going in your life. It is very difficult to express in words the role of music in combating stress, anxiety and depression but it does have a role to play. When all around you is chaos, playing a nice rhythm in 2/4 or 4/4 time on the congas or timbales is soothing, healing and completes you. Of course if you've never played instruments before getting to this point requires a massive amount of work and effort and endless practice but I think the payback rewards the expenditure of the effort.
About Gilbert Labour
Mr Labour is a strategist, consultant, adviser, speaker and presenter on corporate restructuring, psychopathy in the workplace, life and executive coaching, project and program management, Six Sigma and Lean process improvement.
He combines all these skills in a unique combination, utilising Six Sigma and project management, to provide modern enlightened companies with truly innovative advice that will create a sustainable competitive advantage. Mr Labour exercises his skills and influence with compassion and deep understanding of the human condition especially where restructures result in overwhelming change and job loss.
He specialises in the following industries: legal and accountancy, telecommunications, transportation and aviation, banking and finance, insurance, government, IT and outsourcing and believes that his experience in these verticals is applicable across all industries, countries, languages, cultures and businesses generally. He has 30 years corporate experience in these industries.
Every single industry he specialises in (telcos, aviation, retail banking, insurance, outsourcing) faces fundamental challenges to continued survival and prosperity in the 21st Century and Mr Labour is well placed to provide a multi-disciplinary approach to uncovering insights for competitive advantage.
He sees the management of strategic, compliance and operational risk as one of the key issues facing executive managers on a daily basis. But not all companies can take advantage of formal Basel II and Sarbannes-Oxley (SOX) governance models.
For those companies that are not in the financial industry but still require strong governance around the management of operational risk, Mr Labour is an expert on creating strategies for managing operational risk supported by strong programme management structures to ensure compliance.
He has been extensively involved in process improvement initiatives within project and production environments. He has delivered Six Sigma Green and Black Belt process improvement programs that provide bottom line improvement whilst maintaining and enhancing employee morale.
He also owns and runs one of the world's most comprehensive web resources on the topic of life and executive coaching containing over 1500 pages of advice and more than 250 articles on life and executive coaching. He has also been quoted in learned papers, newspaper and magazine articles.
He has written a book on life coaching which provides an introduction to life coaching for the general public. He has also written a book on executive coaching, Executive Coaching for Process Improvement Excellence, that provides daily insights for top managers looking to succeed in today's fast paced environment.
He is also a pioneer in the field of coaching and project management having presented a landmark paper on this topic at PMISA 2004 (World Conference on Project Management) in South Africa in May, 04. His paper entitled Sane Project Management, a Life and Executive Coaching Approach has created both a new field in project management and a new area of interest and research for coaching and coaches around the world.
For PMISA 2006 (World Conference on Project Management) he has written a paper entitled Project Management and Six Sigma - a convergent and divergent model for solving business problems. He seeks to develop a theoretical and practical model to extract readily applicable business approaches from both divergence and convergence of these two disciplines.
He will explore whether coaching can facilitate the extraction of some of the benefits of this convergence? This will be continuing an exploration of the connection between coaching and project management that he first developed and presented at PMISA 2004.
Mr Labour acknowledges that in today's highly competitive and rapidly changing business environment, a busy consultant, life coach or executive coach must evince a compelling value proposition, as much for himself as for his product and service.
His unique value proposition is bringing to bear, on difficult even intractable business problems, a brilliant mix of both quantitative and qualitative approaches, embracing Six Sigma, Lean, project management, executive coaching, operational and line management.
He has a refreshing engaging and vibrant perspective on life and business in the corporate world. He is able to engage with any company in the world, within his industry expertise and beyond, and provide an assessment of the issues and problems that management suspects exists. He does this on a pro-active basis and confidentially.
He is also able to execute or be involved in the execution of any recommendations resulting from these engagements. He has previously managed large programs of work involving major restructuring, outsourcing and downsizing.
He forecasts a greater demand for people with his unique blend of skills in the future especially where established, staid inefficient companies in otherwise dynamic industries face head-on competition from more efficient home grown companies and those companies thriving in the tiger economies of China and India with their vast pool of cheap, educated and trained local talent.
Life Coaching Tips and Techniques No. 132
How do I decide what to write on my web site?
I exercise every morning for about an hour and a half, sometimes this gives me an idea. It may even move beyond a skeleton during the session. Otherwise the idea will need real work and graft to come to an article that is decent enough to be put on the web site. Anything that is too personal and that cannot be abstracted is discarded. It must sound intense, moving, real but rather than personal universal.
I read the news sometimes this gives me an idea. I read very widely and I do it at least for one hour each day. This sometimes inspires me. Wide reading of especially gifted writers helps the phrasing, the approach, the attack, the hook just like budding musicians learn grooves from master musicians. I know what I'm talking about in this analogy as I'm currently learning to be a latin percussionist.
I might watch people around me that also is a rich source of material. Today's topic is grief. There is a lot of suffering about and loss. My father died in 1992 and it took me 10 years of soul searching, analysis, mistakes, regret and agonising pain before I saw my way clear. This is some highlights of that journey. Will it help someone do their sentence in less than 10 years? Perhaps. This is the type of grief where you can't even exercise or even move more than absolutely necessary to maintain life, in essence you're paralysed.
Grief
To live is to grieve
I have written lots on grief on this web site. Also I devote one track on my life coaching CD to grief. This is not just losing a loved one to death but losing your partner for any other reason (they leave you for example) is also devastating and leads to the start of the grieving process.
The pure agony of the loss tempered somewhat by the shock is a sledgehammer combining destructive force of unlimited power and seemingly duration. This is the blow to the stomach, the next blow is when the shock wears off and comes with the realisation of the loss this is the uppercut the knockout blow. This is beyond mere sadness, this is the destruction of your emotional well being for some time to come. The realisation that you'll never see that person come into a room, talk to you, touch them, feel them close to you cannot be borne.
In the early stages of grief nothing can help. This is a period you must go through without pills, illicit drugs, alcohol or tobacco. You will dream a lot of the departed one. You will suffer the lows and lows of regret in all its forms. There is no light at the end of this tunnel (yet). The problem with taking drugs is that it only delays the inevitable reckoning with yourself. This is the most difficult period to survive. What can help is seeking support from someone who specialises in grief counselling or someone who has gone through it and survived (not everybody does).
The idea, belief, suggestion that you need to be strong during this period, to stay strong for those left behind is poor advice and useless when you're in the hurricane of grief the lunacy of grief. The face of someone in grief is enough to tell you that gratuitous advice about standing firm is at the very least unhelpful. There is no need to be strong. If all you can do is be weak, crying all time, sobbing, tearing yourself inside out then so be it. Watch your nutrition during this period as people tend to stop eating.
The point you want to get to is where you celebrating and remembering the good things and forgetting the bad things but that serenity is a long way off. Your anger with them dying is the overriding emotion initially. Why did they have to die? Then guilt why did I let them die? Why didn't I do more? Why wasn't I there when it happened? If there was some argument or dispute in the air when the loved one died then that makes your salvation so much more difficult and protracted.
Grief and recovery is a cyclical process. You can't stop exposure to loss, you never stop grieving, you never stop loving the one you're with or subsequently lose. To live is to experience loss and grief. Grief is the other side of the coin of love. Grief is evidence that you have loved deeply and to love is an indication that you are mentally prepared for grief at anytime. It can't be otherwise as life is ephemeral and full of risks.
There is no point to living without love so you won't experience grief. Love/grief are fundamental human emotions and the process of grief may be a survival instinct. When your partner dies, perhaps in the caveman times that meant there was no longer any food to share around. The grief felt by the partner and the subsequent loss of appetite was perhaps to ensure that the surviving partner could go on without food for a week or two until she found a new partner or perished but evolution would not let that latter circumstance to happen.
About Gilbert Labour
Mr Labour is a strategist, consultant, adviser, speaker and presenter on corporate restructuring, psychopathy in the workplace, life and executive coaching, project and program management, Six Sigma and Lean process improvement.
He combines all these skills in a unique combination, utilising Six Sigma and project management, to provide modern enlightened companies with truly innovative advice that will create a sustainable competitive advantage. Mr Labour exercises his skills and influence with compassion and deep understanding of the human condition especially where restructures result in overwhelming change and job loss.
He specialises in the following industries: legal and accountancy, telecommunications, transportation and aviation, banking and finance, insurance, government, IT and outsourcing and believes that his experience in these verticals is applicable across all industries, countries, languages, cultures and businesses generally. He has 30 years corporate experience in these industries.
Every single industry he specialises in (telcos, aviation, retail banking, insurance, outsourcing) faces fundamental challenges to continued survival and prosperity in the 21st Century and Mr Labour is well placed to provide a multi-disciplinary approach to uncovering insights for competitive advantage.
He sees the management of strategic, compliance and operational risk as one of the key issues facing executive managers on a daily basis. But not all companies can take advantage of formal Basel II and Sarbannes-Oxley (SOX) governance models.
For those companies that are not in the financial industry but still require strong governance around the management of operational risk, Mr Labour is an expert on creating strategies for managing operational risk supported by strong programme management structures to ensure compliance.
He has been extensively involved in process improvement initiatives within project and production environments. He has delivered Six Sigma Green and Black Belt process improvement programs that provide bottom line improvement whilst maintaining and enhancing employee morale.
He also owns and runs one of the world's most comprehensive web resources on the topic of life and executive coaching containing over 1500 pages of advice and more than 250 articles on life and executive coaching. He has also been quoted in learned papers, newspaper and magazine articles.
He has written a book on life coaching which provides an introduction to life coaching for the general public. He has also written a book on executive coaching, Executive Coaching for Process Improvement Excellence, that provides daily insights for top managers looking to succeed in today's fast paced environment.
He is also a pioneer in the field of coaching and project management having presented a landmark paper on this topic at PMISA 2004 (World Conference on Project Management) in South Africa in May, 04. His paper entitled Sane Project Management, a Life and Executive Coaching Approach has created both a new field in project management and a new area of interest and research for coaching and coaches around the world.
For PMISA 2006 (World Conference on Project Management) he has written a paper entitled Project Management and Six Sigma - a convergent and divergent model for solving business problems. He seeks to develop a theoretical and practical model to extract readily applicable business approaches from both divergence and convergence of these two disciplines.
He will explore whether coaching can facilitate the extraction of some of the benefits of this convergence? This will be continuing an exploration of the connection between coaching and project management that he first developed and presented at PMISA 2004.
Mr Labour acknowledges that in today's highly competitive and rapidly changing business environment, a busy consultant, life coach or executive coach must evince a compelling value proposition, as much for himself as for his product and service.
His unique value proposition is bringing to bear, on difficult even intractable business problems, a brilliant mix of both quantitative and qualitative approaches, embracing Six Sigma, Lean, project management, executive coaching, operational and line management.
He has a refreshing engaging and vibrant perspective on life and business in the corporate world. He is able to engage with any company in the world, within his industry expertise and beyond, and provide an assessment of the issues and problems that management suspects exists. He does this on a pro-active basis and confidentially.
He is also able to execute or be involved in the execution of any recommendations resulting from these engagements. He has previously managed large programs of work involving major restructuring, outsourcing and downsizing.
He forecasts a greater demand for people with his unique blend of skills in the future especially where established, staid inefficient companies in otherwise dynamic industries face head-on competition from more efficient home grown companies and those companies thriving in the tiger economies of China and India with their vast pool of cheap, educated and trained local talent.
Life Coaching Tips and Techniques No. 131
More Life Coaching Thoughts and Ideas
Life Coach Position Statement: Hands-on Management of introduced and self generated chaos in self and others.
The number one guiding principle for developing highly effective teams is to have your best people work with the best. Whether it is other internal people or external resources. This is easier said than done. Firstly you have to identify who your 'best' people are. What will be the objective and subjective criteria for selection? Having overcome that hurdle the next hurdle is how find and couple that high achiever with the right person/partner who will out the very best in each of them. On the other hand, great people who work with poor performers become demoralised and demotivated.
In praise of praise. Praise is most treasured when it comes from someone who you trust and who you know from experience is extremely good in your own particular field or specialisation. Praise is a reward for effort and achievement. Praise works best if it is withheld until the correct standard of performance is reached but it can be used judiciously to encourage incremental improvements in performance just short of the required standard. Praise should be something that is used where one has been involved in the progress of the person right from the beginning. Praise invigorates the source of the improvement and becomes almost an eternal flame for self improvement.
The best people are measured by how well they do under pressure. Some thrive some wither. The best thrive but it was probably not always so. What are the secrets to not merely surviving but thriving in a boiling cauldron? The secret is not adaptation which is a Darwinian thing but experience and failure. Lots of both and the attitude that you will learn from each and every mistake no matter how embarrassing or silly.
The winner of a recent stage in the Tour de France said he won it because in June (a month before the race) he did the same stage and knew it to the meter so he knew what he was facing. Another secret to success is repetition, rehearsal and lots of attempts and failures esp. failures.
When you're in the zone, it feels like everything takes off and lands on a solid rock runaway of unlimited length. If feels like you will never run out of runway either taking off or landing. What happens when you run out of runway? Build more runway.
In life you need to maximise every advantage. If you're pretty or handsome then it's a priority to get in shape and stay in shape to better portray a winning image. But the advantage is more than just skin deep. Working out will improve your confidence and will project a certain glow a warmth that people are attracted to.
Life Coach Position Statement: Hands-on Management of introduced and self generated chaos in self and others. A life coach cannot dare to assist others unless he also assists himself at the same time. An obese life coach is not a credible role model for helping a client lose weight and get into shape.
Life coaching recognises that life is an exercise in chaos management/containment. The purpose of life coaching is to introduce some principles and techniques to better manage the chaos. But it is not about management per se because there are more elements involved than can be addressed by management techniques alone.
Management is useless when the person has deep personal or psychological problems to begin with or is addicted to alcohol, gambling or illicit drugs. It is that 'personal' element that takes life coaching out of the realm of the consultants and practitioners who specialise in management and into the sphere of life coaches.
If that were not the case then life coaches would be merely about preparing and executing to do lists. But it is more than that. How much more depends on the style and approach of the particular life coach. In my practice I manage forward but I sometimes need to go back to pick up the thread of someone's life. I can forge into the unknown but preferably from the known.
Obesity. How can working with a life coach help? A life coach can provide a structure for understanding the root causes of obesity in a particular subject. The structure is only the rails, it is not the train. It is for the client to create the train having been given the guidance about the gauge of the track and other characteristics of the environment that the train will run on.
Don't waste time memorising end results and the myriad of different ways to get there. As long as you know the formula you can work towards the end result by reverse engineering the product to derive the process at any time. There is no need to always stick to a rigid inflexible approach for the sake of safety, it's ok to wing it sometimes when one is in command of the methodology to derive the process, any process.
Success both in a corporate environment and in your personal life is sometimes a matter of longevity. Of hanging around long enough to be the last person standing and still interested in the role/position. But this should not be your modus operandi nor should rushing ahead trying to shake up the natural pace of the market. You must conserve your energy and expend it cleverly as there is only so much to go around.
How do you get people to trust your judgement? It starts with you trusting your own judgement and making decisions on that basis and letting people see you doing it. There is no other way to gain their trust.
In corporate environments people send too many emails. By that I mean ineffective people send too many emails. Those that know how to get things done use other strategies and tactics, email not being one of them. It also doesn't mean you then have endless meetings. What it boils down to is great operators know just the right mix between the impersonal (email) and the personal (one on ones) and the group (meetings). They also know how to take time out for reflection knowing that great decisions take time to percolate.
Qualities of good operators. Good operators in a corporate environment are few and far between. People who operate at a consistently high level and can do so on a sustained basis. What are some of the things they are and do that sets them apart? Performance is a race not a sprint but a marathon. Good performers are in it for the long term. They start slow and keep the same pace all the way in. Where they need to accelerate, it is measured and planned. When they decelerate it is done graciously not sliding and skidding all over the road. Good operators strike people from the first as being someone unusual but they don't know the reason. They are attracted to them but they don't know exactly why.
Don't take too much on even if you're capable of doing them concurrently. The surest way to degrade your capability is to give it too much work. The idea is to give the right work and the right amount of that work. It is a matter of experience and judgement to get the best out of you.
About Gilbert Labour
Mr Labour is a strategist, consultant, adviser, speaker and presenter on corporate restructuring, psychopathy in the workplace, life and executive coaching, project and program management, Six Sigma and Lean process improvement.
He combines all these skills in a unique combination, utilising Six Sigma and project management, to provide modern enlightened companies with truly innovative advice that will create a sustainable competitive advantage. Mr Labour exercises his skills and influence with compassion and deep understanding of the human condition especially where restructures result in overwhelming change and job loss.
He specialises in the following industries: legal and accountancy, telecommunications, transportation and aviation, banking and finance, insurance, government, IT and outsourcing and believes that his experience in these verticals is applicable across all industries, countries, languages, cultures and businesses generally. He has 30 years corporate experience in these industries.
Every single industry he specialises in (telcos, aviation, retail banking, insurance, outsourcing) faces fundamental challenges to continued survival and prosperity in the 21st Century and Mr Labour is well placed to provide a multi-disciplinary approach to uncovering insights for competitive advantage.
He sees the management of strategic, compliance and operational risk as one of the key issues facing executive managers on a daily basis. But not all companies can take advantage of formal Basel II and Sarbannes-Oxley (SOX) governance models.
For those companies that are not in the financial industry but still require strong governance around the management of operational risk, Mr Labour is an expert on creating strategies for managing operational risk supported by strong programme management structures to ensure compliance.
He has been extensively involved in process improvement initiatives within project and production environments. He has delivered Six Sigma Green and Black Belt process improvement programs that provide bottom line improvement whilst maintaining and enhancing employee morale.
He also owns and runs one of the world's most comprehensive web resources on the topic of life and executive coaching containing over 1500 pages of advice and more than 250 articles on life and executive coaching. He has also been quoted in learned papers, newspaper and magazine articles.
He has written a book on life coaching which provides an introduction to life coaching for the general public. He has also written a book on executive coaching, Executive Coaching for Process Improvement Excellence, that provides daily insights for top managers looking to succeed in today's fast paced environment.
He is also a pioneer in the field of coaching and project management having presented a landmark paper on this topic at PMISA 2004 (World Conference on Project Management) in South Africa in May, 04. His paper entitled Sane Project Management, a Life and Executive Coaching Approach has created both a new field in project management and a new area of interest and research for coaching and coaches around the world.
For PMISA 2006 (World Conference on Project Management) he has written a paper entitled Project Management and Six Sigma - a convergent and divergent model for solving business problems. He seeks to develop a theoretical and practical model to extract readily applicable business approaches from both divergence and convergence of these two disciplines.
He will explore whether coaching can facilitate the extraction of some of the benefits of this convergence? This will be continuing an exploration of the connection between coaching and project management that he first developed and presented at PMISA 2004.
Mr Labour acknowledges that in today's highly competitive and rapidly changing business environment, a busy consultant, life coach or executive coach must evince a compelling value proposition, as much for himself as for his product and service.
His unique value proposition is bringing to bear, on difficult even intractable business problems, a brilliant mix of both quantitative and qualitative approaches, embracing Six Sigma, Lean, project management, executive coaching, operational and line management.
He has a refreshing engaging and vibrant perspective on life and business in the corporate world. He is able to engage with any company in the world, within his industry expertise and beyond, and provide an assessment of the issues and problems that management suspects exists. He does this on a pro-active basis and confidentially.
He is also able to execute or be involved in the execution of any recommendations resulting from these engagements. He has previously managed large programs of work involving major restructuring, outsourcing and downsizing.
He forecasts a greater demand for people with his unique blend of skills in the future especially where established, staid inefficient companies in otherwise dynamic industries face head-on competition from more efficient home grown companies and those companies thriving in the tiger economies of China and India with their vast pool of cheap, educated and trained local talent.
Mr Labour will be holding an Executive Coaching Retreat in Mauritius between 26 September 2006 and 15 October 2006. Please contact Mr Labour for further details of the retreat. There are places for only 5 executives at this retreat which will focus on the growing opportunities in China and India.
Life Coaching Tips and Techniques No. 129
Life Coaching Thoughts and Ideas
Psychopathy is mind architecture by a Hitler
Every now and then, life for me becomes very busy and I don't have time to properly develop the ideas that come to me when I'm running and doing other things. The ideas don't stop but the time to develop them is not available. These are a collection of raw ideas. If time permitted these would be developed further and may even have turned out in the final shape to be something totally different from what was envisaged originally.
Everything you do at work, every thought you have you can bet someone knows about. Corporates are full of people trying to second guess you. Sometimes they succeed. This is not a bad thing. It simply means that you are behaving predictably some of the time. It's what you do the rest of the time that is the key to high performance, to standing out as someone very special but not weird or a fruit loop. There is a very thin line, a thin membrane between success and madness.
Dysfunctional performance. There are people you encounter every day in corporate environments who are dysfunctional. As a people manager and program manager in charge of project managers I am especially exposed to project managers who have partially lost the plot. I am not talking about people who have spectacularly lost the plot but those who have a low grade infection if you will, who keep under the radar very effectively hidden from those who may pry too much. In actual fact, any manager worth their salt knows these people are afflicted.
Because the problem is not so in your face it is very difficult to establish if someone is failing because of it. I say failing because I know there are people in corporate environments who are dysfunctional but successful these are the psychopaths of this world. So here I am discussing the 'normal' personality type who is failing. The behavior of normal personality types who fail is also known as incompetence. But these performers can improve even given their limited intellectual and emotional horsepower.
My father Raymond. How special was this person? It was like talking to someone who had infinite knowledge. It was as if the conversation could stretch on forever without ever being disordered or boring. It was unfathomable structure with a very light touch. The top was soufflé underneath iron intellectual infrastructure. An unbelievable combination of charisma, knowledge, experience, madness and insights.
I have written elsewhere that he was phenomenally intelligent but it was more than that. In his childhood he suffered from a very undisciplined upbringing saved only by his intellect and wide reading. I use the word saved guardedly because he wasn't really saved at all as he suffered all his life from these bleak episodes. But having gone through his Calvary gave him a very sure touch when analysing and working with people.
Poor performance. Another reason why people aren't performing is that they're not physically fit. By that I don't mean they don't have a physical platform as much as they are not even on an average level of fitness. That is they smoke, they drink to excess, they form very poor quality relationships that only fuel their dependencies, they're over caffeinated, they take recreational drugs, they don't get enough sleep or exercise, they're probably under stress (which they would be if the proceeding was all true) and most telling of all they're overweight. When you add that combination it is a wonder that they can perform at all even poorly. They probably push themselves but there is only so much flogging you can do. The key thing is they don't shine, they cannot.
There is this guy at a workplace I know who is constantly yakking away. Talking non stop. The problem is not that he is talking but that he is verbalising thoughts and ideas what should by rights be kept inside head. No one needs to hear this verbal diarrhoea. It is pre-work and needs to be done in private.
What is the right level of enthusiasm in a corporate setting? Difficult to say. If you're not excited enough you make mistakes and if you're too excited you make mistakes. The environment is conducive to making mistakes what with unrealistic deadlines mixed with high quality expectations. A high level of enthusiasm enables a person to keep a high energy level for multiple short periods of time.
There is an interesting case going on in the US of a soldier who ha been accused or rape and murder in Iraq. The interesting this is this soldier was discharged from the army on the grounds of a 'personality disorder'. Now my guess is that this guy is psychopathic meaning he is an automaton without a conscience. A perfect killing machine. The only surprise for me is why he was discharged from the army. I would have thought he had the perfect mind architecture for a brutal war being fought without rules or quarter.
A lot of middle age guys have completely lose the plot. How can you tell? They are cranky, mean, selfish, whinging and short sighted. They pine to have sex with 20 year old girls. They have problems with internal discipline. They are erratic and these are the sane ones. The insane ones (the psychopaths) are impossible.
You notice, even amidst the endless violence in the Middle East that ordinary people are still helping their fellow man, taking them to hospital, carrying them on stretchers, holding their hand. The forbearance of these people is amazing. These people don't have to do it but they do. They do it because it could have been them, it could be them tomorrow. All this in 49C heat in the middle of summer in Baghdad. It is inhuman that people are suffering this violence in such devastating heat. If a place on earth it is this place. You notice how civil wars take place in some of the most inhospitable places on earth like Somalia and Afghanistan. Why fight over what is mostly barren earth.
There is a no way the federal opposition in Australia can afford a top flight executive coach (@ say $25000 per month retainer but an as executive coach I can give them some free advice (gratuitous maybe). IR will be a huge issue at the next election but it will have a tendency to get away from them especially when it gets down and dirty into the detail. My suggestion: hire an IR genius who knows every detail of the legislation. Someone who is both tactical and strategic. Someone who understands politics intimately. Someone who can drive the opposition agenda. This person already exists but they are employed by the major consulting firms and hired out as $400 per hour. The lesson is that the opposition has to treat the election and all the period before it as a corporate would for say a key product launch, a life and death product launch. You have to employ and engage the best of the best in all fields. If you don't there will be another 4 wilderness years.
Executive Coaching and Stress. The purpose of executive coaching is not to alleviate or eliminate stress per se. The purpose of Executive Coaching is to provide a structure, a paradigm by which the Exec may make sense of his surroundings and his performance in these surroundings. Once he has developed an internal model, a simulator of existing performance, he can then use that engine (without involving or jeopardising his current job) to run test cases, That is, play with different performance parameters so as to come up with a number of likely candidates for excellence. Ironically it is former executives and senior managers that fill the ranks of executive coaches as no one without that background can be a credible, reliable and effective executive coach. So stress is well known to executive coaches, that is probably why they are coaches escaping from the fire.
The purpose of life coaching is not to make your life perfect in every aspect nor is it even to strive for perfection however noble that might be. Life coaching is the art of the possible within existing constrains and resources. Life coaching is evolution rather than revolution. Don't focus on the tiny aspects of your life and try and get those all right. Don't expect or try for perfection in everything. Don't be distracted from your main mission by the little mistakes along the way. Sure they're frustrating and perhaps show a lack of discipline and application occasionally. To be really good requires the ability to create and evaluate multiple hypothetical situations and determine their usefulness in your master plan moving forward. For a successful business person, life is a massive juggling act balancing work, life, family, own personal business and everything else going on. Life coaching answers the question "How can they do it better?".
When you're really busy is the best time to get going with the things you really want to do in life. Write your book, article, develop your business or web site, start a great relationship/end a non functioning relationship. The busier you are the more focused, directed will be your effort and the more weight your work will have. Because the time you spent doing it is time you could hardly spare but you did therefore the value in time translates hopefully into work that is spare, strong, dedicated and useful for yourself and others. As a corollary when you're not busy is not the time to start something fresh, new and innovative. When you're not busy you're soft, flabby, sloppy wasteful of your time and unable to distill your resources to be more effective.
Continuity. When people get sick, demotivated, lackluster or simply have given up you break continuity and without continuity you can't have performance.
A very public breakdown. Most Executives break down in private (of course everyone knows about it but that is a different matter) but occasionally a breakdown is very public. A referee affords a unique opportunity to watch decisions being made, mistakes being made and the forces at work to redeem these mistakes. That redemption is within the context of the game and the referee compensates for the mistake, sometimes overcompensates and then both sides are angry with him.
A top class sporting match (refereed by a top ref) provides an Executive Coach with a great opportunity to watch an executive at work. In a recent match, a referee had a spectacular breakdown issuing 16 admonitions. A referee is an Executive, the work place is the soccer pitch. The referee is at work. Each day Executives make decisions but the ramifications of these decisions is sometimes not known for 3 months or 6 months or more but in a soccer game each decision is made in a split second and the results of these decisions is plain for all to see instantaneously. Watch when the ref makes a mistake, you will see him compensating the other side, given them the benefit of the doubt in every 50/50 decision that has to be made.
About Gilbert Labour
Mr Labour is a strategist, consultant, adviser, speaker and presenter on corporate restructuring, psychopathy in the workplace, life and executive coaching, project and program management, Six Sigma and Lean process improvement.
He combines all these skills in a unique combination, utilising Six Sigma and project management, to provide modern enlightened companies with truly innovative advice that will create a sustainable competitive advantage. Mr Labour exercises his skills and influence with compassion and deep understanding of the human condition especially where restructures result in overwhelming change and job loss.
He specialises in the following industries: legal and accountancy, telecommunications, transportation and aviation, banking and finance, insurance, government, IT and outsourcing and believes that his experience in these verticals is applicable across all industries, countries, languages, cultures and businesses generally. He has 30 years corporate experience in these industries.
Every single industry he specialises in (telcos, aviation, retail banking, insurance, outsourcing) faces fundamental challenges to continued survival and prosperity in the 21st Century and Mr Labour is well placed to provide a multi-disciplinary approach to uncovering insights for competitive advantage.
He sees the management of strategic, compliance and operational risk as one of the key issues facing executive managers on a daily basis. But not all companies can take advantage of formal Basel II and Sarbannes-Oxley (SOX) governance models.
For those companies that are not in the financial industry but still require strong governance around the management of operational risk, Mr Labour is an expert on creating strategies for managing operational risk supported by strong programme management structures to ensure compliance.
He has been extensively involved in process improvement initiatives within project and production environments. He has delivered Six Sigma Green and Black Belt process improvement programs that provide bottom line improvement whilst maintaining and enhancing employee morale.
He also owns and runs one of the world's most comprehensive web resources on the topic of life and executive coaching containing over 1500 pages of advice and more than 250 articles on life and executive coaching. He has also been quoted in learned papers, newspaper and magazine articles.
He has written a book on life coaching which provides an introduction to life coaching for the general public. He has also written a book on executive coaching, Executive Coaching for Process Improvement Excellence, that provides daily insights for top managers looking to succeed in today's fast paced environment.
He is also a pioneer in the field of coaching and project management having presented a landmark paper on this topic at PMISA 2004 (World Conference on Project Management) in South Africa in May, 04. His paper entitled Sane Project Management, a Life and Executive Coaching Approach has created both a new field in project management and a new area of interest and research for coaching and coaches around the world.
For PMISA 2006 (World Conference on Project Management) he has written a paper entitled Project Management and Six Sigma - a convergent and divergent model for solving business problems. He seeks to develop a theoretical and practical model to extract readily applicable business approaches from both divergence and convergence of these two disciplines.
He will explore whether coaching can facilitate the extraction of some of the benefits of this convergence? This will be continuing an exploration of the connection between coaching and project management that he first developed and presented at PMISA 2004.
Mr Labour acknowledges that in today's highly competitive and rapidly changing business environment, a busy consultant, life coach or executive coach must evince a compelling value proposition, as much for himself as for his product and service.
His unique value proposition is bringing to bear, on difficult even intractable business problems, a brilliant mix of both quantitative and qualitative approaches, embracing Six Sigma, Lean, project management, executive coaching, operational and line management.
He has a refreshing engaging and vibrant perspective on life and business in the corporate world. He is able to engage with any company in the world, within his industry expertise and beyond, and provide an assessment of the issues and problems that management suspects exists. He does this on a pro-active basis and confidentially.
He is also able to execute or be involved in the execution of any recommendations resulting from these engagements. He has previously managed large programs of work involving major restructuring, outsourcing and downsizing.
He forecasts a greater demand for people with his unique blend of skills in the future especially where established, staid inefficient companies in otherwise dynamic industries face head-on competition from more efficient home grown companies and those companies thriving in the tiger economies of China and India with their vast pool of cheap, educated and trained local talent.
Mr Labour will be holding an Executive Coaching Retreat in Mauritius between 26 September 2006 and 15 October 2006. Please contact Mr Labour for further details of the retreat. There are places for only 5 executives at this retreat which will focus on the growing opportunities in China and India.
Life Coaching Tips and Techniques No. 128
Life Coaching Thoughts and Ideas
In whatever walk of life or profession you might be in, no matter how busy you are, how demanding you are of other people (especially if you are), always but always give praise and thanks for a job well done. Nothing will buy you more loyalty and even greater efforts from your people than praise. One of the truest markers of psychopaths is that they never give praise (and probably have never received it).
There are the great players who you couldn't have a conversation with about the game they are so gifted at. These people are purely instinctive sportsman. Whilst there are others who besides being great players are also great people, great intellects who know the game from a human dimension and understand greatness. You may be great but it does not necessarily follow you understand what it is to be great, what it takes to be great. These latter also make the best teachers.
Sports people who lose the plot are the same as executives having a breakdown. There is a cause of the breakdown, there is a recovery period both mental and physical and there is a return to the game/office. If only it were as simple as that. The breakdown is such a calamity such a journey into the abyss the void that the comeback is a journey of another dimension. Think of running a mile with a 40 kilos pack on your back and your energy level half of what it used to be.
If you are better, much better than anyone around you it is not really a cause for your personal rejoicing. One of the reasons for your excellence is that your current capability is so much more than whatever the current situation will ever demand of you. The question to ask is: why are you wasting your talents on a position or situation that is evidently far less demanding of your talents than you would wish it to be (in ideal circumstances).
One of the reasons for this is discrimination whether age, race or otherwise. Another reason could be that you have voluntarily downsized and you have taken a role that is less demanding on yourself because your personal circumstances have changed, your energy levels lower and your focus less sharp.
There should always be a layer between what you write and you. Sometimes this layer is raw, bleeding, on edge but it should always be there. When it is not there hell ensures for the artist but undoubtedly great art can ensue but it is not sustainable for the artist. The other extreme is art or writing which is barren, devoid of emotional risk. An artist that is still emotionally engaged but healthily so (especially with all addictions under tight control) is the ideal. The work is edgy but it is sustainable and will improve over time. The time of the incandescent artist is probably past. Does that mean the time of great art is passed?
Corporate psychopathy - what can the knowledge we have about this subject do for us? Is there a program, tool, something to identify and remove psychopaths from the organisation, from our lives? Unfortunately there is no such thing because the disease is not recognised as such and hence has no reliable and agreed diagnosis and treatment. There are no doctors specialising in treating psychopathy, it is not a
condition per se but a description of a personality trait that is socially undesirable but not thought of as an illness. As a result of this there are people out there causing havoc in our personal and work lives that are literally getting away with murder.
How do you recognise someone who's lost the plot? How do you help someone who's lost the plot? You will only help someone you care about. You only want to help someone who you already think highly enough about to take the time to understand their situation. The number one symptom of this problem is asking an area or person to do work for you that is out of their scope. The correct response is for them not to do it. If they do it, then you have two people who've lost the plot. People who have lost the plot are an embarrassment but keep the workplace interesting and vibrant.
What is better? Working within yourself but doing so superlatively and getting compliments and satisfaction form your clients? Or working on something new, at the edge and beyond your performance envelope and confused each day with your clients bemused, unhappy, impatient and frustrated? Pushing the envelopes working in the area of invention, innovation and creativity. Probably the natural answer is working within yourself but that would be wrong. The right answer is both together are better than either one on their own. One is past the other is the future. The future builds on the past but the past also builds on the future. For an explanation see other articles on this web site regarding how to improve your past. You have to look back if you are going forward (using your in built rear view mirror).
How to make the best use of your corporate time? Have a goal separate from the organisation goals that you are working towards. Ideally make everything you do for a corporate goal also work simultaneously toward your personal goal. Merge the two seamlessly so that one becomes the other. There is no two lives here. It is one and only and they are the same.. There is no separation between work and play, life and work.. At work there is life, at home there is work.
How to make the best use of your corporate time? Have a goal separate from the organisation goals that you are working towards. Ideally make everything you do for a corporate goal also work simultaneously toward your personal goal. Merge the two seamlessly so that one becomes the other. There is no two lives here. It is one and only and they are the same.. There is no separation between work and play, life and work.. At work there is life, at home there is work.
All personal success requires a personal charisma the 'why should I care about you factor'. This cannot be manufactured but it can be nurtured if there is a spark of it there. There are books written about how to be likeable but they are useless. Being likeable is a gift. The very best managers, when they walk back into a room where people are working, cough or speak aloud just before they get there (to give them a chance to get on with whatever it is they do and not embarrass them). It is a courtesy by the manager but speaks volumes for their people skills and sensitivity. It displays an innate sense of management.
Realise that you're not in a corporate environment forever so make the most of your time there. Enjoy it. You can only enjoy it if you are triumphant. The secret is to be at the top of your mental and physical game whilst you're there and leave when you go off your game. There is no point being there if you're a lame duck.
About Gilbert Labour
Mr Labour is a strategist, consultant, adviser, speaker and presenter on corporate restructuring, psychopathy in the workplace, life and executive coaching, project and program management, Six Sigma and Lean process improvement.
He combines all these skills in a unique combination, utilising Six Sigma and project management, to provide modern enlightened companies with truly innovative advice that will create a sustainable competitive advantage. Mr Labour exercises his skills and influence with compassion and deep understanding of the human condition especially where restructures result in overwhelming change and job loss.
He specialises in the following industries: legal and accountancy, telecommunications, transportation and aviation, banking and finance, insurance, government, IT and outsourcing and believes that his experience in these verticals is applicable across all industries, countries, languages, cultures and businesses generally. He has 30 years corporate experience in these industries.
Every single industry he specialises in (telcos, aviation, retail banking, insurance, outsourcing) faces fundamental challenges to continued survival and prosperity in the 21st Century and Mr Labour is well placed to provide a multi-disciplinary approach to uncovering insights for competitive advantage.
He sees the management of strategic, compliance and operational risk as one of the key issues facing executive managers on a daily basis. But not all companies can take advantage of formal Basel II and Sarbannes-Oxley (SOX) governance models.
For those companies that are not in the financial industry but still require strong governance around the management of operational risk, Mr Labour is an expert on creating strategies for managing operational risk supported by strong programme management structures to ensure compliance.
He has been extensively involved in process improvement initiatives within project and production environments. He has delivered Six Sigma Green and Black Belt process improvement programs that provide bottom line improvement whilst maintaining and enhancing employee morale.
He also owns and runs one of the world's most comprehensive web resources on the topic of life and executive coaching containing over 1500 pages of advice and more than 250 articles on life and executive coaching. He has also been quoted in learned papers, newspaper and magazine articles.
He has written a book on life coaching which provides an introduction to life coaching for the general public. He has also written a book on executive coaching, Executive Coaching for Process Improvement Excellence, that provides daily insights for top managers looking to succeed in today's fast paced environment.
He is also a pioneer in the field of coaching and project management having presented a landmark paper on this topic at PMISA 2004 (World Conference on Project Management) in South Africa in May, 04. His paper entitled Sane Project Management, a Life and Executive Coaching Approach has created both a new field in project management and a new area of interest and research for coaching and coaches around the world.
For PMISA 2006 (World Conference on Project Management) he has written a paper entitled Project Management and Six Sigma - a convergent and divergent model for solving business problems. He seeks to develop a theoretical and practical model to extract readily applicable business approaches from both divergence and convergence of these two disciplines.
He will explore whether coaching can facilitate the extraction of some of the benefits of this convergence? This will be continuing an exploration of the connection between coaching and project management that he first developed and presented at PMISA 2004.
Mr Labour acknowledges that in today's highly competitive and rapidly changing business environment, a busy consultant, life coach or executive coach must evince a compelling value proposition, as much for himself as for his product and service.
His unique value proposition is bringing to bear, on difficult even intractable business problems, a brilliant mix of both quantitative and qualitative approaches, embracing Six Sigma, Lean, project management, executive coaching, operational and line management.
He has a refreshing engaging and vibrant perspective on life and business in the corporate world. He is able to engage with any company in the world, within his industry expertise and beyond, and provide an assessment of the issues and problems that management suspects exists. He does this on a pro-active basis and confidentially.
He is also able to execute or be involved in the execution of any recommendations resulting from these engagements. He has previously managed large programs of work involving major restructuring, outsourcing and downsizing.
He forecasts a greater demand for people with his unique blend of skills in the future especially where established, staid inefficient companies in otherwise dynamic industries face head-on competition from more efficient home grown companies and those companies thriving in the tiger economies of China and India with their vast pool of cheap, educated and trained local talent.
Mr Labour will be holding an Executive Coaching Retreat in Mauritius between 26 September 2006 and 15 October 2006. Please contact Mr Labour for further details of the retreat. There are places for only 5 executives at this retreat which will focus on the growing opportunities in China and India.
Life Coaching Tips and Techniques No. 127
Life coaching is not about making people feel good about themselves. In some cases, it makes people feel bad about themselves
Influential enough to be credible and credible enough to be influential
The best life coaches learn from their clients as much as if not more than their clients learn from them
A life coach has to be creative because he is in a way reshaping someone else's life and even beliefs. That provides the life coach with a lot of power and influence. How does a life coach reshape someone's life? Or more to the point how does he get himself into a position where he is influential enough to be credible in reshaping someone's life? The latter is the job specification of a life coach.
It is what all your experience and sessions with your client should lead you to. If it doesn't you're not a life coach and your client is wasting his time and money. The former is aspirational, that is, the best life coaches should aim to reshape people's lives. After all, why would they come to you? They come to you because they need a structure to conduct their daily lives. Perhaps even a direction to aim their daily life efforts at. But as life coaching is collaborational, by direction I mean self-direction. But a guided self-direction, at least at first.
The world has endless variety and provides the observant life coach with many opportunities to observe and learn from people (not clients). A great life coach looks for these opportunities, especially if it involves himself, and exploits them to the max. Squeezing all the life learning out of them. At times this may cause pain but that is a small price to pay for this priceless learning. It is what your clients pay you for. That perceptive insight into their own condition.
But that is not to say that life coaching is a purely intellectual pursuit and the resulting relationship one that is antiseptic. It is far from that but it is always absolutely professional and ethical. Great life coaches perform a very difficult balancing act.
They have intellectual horse power of the highest calibre, you need it to be a credible life coach, but that is allied with an emotional awareness of yourself and the client that transcends the intellect and operates in a magical sphere.
All great relationships possess something unfathomable something unexplainable something undeniable something unique and the relationship of a life coach to a client no less so perhaps even more so.
There are two sides to the relationship and the best life coaches do not let you see the join. Rather the join is powerful yet almost invisible that the client has no suspicion that the relationship also has strong emotional elements and that is how it should be.
It is the unspoken part of the relationship and in my opinion the most important part, at least it is the most effective part. That is, recourse to it almost always produces great results. It is where you communicate with someone in an environment of total trust. That is, the point I started this article with has been reached 'influential enough to be credible'.
This trust reposed in you by a client has to be used carefully and wisely. It is communicating beyond the normal barriers people put up. Therefore it reaches down deep and a great life coach can really great affect change for the good. That is a huge responsibility and really should only be reposed in someone who is an exceptional life coach and who understands the scope and range of that responsibility.
A life coach is continually experiencing life, there is no other choice. But what sets a life coach apart is that he can dissect that experience even if it is excoriating especially if it is that way. The tougher the pain the better the lesson. But dissecting pure pain is not for everybody. For most it is too raw to learn from. For those who will go on to make great life coaches, there is no greater crucible.
Where do the great ideas generated in a life coaching session come from? Firstly it is a given that there is no great life coaching session without great ideas. Ideas are generated when the chemistry is right. That is someone who comes to you with the world's problems on his shoulders, no matter how great a life coach you are, you will not be generating ideas at least not initially. Because the client is not ready, you're not ready and the relationship is not ready.
As I alluded to above if life coaching is anything it is a relationship. Without it there is no life coaching. It takes time, it takes knowledge, it takes experience for a life coach to understand exactly what buttons to push. To first of all address what is going on and seek shelter from the storm in a favourable anchorage and then to even think about setting sail for a new course.
It takes working with many clients or a selected client over time (you learn lots either way) to understand exactly what tools in your carry bag to use, how to calibrate these tools and how to deploy in the most efficient way possible. Life coaching is a great learning experience and the best realise that start off pretty useless and as they get more experience, they hopefully will learn and learn quickly.
There is no magic or secret to being a life coach. It takes a confidence in your own abilities to resolve people's problems and issues and the capability to do it relatively quickly. For that you need pure intellect. But that is not enough you also need to be personable and able to develop the right chemistry between you and the client to get things done. On top of all that, you must be a smart and canny business person.
After all life coaching is a small business and a most demanding one at that. Because you are selling yourself, your warmth, your generosity, your analytical skills, your objectivity and above all your honesty and integrity. A tough job skills description. There are not many jobs as demanding. Not to mention the competition. There are at least 50 million web sites out there that deal in life coaching in one way or another.
To be a successful life coach, you must be a stand out in more ways than one. You must catch the attention by your own unique individual slant on life. One that is quirky but truth. One that resonates with the people out there searching the internet for anything and nothing and everything in between. Of course it goes without saying that once you begin to snare clients, you must work with them in an exceptional capacity delivering results. Life coaching is not about making people feel good about themselves. In some cases, it makes people feel bad about themselves at least at the point of initial contact. They're in a space they don't want to be. It is about making people reassess why that is and forcing them in some cases to make changes to their lives to get away from that unwanted space.
About Gilbert Labour
Mr Labour is a strategist, consultant, adviser, speaker and presenter on corporate restructuring, psychopathy in the workplace, life and executive coaching, project and program management, Six Sigma and Lean process improvement.
He combines all these skills in a unique combination, utilising Six Sigma and project management, to provide modern enlightened companies with truly innovative advice that will create a sustainable competitive advantage. Mr Labour exercises his skills and influence with compassion and deep understanding of the human condition especially where restructures result in overwhelming change and job loss.
He specialises in the following industries: legal and accountancy, telecommunications, transportation and aviation, banking and finance, insurance, government, IT and outsourcing and believes that his experience in these verticals is applicable across all industries, countries, languages, cultures and businesses generally. He has 30 years corporate experience in these industries.
Every single industry he specialises in (telcos, aviation, retail banking, insurance, outsourcing) faces fundamental challenges to continued survival and prosperity in the 21st Century and Mr Labour is well placed to provide a multi-disciplinary approach to uncovering insights for competitive advantage.
He sees the management of strategic, compliance and operational risk as one of the key issues facing executive managers on a daily basis. But not all companies can take advantage of formal Basel II and Sarbannes-Oxley (SOX) governance models.
For those companies that are not in the financial industry but still require strong governance around the management of operational risk, Mr Labour is an expert on creating strategies for managing operational risk supported by strong programme management structures to ensure compliance.
He has been extensively involved in process improvement initiatives within project and production environments. He has delivered Six Sigma Green and Black Belt process improvement programs that provide bottom line improvement whilst maintaining and enhancing employee morale.
He also owns and runs one of the world's most comprehensive web resources on the topic of life and executive coaching containing over 1500 pages of advice and more than 250 articles on life and executive coaching. He has also been quoted in learned papers, newspaper and magazine articles.
He has written a book on life coaching which provides an introduction to life coaching for the general public. He has also written a book on executive coaching, Executive Coaching for Process Improvement Excellence, that provides daily insights for top managers looking to succeed in today's fast paced environment.
He is also a pioneer in the field of coaching and project management having presented a landmark paper on this topic at PMISA 2004 (World Conference on Project Management) in South Africa in May, 04. His paper entitled Sane Project Management, a Life and Executive Coaching Approach has created both a new field in project management and a new area of interest and research for coaching and coaches around the world.
For PMISA 2006 (World Conference on Project Management) he has written a paper entitled Project Management and Six Sigma - a convergent and divergent model for solving business problems. He seeks to develop a theoretical and practical model to extract readily applicable business approaches from both divergence and convergence of these two disciplines.
He will explore whether coaching can facilitate the extraction of some of the benefits of this convergence? This will be continuing an exploration of the connection between coaching and project management that he first developed and presented at PMISA 2004.
Mr Labour acknowledges that in today's highly competitive and rapidly changing business environment, a busy consultant, life coach or executive coach must evince a compelling value proposition, as much for himself as for his product and service.
His unique value proposition is bringing to bear, on difficult even intractable business problems, a brilliant mix of both quantitative and qualitative approaches, embracing Six Sigma, Lean, project management, executive coaching, operational and line management.
He has a refreshing engaging and vibrant perspective on life and business in the corporate world. He is able to engage with any company in the world, within his industry expertise and beyond, and provide an assessment of the issues and problems that management suspects exists. He does this on a pro-active basis and confidentially.
He is also able to execute or be involved in the execution of any recommendations resulting from these engagements. He has previously managed large programs of work involving major restructuring, outsourcing and downsizing.
He forecasts a greater demand for people with his unique blend of skills in the future especially where established, staid inefficient companies in otherwise dynamic industries face head-on competition from more efficient home grown companies and those companies thriving in the tiger economies of China and India with their vast pool of cheap, educated and trained local talent.
Mr Labour will be holding an Executive Coaching Retreat in Mauritius between 26 September 2006 and 15 October 2006. Please contact Mr Labour for further details of the retreat. There are places for only 5 executives at this retreat which will focus on the growing opportunities in China and India.
Life Coaching Tips and Techniques No. 126
Life Coaching can help unhappy people
But really unhappy people don't want to let go of this pain, it is so comforting and defining
Emotional pain provides a story, a point of reference, a structure, a past but no future
Unhappiness is contagious. Unhappy people want to make other happy people unhappy. They want to make people aware that they're unhappy but they usually do it in a round about way.
They want to infect others with their contagion, with their agony. But because agony cannot be simply transferred or shared, they a will create a little drama and dissension in your life that goes quite close to mimicking what they themselves are going through.
They want to envelope you in a folder of distress and frustration and file you. But not if you know what to watch out for. You will find nothing overt or verbal to help you identify this distressed individual who wants to make you that way too.
Rather than being depressed about it, they are morbidly active and overtly but superficially happy. They are always willing to help you but behind your back they are always complaining about you. You are their victim don't you forget it.
There are some people who you can read unhappiness on their faces. They are emotionally bruised and have lost their inner smile. How do you detect? Just a blank look when formerly it was an active proactive look full of forward energy.
How to detect hidden unhappiness
The state of unhappiness is pretty hard to hide but some people have perfected this difficult art. Most do it poorly because the body language and the eyes give it away. But those who have mastered the inner turmoil and show a pleasant, kind and engaging personality to the outside world, how can you tell they're unhappy?
You will find this type in corporate environments. No matter how bad things are going for them, they still smile and plod (not power) on. The giveaway here is: they are a guided missile but with a faulty inertial navigation system that is stuck on one mode: autopilot and goes in only one direction only. Trying to get them to change tack is senseless and useless.
The next giveaway is a lack of deep and true emotional engagement in anything that is going on around them. They are at the wheel but with eyes shut. This lack of emotional involvement manifests itself in the inability (and reluctance) to adapt to new or change situations.
The third giveaway is that they look as if they are carrying an enormous weight of pain and suffering around them, inside them and outside them. It is a weight you cannot share with them not can they share it with anybody else. It is their own private pain and they possess it fully and no one will take it off them. In fact they don't want to let go of this pain it is so comforting and defining.
The fourth giveaway is a hugely diminished faculty of creativity and innovation especially when it is really necessary: when dealing with a crisis or other disaster. Creativity is usually associate with someone performing at the pinnacle but it is also useful when coming up with creative solutions for getting out of a slump.
It is as if they are paying a penance for a sin not yet committed or a sin committed long ago or an imagined sin. In other works the nexus between cause and effect is tenuous at best. It is very hard to understand what the root cause of the unhappiness as the real reasons are hidden in personal antiquity.
They are all wounds no scars. Scars have not yet had time to form. They carry big open wounds that bleed at the slightest touch so they are afraid to touch and be touched. Afraid to feel and to be the subject of someone else's feelings. Afraid to love and be loved. Too afraid to exist but too afraid not to exist.
The openness of someone healed surprises them but there is unknowing retreat into themselves, a headlong escape into the self which in reality means from prison to solitary confinement.
Love dies on their lips. Warmth chills on their breadth. Beauty petrifies on their face. The furnace of their love perishes. Their sourness bitters their life with bitterness.
Unhappy people are lost, have lost the plot. Don't know themselves anymore. Don't trust themselves anymore. They are on a bleak journey, know there is another more open journey full of sun but don't know how to get there. It exists but cannot be conceived much less found.
About Gilbert Labour
Mr Labour is a strategist, consultant, adviser, speaker and presenter on corporate restructuring, psychopathy in the workplace, life and executive coaching, project and program management, Six Sigma and Lean process improvement.
He combines all these skills in a unique combination, utilising Six Sigma and project management, to provide modern enlightened companies with truly innovative advice that will create a sustainable competitive advantage. Mr Labour exercises his skills and influence with compassion and deep understanding of the human condition especially where restructures result in overwhelming change and job loss.
He specialises in the following industries: legal and accountancy, telecommunications, transportation and aviation, banking and finance, insurance, government, IT and outsourcing and believes that his experience in these verticals is applicable across all industries, countries, languages, cultures and businesses generally. He has 30 years corporate experience in these industries.
Every single industry he specialises in (telcos, aviation, retail banking, insurance, outsourcing) faces fundamental challenges to continued survival and prosperity in the 21st Century and Mr Labour is well placed to provide a multi-disciplinary approach to uncovering insights for competitive advantage.
He sees the management of strategic, compliance and operational risk as one of the key issues facing executive managers on a daily basis. But not all companies can take advantage of formal Basel II and Sarbannes-Oxley (SOX) governance models.
For those companies that are not in the financial industry but still require strong governance around the management of operational risk, Mr Labour is an expert on creating strategies for managing operational risk supported by strong programme management structures to ensure compliance.
He has been extensively involved in process improvement initiatives within project and production environments. He has delivered Six Sigma Green and Black Belt process improvement programs that provide bottom line improvement whilst maintaining and enhancing employee morale.
He also owns and runs one of the world's most comprehensive web resources on the topic of life and executive coaching containing over 1500 pages of advice and more than 250 articles on life and executive coaching. He has also been quoted in learned papers, newspaper and magazine articles.
He has written a book on life coaching which provides an introduction to life coaching for the general public. He has also written a book on executive coaching, Executive Coaching for Process Improvement Excellence, that provides daily insights for top managers looking to succeed in today's fast paced environment.
He is also a pioneer in the field of coaching and project management having presented a landmark paper on this topic at PMISA 2004 (World Conference on Project Management) in South Africa in May, 04. His paper entitled Sane Project Management, a Life and Executive Coaching Approach has created both a new field in project management and a new area of interest and research for coaching and coaches around the world.
For PMISA 2006 (World Conference on Project Management) he has written a paper entitled Project Management and Six Sigma - a convergent and divergent model for solving business problems. He seeks to develop a theoretical and practical model to extract readily applicable business approaches from both divergence and convergence of these two disciplines.
He will explore whether coaching can facilitate the extraction of some of the benefits of this convergence? This will be continuing an exploration of the connection between coaching and project management that he first developed and presented at PMISA 2004.
Mr Labour acknowledges that in today's highly competitive and rapidly changing business environment, a busy consultant, life coach or executive coach must evince a compelling value proposition, as much for himself as for his product and service.
His unique value proposition is bringing to bear, on difficult even intractable business problems, a brilliant mix of both quantitative and qualitative approaches, embracing Six Sigma, Lean, project management, executive coaching, operational and line management.
He has a refreshing engaging and vibrant perspective on life and business in the corporate world. He is able to engage with any company in the world, within his industry expertise and beyond, and provide an assessment of the issues and problems that management suspects exists. He does this on a pro-active basis and confidentially.
He is also able to execute or be involved in the execution of any recommendations resulting from these engagements. He has previously managed large programs of work involving major restructuring, outsourcing and downsizing.
He forecasts a greater demand for people with his unique blend of skills in the future especially where established, staid inefficient companies in otherwise dynamic industries face head-on competition from more efficient home grown companies and those companies thriving in the tiger economies of China and India with their vast pool of cheap, educated and trained local talent.
Mr Labour will be holding an Executive Coaching Retreat in Mauritius between 26 September 2006 and 15 October 2006. Please contact Mr Labour for further details of the retreat. There are places for only 5 executives at this retreat which will focus on the growing opportunities in China and India.
Life Coaching Tips and Techniques No. 125
The mindset of a life coach
How do you go from mere mortal to life coach in the space of 30 minutes
As a life coach the client expects you to be high performing at all times especially when every minute is paid for in advance but how do you get into this mindset where you can be effective immediately?
Firstly, being a life coach is a 1500 metres race (no longer) but not a 100 metre sprint. So you have some time to create the right environment for coaching. You must use this time wisely. Probably in a session you will have the first say 20 minutes to create/recreate the coaching connection. Without this connection, there is no coaching possible.
What do you do in the first 20 minutes whilst you on the fly create the connection. You talk about the known, what has been occupying your client's time since the last session. You not only have to talk to keep this conversation going but you also have to think of the right entry point for your coaching for this session. So you need to keep one conversation going whilst working out how to start another one. You must create that entry point rather than wait for it.
Based on what was discussed at the last session and what the client has been doing in the last two weeks, you can work out the level of traction and progress made against what may have been agreed or discussed at the last session. Life coaching is not project management, it is not a task list. What is discussed and agreed upon from session to session has to reasonably fluid as unavoidable circumstances may derail the best laid plans and intentions.
After the first 20 minutes, you will then have a clear idea of what to focus on. There are a number of standard approaches that I use in my practice that I focus on generically. Sometimes this is tailored for the client but generally speaking these include platform for performance, approaches to keep the brain muscular and active, facing to/creating challenges in the personal and work sphere. Always looking to push the performance envelope.
Once platform is in place then the coaching journey can go where it may. It is like having a car fully charged with fuel and ready to go in any direction you point it. The work can lead into the personal arena looking at relationships for example and/or it can deviate into the work arena and look at such issues as executive health. I find in practice that the professionals I coach are usually workaholics. I can't help them until I can cure them of this addiction. This is a sump that drains away all effort, focus and energies. There is no time, space or energy for a life.
Coaching has a beautiful simplicity and symmetry. It is based on having the right chemistry, the right connection between two people. But it is much more than an emotional connection or bond. Because a coaching relationship is a professional one, the coach must retain a level of emotional independence because the advice you give must be impartial and right given the circumstances. It cannot be based on your own feelings or emotions. It is ironic in that it is a relationship that requires an emotional connection to work yet emotion can have no part in the outcomes or direction.
Clients can and do fall in love with their coaches. It is the nature of the beast. Coaches know this and keep the relationship on a relaxed but business footing. As a coach you are trusted implicitly and it is incumbent upon you to never violate or damage that trust. The coaching relationship cannot survive if the trust is not there.
Being a good coach takes time and experience to understand the right pacing and to not ever force the pacing of any session even though there might be other areas you would like to cover. Given the nature of this relationship, you must always create a bridge from one area to another. You must show how they are inter-connected and one supports the other. Ideas, even the client's, on their own have no place unless you can integrate them into where the client is going.
Given what I have said above, to be a credible life coach you must have a first class brain for working with people. But allied with this brain power must be an emotional maturity to be able to absorb everything the client tells you and reflect it back to them in ways that are new, innovative and creative yet which makes complete and absolute simple sense.
As a life coach, 99% of what you see and understand is left unsaid and unspoken. Therefore when you do speak it should have strong emotional power because you have distilled the best ideas and thoughts in some short, simple but powerful sentences and phrases.
You must have the ability to forget your own personal problems and worries for a moment and focus totally on your client. Sometimes it is hard to do that no matter how professional you are. But there is a space that is not where you are now and where you need to be to be of most use to the client in the shortest possible time. You must jump into that space either before or during the session. That way when the client tells you A, F, O, X, P you can work out that the equation is F = (A + P/O)*X and no other. This is not work for a hack or a poor professional but for someone at the peak of their powers, someone who is the best they have ever been. This is the price of entry for a job that pays $150 per hour.
Being creative is a curse, you are always thinking, molding, merging, sorting and producing. As a life coach, this means writing about what I do on a daily basis and coming up with ideas which I myself have no idea of where they come from. But I do read voraciously so it must have something to do with that. Great ideas about management and executive coaching come from all sorts of places: roman history, german history, Malcolm de Chazal, poetry, Galsworthy, novels of the nineteenth century. Anywhere the human species is flayed to the bone and exposed for scrutiny, study and pity.
A life coach need not have any of the qualities above. The benchmark for a successful life coach is someone who has a good client base and whose business prospers as a result. But I would say as a life coach myself clients only become regular when you start doing some of the things I have outlined above. People will not pay a life coach the large sums they pay them if they are no good, if they do not have an emotional connection with them that sees results.
About Gilbert Labour
Mr Labour is a strategist, consultant, adviser, speaker and presenter on corporate restructuring, psychopathy in the workplace, life and executive coaching, project and program management, Six Sigma and Lean process improvement.
He combines all these skills in a unique combination, utilising Six Sigma and project management, to provide modern enlightened companies with truly innovative advice that will create a sustainable competitive advantage. Mr Labour exercises his skills and influence with compassion and deep understanding of the human condition especially where restructures result in overwhelming change and job loss.
He specialises in the following industries: legal and accountancy, telecommunications, transportation and aviation, banking and finance, insurance, government, IT and outsourcing and believes that his experience in these verticals is applicable across all industries, countries, languages, cultures and businesses generally. He has 30 years corporate experience in these industries.
Every single industry he specialises in (telcos, aviation, retail banking, insurance, outsourcing) faces fundamental challenges to continued survival and prosperity in the 21st Century and Mr Labour is well placed to provide a multi-disciplinary approach to uncovering insights for competitive advantage.
He sees the management of strategic, compliance and operational risk as one of the key issues facing executive managers on a daily basis. But not all companies can take advantage of formal Basel II and Sarbannes-Oxley (SOX) governance models.
For those companies that are not in the financial industry but still require strong governance around the management of operational risk, Mr Labour is an expert on creating strategies for managing operational risk supported by strong programme management structures to ensure compliance.
He has been extensively involved in process improvement initiatives within project and production environments. He has delivered Six Sigma Green and Black Belt process improvement programs that provide bottom line improvement whilst maintaining and enhancing employee morale.
He also owns and runs one of the world's most comprehensive web resources on the topic of life and executive coaching containing over 1500 pages of advice and more than 250 articles on life and executive coaching. He has also been quoted in learned papers, newspaper and magazine articles.
He has written a book on life coaching which provides an introduction to life coaching for the general public. He has also written a book on executive coaching, Executive Coaching for Process Improvement Excellence, that provides daily insights for top managers looking to succeed in today's fast paced environment.
He is also a pioneer in the field of coaching and project management having presented a landmark paper on this topic at PMISA 2004 (World Conference on Project Management) in South Africa in May, 04. His paper entitled Sane Project Management, a Life and Executive Coaching Approach has created both a new field in project management and a new area of interest and research for coaching and coaches around the world.
For PMISA 2006 (World Conference on Project Management) he is presenting a paper entitled Project Management and Six Sigma - a convergent and divergent model for solving business problems. He seeks to develop a theoretical and practical model to extract readily applicable business approaches from both divergence and convergence of these two disciplines.
He will explore whether coaching can facilitate the extraction of some of the benefits of this convergence? This will be continuing an exploration of the connection between coaching and project management that he first developed and presented at PMISA 2004.
Mr Labour acknowledges that in today's highly competitive and rapidly changing business environment, a busy consultant, life coach or executive coach must evince a compelling value proposition, as much for himself as for his product and service.
His unique value proposition is bringing to bear, on difficult even intractable business problems, a brilliant mix of both quantitative and qualitative approaches, embracing Six Sigma, Lean, project management, executive coaching, operational and line management.
He has a refreshing engaging and vibrant perspective on life and business in the corporate world. He is able to engage with any company in the world, within his industry expertise and beyond, and provide an assessment of the issues and problems that management suspects exists. He does this on a pro-active basis and confidentially.
He is also able to execute or be involved in the execution of any recommendations resulting from these engagements. He has previously managed large programs of work involving major restructuring, outsourcing and downsizing.
He forecasts a greater demand for people with his unique blend of skills in the future especially where established, staid inefficient companies in otherwise dynamic industries face head-on competition from more efficient home grown companies and those companies thriving in the tiger economies of China and India with their vast pool of cheap, educated and trained local talent.
Mr Labour will be holding an Executive Coaching Retreat in Mauritius between 29 May 06 and June 11 06. Please contact Mr Labour for further details on the retreat. There are places for only 10 executives at this retreat which will focus on the opportunities in China and India.
Life Coaching Tips and Techniques No. 124
Disappointment
Not being disappointed is bad, being disappointed now and then is good. It means you are setting goals. It may also mean that you may not have the life skills and methodology in place to achieve them especially if they are set very high.
But it is preferable to set goals and fail that not set goals at all. It means you are trying at least. What life coaching can help you with is provide you with some tools and skills to turn the 'try' into a successful strategy.
If you're not disappointed every now and then it means that you are not setting your standards high enough. It means that you are not setting expectations on yourself or setting them high enough. There is no life which is an uninterrupted success or uninterrupted failure. Most lives fall in between the two, some cluster predominantly around the pole of failure.
Being disappointed is good. Not being disappointed in essence means that you have not set your expectations high enough. There is a tendency to go through life 'safely' and not being disappointed and as a corollary being surprised by exceptional performance.
But exceptional performance does not come about when you're not looking. It requires a conscious decision to get there. The conventional wisdom is that being disappointed is something that you should feel bad about because upsets the status quo (of doing little) and is a bad thing all round.
But in life coaching being disappointed is a good thing because it means the first of the two parts required to succeed is in place. The first is setting an expectation on yourself or others that is beyond the norm. The second part then needs to follow and that is providing the guidance and direction required to meet that expectation.
In corporate situations not being disappointed means you're not setting the bar high enough for yourself, your people or your company. There is no point not setting the bar high so as not to be disappointed at the result, that achieves nothing. The point is set the bar high but also provide the support and coaching to reach it.
About Gilbert Labour
Mr Labour is a strategist, consultant, adviser, speaker and presenter on corporate restructuring, psychopathy in the workplace, life and executive coaching, project and program management, Six Sigma and Lean process improvement.
He combines all these skills in a unique combination, utilising Six Sigma and project management, to provide modern enlightened companies with truly innovative advice that will create a sustainable competitive advantage. Mr Labour exercises his skills and influence with compassion and deep understanding of the human condition especially where restructures result in overwhelming change and job loss.
He specialises in the following industries: legal and accountancy, telecommunications, transportation and aviation, banking and finance, insurance, government, IT and outsourcing and believes that his experience in these verticals is applicable across all industries, countries, languages, cultures and businesses generally. He has 30 years corporate experience in these industries.
Every single industry he specialises in (telcos, aviation, retail banking, insurance, outsourcing) faces fundamental challenges to continued survival and prosperity in the 21st Century and Mr Labour is well placed to provide a multi-disciplinary approach to uncovering insights for competitive advantage.
He sees the management of strategic, compliance and operational risk as one of the key issues facing executive managers on a daily basis. But not all companies can take advantage of formal Basel II and Sarbannes-Oxley (SOX) governance models.
For those companies that are not in the financial industry but still require strong governance around the management of operational risk, Mr Labour is an expert on creating strategies for managing operational risk supported by strong programme management structures to ensure compliance.
He has been extensively involved in process improvement initiatives within project and production environments. He has delivered Six Sigma Green and Black Belt process improvement programs that provide bottom line improvement whilst maintaining and enhancing employee morale.
He also owns and runs one of the world's most comprehensive web resources on the topic of life and executive coaching containing over 1500 pages of advice and more than 250 articles on life and executive coaching. He has also been quoted in learned papers, newspaper and magazine articles.
He has written a book on life coaching which provides an introduction to life coaching for the general public. He has also written a book on executive coaching, Executive Coaching for Process Improvement Excellence, that provides daily insights for top managers looking to succeed in today's fast paced environment.
He is also a pioneer in the field of coaching and project management having presented a landmark paper on this topic at PMISA 2004 (World Conference on Project Management) in South Africa in May, 04. His paper entitled Sane Project Management, a Life and Executive Coaching Approach has created both a new field in project management and a new area of interest and research for coaching and coaches around the world.
For PMISA 2006 (World Conference on Project Management) he is presenting a paper entitled Project Management and Six Sigma - a convergent and divergent model for solving business problems. He seeks to develop a theoretical and practical model to extract readily applicable business approaches from both divergence and convergence of these two disciplines.
He will explore whether coaching can facilitate the extraction of some of the benefits of this convergence? This will be continuing an exploration of the connection between coaching and project management that he first developed and presented at PMISA 2004.
Mr Labour acknowledges that in today's highly competitive and rapidly changing business environment, a busy consultant, life coach or executive coach must evince a compelling value proposition, as much for himself as for his product and service.
His unique value proposition is bringing to bear, on difficult even intractable business problems, a brilliant mix of both quantitative and qualitative approaches, embracing Six Sigma, Lean, project management, executive coaching, operational and line management.
He has a refreshing engaging and vibrant perspective on life and business in the corporate world. He is able to engage with any company in the world, within his industry expertise and beyond, and provide an assessment of the issues and problems that management suspects exists. He does this on a pro-active basis and confidentially.
He is also able to execute or be involved in the execution of any recommendations resulting from these engagements. He has previously managed large programs of work involving major restructuring, outsourcing and downsizing.
He forecasts a greater demand for people with his unique blend of skills in the future especially where established, staid inefficient companies in otherwise dynamic industries face head-on competition from more efficient home grown companies and those companies thriving in the tiger economies of China and India with their vast pool of cheap, educated and trained local talent.
Mr Labour will be holding an Executive Coaching Retreat in Mauritius between 29 May 06 and June 11 06. Please contact Mr Labour for further details on the retreat. There are places for only 10 executives at this retreat which will focus on the opportunities in China and India.
Life Coaching Tips and Techniques No. 123
Life Coaching Case Study
Coaching for Life Coaches
T is a lady who was born overseas and emigrated to Australia a number of years ago. She is very intelligent but has a number of failures behind her. Some of which are still ongoing and yet to be fully resolved satisfactorily. The degree of loss is known but the exact number is not, at this stage.
She is an attractive person, warm and friendly. She is also severely overweight but her health is not currently seriously affected. Her husband has been stricken with serious life threatening health issues and this has created a lot of unbalance in her life. She previously lived a life as a high flyer supping with the best in the land.
She has made a number of investments on the assumption that her husband will be with there to make them work but unfortunately his illness has forced her to fire sale some of the these investment at quite a substantial loss.
She is currently reeling because the bad investments are now coming home to roost and in essence she will be paying for these mistakes for many years to come with no underlying assets to show for it at the end of the futile repayments. In addition to the above T has also bought a new business which is in its infancy and yet to become profitable and no other employment at this stage.
What to do? Where to go from here?
A life coach assists with this emotional stock taking by purely facilitating the process. There is no need to provide answers just subtle changes in the right direction. Guide the client ship with tiny imperceptible movements. Only when you are comfortable with the client can you make sudden shifts in direction but even then it must seem and feel normal and logical.
Prepare a balance sheet and quantify the loss in monetary terms. Do not count opportunity cost loss just realisable losses. Have a sum that you can look at and get used to. Think of it as financial closure. Of course it is not closure as you still to fund the deficit but from a moving forward point of view it does provide closure because it is a number than cannot get any bigger and cause any more damage. Do not move to the next step until you have done this accounting work. Seek help from an accountant if you can't do it alone or dispassionately enough but you must have a number to work with.
Now that you have the number of your loss, is that amount funded or not? In other words can you fund this loss from your savings or will you need to borrow money to pay it? If you need to borrow, what are the repayments and can you fund those repayments? Will you need a job to meet the repayments?
After you have settled the financial side of things now comes the emotional fall-out and formation of future baggage. The failure to resolve this may have led T to neglect her weight problem. This latter can take you eye off the ball. Without fitness there is no possibility of platform and without platform there can be no success no matter how talented you are.
Now the hard part but it may have to wait just as a cut takes time to form a scar and heal. There may be a period of time between paying off the financial debts of a failure and beginning to count the emotional debts of failure. Prepare an emotional balance sheet. What are the pluses and minuses in this balance sheet. Preparing this balance sheet requires a crystal clear honesty. So this might take some time when (and if) you get around to it. But until such time as you get around to this, you cannot move forward. Here you should be thinking about what it took you in the first place to give this chance a go? When did it all begin to wrong? The cost of you admitting to yourself that it wasn't going to work and the emotional penalties that admission then imposed. This taking stock of the past might take you six months if you were to do it alone with a life coach perhaps 1 month.
The moment you realised you have made a mistake when you're still buried up to your ears in it is a moment never to be forgotten. In fact you will not let yourself forget it. You do this by inflicting excruciating pain on yourself. At that moment there seems no way out but there is even if the way out leaves you naked on the sea shore after the shipwreck. That moment plus perhaps 3 to 6 months is when those people who will seek help seek it. The others never do and they are in a perpetual purgatory, in life coaching limbo unable to go back (too painful) and unable to go forward (no way or technique of overcoming the negative emotions holding them back).
A perceptive life coach is able to clear the way forward by providing a direction in quite small steps. It is not even a technique at this stage, just tentative steps. Coaching the client to see what works and what doesn't. What unlocks and is a step forward, what brings back old memories and is a step backward. In a way this is a mystery to be unearthed, a secret to be uncovered and hidden country to be discovered. This is the meat of being a life coach.
When the client comes to you with this sort of background, everything you do in a session must be towards unlocking the keys to this mystery. Everything they say you must know in advance what it will be and have already worked out the response (not in terms of words back to them) but in terms of the overall direction you should the session. You must be thinking on your feet at 100 mph but without the client knowing.
Being nervous plays no part in being a life coach. If you are nervous working with strangers on an intimate basis, then life coaching is not for you. The point is that you must be as perceptive and sensitive as an artist but having a solid platform yourself that is analytical and results oriented. It must so you are being paid a lot of money by the client. They are paying for real direction and results not some fantastic or artistic exposition of their character or habits.
BTW T is not a real person but a composite used for the sake of exposition and teaching.
About Gilbert Labour
Mr Labour is a strategist, consultant, adviser, speaker and presenter on corporate restructuring, psychopathy in the workplace, life and executive coaching, project and program management, Six Sigma and Lean process improvement.
He combines all these skills in a unique combination, utilising Six Sigma and project management, to provide modern enlightened companies with truly innovative advice that will create a sustainable competitive advantage. Mr Labour exercises his skills and influence with compassion and deep understanding of the human condition especially where restructures result in overwhelming change and job loss.
He specialises in the following industries: legal and accountancy, telecommunications, transportation and aviation, banking and finance, insurance, government, IT and outsourcing and believes that his experience in these verticals is applicable across all industries, countries, languages, cultures and businesses generally. He has 30 years corporate experience in these industries.
Every single industry he specialises in (telcos, aviation, retail banking, insurance, outsourcing) faces fundamental challenges to continued survival and prosperity in the 21st Century and Mr Labour is well placed to provide a multi-disciplinary approach to uncovering insights for competitive advantage.
He sees the management of strategic, compliance and operational risk as one of the key issues facing executive managers on a daily basis. But not all companies can take advantage of formal Basel II and Sarbannes-Oxley (SOX) governance models.
For those companies that are not in the financial industry but still require strong governance around the management of operational risk, Mr Labour is an expert on creating strategies for managing operational risk supported by strong programme management structures to ensure compliance.
He has been extensively involved in process improvement initiatives within project and production environments. He has delivered Six Sigma Green and Black Belt process improvement programs that provide bottom line improvement whilst maintaining and enhancing employee morale.
He also owns and runs one of the world's most comprehensive web resources on the topic of life and executive coaching containing over 1500 pages of advice and more than 250 articles on life and executive coaching. He has also been quoted in learned papers, newspaper and magazine articles.
He has written a book on life coaching which provides an introduction to life coaching for the general public. He has also written a book on executive coaching, Executive Coaching for Process Improvement Excellence, that provides daily insights for top managers looking to succeed in today's fast paced environment.
He is also a pioneer in the field of coaching and project management having presented a landmark paper on this topic at PMISA 2004 (World Conference on Project Management) in South Africa in May, 04. His paper entitled Sane Project Management, a Life and Executive Coaching Approach has created both a new field in project management and a new area of interest and research for coaching and coaches around the world.
For PMISA 2006 (World Conference on Project Management) he is presenting a paper entitled Project Management and Six Sigma - a convergent and divergent model for solving business problems. He seeks to develop a theoretical and practical model to extract readily applicable business approaches from both divergence and convergence of these two disciplines.
He will explore whether coaching can facilitate the extraction of some of the benefits of this convergence? This will be continuing an exploration of the connection between coaching and project management that he first developed and presented at PMISA 2004.
Mr Labour acknowledges that in today's highly competitive and rapidly changing business environment, a busy consultant, life coach or executive coach must evince a compelling value proposition, as much for himself as for his product and service.
His unique value proposition is bringing to bear, on difficult even intractable business problems, a brilliant mix of both quantitative and qualitative approaches, embracing Six Sigma, Lean, project management, executive coaching, operational and line management.
He has a refreshing engaging and vibrant perspective on life and business in the corporate world. He is able to engage with any company in the world, within his industry expertise and beyond, and provide an assessment of the issues and problems that management suspects exists. He does this on a pro-active basis and confidentially.
He is also able to execute or be involved in the execution of any recommendations resulting from these engagements. He has previously managed large programs of work involving major restructuring, outsourcing and downsizing.
He forecasts a greater demand for people with his unique blend of skills in the future especially where established, staid inefficient companies in otherwise dynamic industries face head-on competition from more efficient home grown companies and those companies thriving in the tiger economies of China and India with their vast pool of cheap, educated and trained local talent.
Mr Labour will be holding an Executive Coaching Retreat in Mauritius between 29 May 06 and June 11 06. Please contact Mr Labour for further details on the retreat. There are places for only 10 executives at this retreat which will focus on the opportunities in China and India.
Life Coaching Tips and Techniques No. 10
Obesity and the roller coaster ride from nadir to zenith and back
There are five journeys in obesity, which one are you on now?
Why are there obese people when there are people starving in the world? Is obesity a medical problem rather than
one of lack of self-control or perhaps even one using food for sexual/sensual gratification for masking (?) the real problems?
How successful is someone who is 250 kilos at 'masking' or hiding the problem?
The five journeys is obesity are -
Getting there becoming obese, this is the easiest journey of all and happens almost without you knowing. This journey is on the road to death.
Staying there at a steady weight, this is a hard journey because the tendency is to put on more weight not less. This journey is a slow death.
The next journey is one into hell and that is on the road to putting on more and more weight. This is the last journey these people even embark on.
This journey ends in death.
The penultimate journey and the one with the most difficulty starting is the road back away from obesity. The enormous journey back is not the problem
but the first step back, the first gram lost. This journey is not a journey of weight loss but a journey to lose the fears and problems that the weight gain had
temporarily put on the back burner. This second last journey is the life coaching journey and has much less to do with weight loss, exercise and fitness and more to do with
facing problems in their real intensity and fury perhaps for the first time since the decision taken to embark on the first journey.
The last journey and that is to keep the weight at the target weight after the massive task of weight loss because again the tendency is to put the weight back on
even faster than before and much much faster than it was lost. For every gram lost a kilo is put on.
Work with a life coach who understands your weight problem is not a weight problem but a personal problem posing, impersonating a weight problem. Someone who knows which
journey you are on and can make sure you either move to the next healthy journey or stay at the healthy journey you're on.
New Life Coaching Service Model - All Inclusive Platinum Service
Product Features
One new low totally all inclusive monthly fee ($400 AUS) - currently this is $500 AUS. Saving $100 AUS per month.
No contracts whatsoever, pay as you go month by month. Start when you want, stop when you want. No questions asked.
No need to furnish more than your first name. No notes taken during any sessions and no personal identifying details asked for, required or noted down.
Coaching can take place exclusively by phone and/or internet but it is preferred that an initial one on one session take place but this is not essential.
All inclusive, no exclusions, all services available (as per below).
Paid once a month at the beginning of the month (non refundable if cancelled during month).
Entitled to the full range of services (one on one, SMS, Mobile, Phone, ICQ, MSN Messenger, MS Netmeeting) on an as required basis. But does not
include CD and video conferencing products.
Use as much of the service as you require but please note as coaching is a relationship which requires and places responsibility on you to complete
agreed upon tasks, there will be regular scheduled feedback and catchup sessions. These are usually by phone or ICQ.
Clearly articulated and set goals such as embarking on a new career, changing careers, developing new small business, creating small business growth,
preparation for retirement, developing additional income in/for retirement.
These services include small business development coaching, product development and promotion, and press release preparation.
Payment and services commences in the calendar month of first payment and lasts till the end of the next month, then regular monthy payments commence on the 1st of each month thereafter (for example) ---
Paid 1 month on 15th of July - $400
Payment due on 1st August - Nil
Payment due on 1st September - $400
Payment and services terminates at the end of the calendar month of the last payment as follows (for example) ---
Payment made on 1st October - $400
Decision to cancel made 4th October and notice to do so received on that day or any day within the month
No refund policy but services available until 31st October if required
No further payments then required due to cancellation
The Platinum Life Coaching Product is now the only life coaching product available aside from
tailored programs and the featured programs.
50% Discount for bona fide students. The fee for students is $200 per month.
You will receive an exceptional level of service and care from one of the best life coaches practicing today.
Coaching Programs
555 Program
The 555 Program is complementary to the 333 Program and is part of a family of programs called The Numbered Series, a simplification of a plethora of products, services and programs into
a number of specifically targeted set of programs that target a very specific audience with a limited amount of time and resources to devote to a life and executive coaching program. The programs
covers a set of goals over a set period for a specific (one time only) fee.
The key goals of the 555 Program is to be able to run 5k in 5 months, to solve 5 life coaching issues or problems in 5 months and to investigate and resolve 5 executive coaching problems
in 5 months.
Life Coaching Portal Programs
Beyond the existing Diamond program being run on the portal, a series of additional programs are being developed to be run for specific audiences and which have very clear targets and goals.
These include the following.
The 555 Program
Gilbert Labour, will personally run this program. It will probably take in the region of 10 suitable people and run for 5 months. The program is multi-faceted and covers three main streams a fitness stream, a life coaching stream
dealing with personal issues and an executive stream to supercharge your work, business and corporate environment.
The first stream is a fitness element. The goal is to be able to run 5k (non stop) in five months and be able to lose 5 kilos in the process. This is a modest achievement and is considered a healthy approach to fitness generally.
I am a former fitness instructor and dance teacher and can provide guidance in this area. You will need a clearance from your doctor if you're over 45.
The second stream is a life coaching element. The goal of the life coaching is to investigate a number of current personal issues and focus on 5 for resolution in 5 months. One to be resolved or at least worked on each month.
The third stream is an executive coaching element. The goal of this element is to come up with five goals or issues to be dealt with in the 5 months of the program. These could involve working towards a promotion, changing jobs, changing careers,
leaving the corporate environment and developing a small business. For the hard core executives and other corporate thrivers and survivors there will be a number of areas that include executive interview training and executive decision making that can be covered.
There are many others and these can be chosen based on your current goals. The aim of this stream is canvass all the possibilities and focus on only 5 and work through each one.
The cost of the program varies. To take part on a one-on-one basis with Gilbert Labour will cost $5000. To take part in a group setting will cost $2000. Individual programs can start at anytime considered suitable.
To provide this program on a company wide basis (more than 10 people), please call Gilbert Labour for a quote.
Please call Gilbert Labour on 0409 223 436 if you would like to take part. Further information on the 555 Program is available from the portal.
General Information
I also do a small amount of pro-bono work in the area of life coaching. I belong to the Life Coaching Pro Bono Group (LCPBG), a group of life coaches I am putting together to do this type of work for people in need but who may not be able to afford the services of a full fee life coach. We make allowances for your circumstances and also on the understanding that once you're back on your
feet, your capacity to contribute to your life coaching will also improve.
Generally speaking, we will set clear goals, we will put in place plans to attain those goals, we will execute the plan effectively. We will monitor and survey the results and ensure our goals are met. In most cases, we will envelope what we are trying to achieve into a coaching programme.
I operate flexibly taking into account the needs of the client as we progress with the programme.
Please call me on my mobile (0409 223 436) for a confidential discussion to begin the journey of self discovery.
Linking to My Site - send me details of your URL. Please note I will only link to your site if your site appears on the search engines already. When you send details of your site, please advise
which search engines the site appears on. If you do not follow this rule, I will delete your request immediately. Please also no "home business" or no content web sites or those that use those robotised
link lists.
