These are notes on my coaching experiment that’s taking place on Lift. The program is called Look before you Lift and Batch 2 will be opening up soon.

Batch 1 date: 11/13/2014 - 11/19/2014
Number of coachees: 9

Program description:

This is a 1-week guided self-reflection program that can be used before you get started on your other Lift goals or after you’ve lapsed from something that worked for a while. I hope to help you reveal the hidden obstacles that trip you up whenever you attempt to change your behavior in a way that sticks.

With a short casual semi-structured chat every day, we’ll talk and learn about old and new obstacles in your life, understand what keeps them there, what they’re blocking, and how they’re connected together.

By the end of a week I hope to help you have at least one new idea for a new Lift goal that has a high chance of succeeding and improving the quality of your life.

First question is: Which 1-3 of these things could you use more of today? energy, clarity, human connection, productivity, fun, none, or other. We’ll build from there.

And of course, if it doesn’t work out for any reason, I’ll refund the full cost.

Results:

After a week of casual conversation with 9 people, here are some results

• 2/9 dropped out before getting very far and I never heard from them again
• 3/9 made some progress but didn’t complete my end-of-week survey
• 4/9 completed my end-of-week survey

Of those 4 who completed the end-of-week survey:

• 100% said “We talked about an objective in my life that is important to me”.
• 75% said “I identified at least 1 hidden reason that was blocking me from my objective”.
• 50% said “I discovered a new idea for a Lift goal that will help me towards my objective”.
• And 25% said “I learned something new about myself”.

When rated 1-10 on likelihood of recommending the program to peers:

• 2 rated it 10
• 2 rated it 8

Reviews posted with their permission:

“From my end, this was the briefest and most to-the-point coaching interaction I’ve been part of (which is actually a lot of them!) but it still seemed effective in solving a specific problem. My suspicion is that the most effective interventions are more brief, more focused on a single problem and lead to working on one new habit/action.”

“Brief, direct questions drilled down to the root of my problem quickly. Left conversation with a specific, measurable way to make progress. Asynchronous a plus.”

“Buster’s slow and methodical approach uncovers personal narratives that prevent you from achieving your goals.”

“Buster has an uncanny ability to read your emotionally charged messages and distill them into actionable goals. He asks all the right ?s.”

“Buster slowly and patiently encourages you to understand yourself. It’s methodical and illuminating.”

Join the next batch from here