In this podcast episode, Kate and Kerry explain their coaching services for directors, emphasizing its importance for skill application and long-term program improvement. They distinguish coaching from consulting and therapy, aiming to empower directors rather than create dependency. They discuss their affordable rates and non-pressurizing approach, cautioning listeners about high-fee, long-term coaching commitments. They also advise thorough research before hiring a coach. They reveal their coaching schedule and encourage listeners to avail of their services. Upcoming episodes on end-of-year finances and business planning are mentioned, and listeners are invited to engage with the show.
Thanks for Listening 🎙
In this podcast episode, Kate and Kerry explain their coaching services for directors, emphasizing its importance for skill application and long-term program improvement. They distinguish coaching from consulting and therapy, aiming to empower directors rather than create dependency. They discuss their affordable rates and non-pressurizing approach, cautioning listeners about high-fee, long-term coaching commitments. They also advise thorough research before hiring a coach. They reveal their coaching schedule and encourage listeners to avail of their services. Upcoming episodes on end-of-year finances and business planning are mentioned, and listeners are invited to engage with the show.
Thanks for Listening 🎙
Marie (00:00:01) - Welcome to childcare conversations with Kate and Carrie.
Carrie (00:00:05) - Hey guys. So Kate and I are here to chit chat and bring you into the conversation. And we had a question. Well, I had a question in a director's class that I just taught, and they said, so why do you offer coaching to your directors at such a low rate? Meaning they did not have to pay anything else after they paid for the class, and when they renewed, they got five hours for $75. They're like, nobody offers coaching, five hours for $75. Why do we do that? So I figured we could talk about it here on the podcast.
Kate (00:00:43) - I think that's a great idea. So one of. The things that is really important when anytime you're learning a new skill is to know that you're learning that skill. But when you're in a class setting or even learning it on your own, well, you're with a group of people where if you're doing it in a small group or a one on one, you're still learning the same skills, but you're learning it with a coach specifically for you.
Kate (00:01:07) - Very little about what we do in coaching or in our director credentialing classes are rocket science, but one of the things that we do do with coaching is help you apply it to your your situation and for you personally. And it's all about the work that you do. But yes, it's it is a commitment. Um, you don't have to take your coaching all at one time. We do encourage folks to do that. To take their five hours is a five hour block so that they get to either master a skill, identify some skills or issues, and it's not consulting and think that's the big thing, Carrie, is that we get a lot of people who think that those five hours, we're just going to do the work for them.
Carrie (00:01:55) - Yeah. And sometimes they call because they're having a specific issue, and it's really a one hour issue and they don't need all five hours. And I get that. I'm thinking of a particular program right now who had a problem with a flea infestation in the playground because there were were some there was some wildlife that when the kids weren't out there, they thought this playground looked like a good place for them to play to.
Carrie (00:02:22) - And they were leaving their flea friends behind, and it was becoming a problem for the kids. Well, that's probably not a five hour coaching situation. So in that situation, you know, that was a one hour coaching situation. So we talked through okay, where do you think the fleas are coming from. What have you already tried. What are the resources in the community. You know. So there was a little bit of consulting because sometimes the answer was I don't know, Carrie. That's why I called you. Um, and so we had to do a little bit of consulting in there. So that I could tell them a couple of resources, but more often, what we would love for the coaching to be and what it is sometimes, um, is my enrollment, usually by this time of the year is at this point. And instead we're we're back in, you know, 2022 numbers. And I was expecting to be back in 2019 numbers by this point in the fall. What what should I do?
Carrie (00:03:30) - And that's the kind of coaching that I think is much more impactful to your program long term than how to deal with a flea infestation.
Kate (00:03:40) - Absolutely. So we absolutely can help you with any of your operational systems through a coaching engagement. We can also talk to you about, you know, the number one, the title of our book, right from Going from Overwhelm to I've Got This. So sometimes as directors and owners, we are overwhelmed, but we're overwhelmed, not entirely because of the business. And so with that five hours of coaching engagement, we might explore areas outside of your day-to-day operations that might be having an impact on your ability to be the director. So, for example, if you are in the middle of a life transition and this life transition can be because of death or divorce, or maybe you are all of a sudden an empty nester, whatever that life transition might look like for you, it does mean that there's probably an awful lot going on over here that you're trying to compartmentalize and leaving its container, but you just can't always keep the lid on, right? Sometimes it's going to seep over into your day job.
Kate (00:04:53) - And so we want to be there to help you so that you can move through. And. We're not therapists. We're. We're not even consultants in our coaching endeavors. Um, but we're there to help you walk yourself through it and move forward. So coaches are always just like sports coaches. Our job is to help you be a better person, better manager, better owner. We're not there to tell you how to do it. Um, but to help you identify the things that you know for yourself, you should be doing. We might give you suggestions. We might help you brainstorm some ideas, but we're never going to sit there and go, you must do it this way or it won't work. Yeah, because not every program is the same, and not every director is the same.
Carrie (00:05:42) - Yeah. So the coaching can be that whole I've got a flea infestation. I've got licensing all up in my business about this certain thing. It can be I need some help with changing my enrollment procedures or my marketing procedures because I don't have the number of kids that I should have.
Carrie (00:06:03) - Maybe you're having some life changes. Maybe you're having some culture issues at your school, and there's some backbiting or some gossiping or an attitude of malaise where everybody's like, well, that's not my job. That's not my job. All of these things are things that we can help with, with coaching and the reason we give it to our directors, the people who come through director credentialing for such a low cost as opposed to what we normally charge in a second, Kate, you can tell them what we normally charge. That's not my job. That's your job. Uh, um, is because the average lifespan of a director is 15 months, and it's because of that whole getting overwhelmed thing. We don't want you to get overwhelmed. We want you to go get coaching. So our directors, the last time we did a survey, you know, we went back and we were like, this person's been with us since this date. ET cetera. So the last time we did the survey, they were like four years.
Carrie (00:07:07) - Is that right, Kate? Those people stayed with the Texas director. And if you've been a director in the state of Texas for four years with a credentialing agency, you almost automatically qualify for a permanent credential with the state. So just because they only stayed with us for four years doesn't mean they left. But that's a huge difference between 15 months and 48 months. And I put a lot of the reason for why more people make it for years, to the fact that those people know they have the resource of being able to come and get that coaching from us. So, Kate, what do we normally charge for coaching if they're not using the coaching that they get with their course?
Kate (00:07:49) - Great question Carrie. So our sessions always come in a minimum of a six-week engagement. And a standard six-week engagement is $1,500. So $1500. So you get that for free. As a Texas director, you get five, five not.
Carrie (00:08:08) - Not five six week sessions.
Kate (00:08:10) - No, you get five total hours. However, we also have folks who are coming in for larger-scale programs or projects, such as exit strategy or even onboarding strategy.
Kate (00:08:26) - In other words, they're buying a program and they want to be best prepared for that, or they know it's time for them to retire and sell. And that generally starts about $2400. Why? Well, Carrie and I have the training. We do follow the International Coaching Federation code of ethics. We use the term coach because we have the credentials recognized internationally for over 20 years. As coaches, we aren't using the term coach because, well, we felt like it and know there's all kinds.
Carrie (00:09:00) - Of childcare coaches out there. There's the one in Cal, there's the one in Colorado, there's the one in Nevada, there's that one in Houston. There's lots of them.
Kate (00:09:11) - You're right. Anybody can always throw Coach on the end of their name. What I would like to encourage you to do, as somebody listening to this podcast is do your homework, ask the hard questions, or maybe not even all that hard. Ask the questions. Ask them if they're a member. You know what? You can go look on International Coaching Federation and see who is a member.
Kate (00:09:35) - You ask them where they got their training. You know, if they have a degree in psychology that doesn't make them a coach. If they have been in an affiliated program or they have clients who are in child cares, doesn't mean that they're an expert in child care. So that's a whole different rant. And Carrie's been down that road and we can go there a little bit, but I just want. Sure to make sure that you're doing your homework so that when you're hiring someone who uses the term coach versus consultant, big, big, big suggestion or big idea with that is if they're telling you what to do, they're not a coach, they're a consultant. And, you know, I'm here to help you get there. And yeah, I might give you ideas. I will definitely give you homework, but I'm not going to do it for you. So if all I do is tell you everything I know, then you're going to have a hard time being able to help yourself. So my goal is that that the end of a sixth engagement session.
Kate (00:10:35) - You're done with me on that topic. Okay. This isn't one of those things where I'm going to charge you 600, $2,000 a month every month, and you're never going. You're always going to feel like you need me, because that's not the goal here.
Carrie (00:10:48) - No no no no no no. Because I know for a fact that the biggest child care coaching organization in the world wants you to be paying that coaching fee at a minimum of $500 a month, and then they only want you to do that for six months, and then they want you to move up to the $1,500 a month, and then you're supposed to pay that for the next 5 to 10 years. But there's a level above that which is called enterprise. So that can't be right, Kate, that it that a coach wants you to outgrow them. That can't be right.
Kate (00:11:24) - Well then that's the that's the big difference between a coach and a consultant. So really what you've got are flashy salespeople who are using the term coach, haven't done the training, don't have the certification, don't really understand.
Kate (00:11:37) - And they've gotten really good at flashy communication, flashy ads. Carrie can almost always tell you at what point in time the sales pitch is going to come. So if you are ever attending a one, two, three, four day conference for our conference, Carrie will tell you, okay, so we're an hour, two and a half. We're a day two day, two and a half, and the sales pitch is coming. So there's no sales pitch here. If you choose to stay, we're usually going to be jumping to a different topic because my goal is at the end of six engagements, you're where you need to be in that area. So if you've come to me to help me, for me to help you with marketing or getting butts in your seats, you're going to be done with that in six weeks. Now, if you then decide you have hiring issues or personnel issues or parent communication issues, that might be another engagement period. That's different than me telling you what to do every week with a group of other people.
Kate (00:12:36) - So again, know what you're paying for. If you've got coaching with Carrie and it's with us, it is not with a small group unless we've specifically told you we're doing a group training.
Carrie (00:12:47) - Okay. So hopefully that answers the question of why do Kate and Carrie give coaching to our directors at such a discounted rate? And how much is that discount really? Um, so the discount is you're getting more in coaching than you are paying for the class. So if you don't want to use it, we're not going to pressure you because we're not high-pressure salespeople. And if you don't want to use that service that you have.
Kate (00:13:22) - 500 to 600 clients every year, we can't do that for everybody. Um, so, yeah. So if you do think if you are ever curious, Texas Director usually has between 500 and 600 clients a year. Uh, so if you are interested, I will tell you that the schedule does have a tendency to fill up. I do take people on a six week rotation, and our next rotation will start through in January or in December.
Kate (00:13:47) - So if you've got some interest and you're not really sure and you want to take advantage of your coaching that comes with your class or your renewal, it doesn't mean that other people can't sign up and do coaching. But if you want your included coaching, um, the next round will start in December.
Carrie (00:14:08) - Okay, so hopefully that answers all the questions like I said, and we'll talk to you next week. It's getting towards the end of the year guys. So we may be talking about end of year finances in the next couple of weeks. Maybe some business planning look for that. It'll definitely be some of those heavier business topics coming up as we get to the end of the year. But we'll we'll try to mix it up with some fun stuff to your last.
Kate (00:14:39) - The last eight weeks of 2023.
Carrie (00:14:41) - Oh, that sounds.
Carrie (00:14:43) - Like a lot. Okay, so as we say, most episodes, please go on to your favorite podcast listening app, like the show, subscribe or follow depending on what it's called on your podcast app.
Carrie (00:14:59) - And write a review if you haven't. Once you write a review, take a screen capture and send it over to Kate@Texas Director.org and she will get you your t-shirt. Okay, see you next week.
Marie (00:15:14) - Thank you for listening to Child Care Conversations with Kate and Kerry. Want to learn more? Check out our website at Texas Director George and if you've learned anything today, leave us a comment below and share the show.