The New Year is approaching and professional and personal growth occurs when we select a new experience. The challenge is what do you want to accomplish, how will it benefit you and how will you do it?

In my classes, I ask participants to write down a skill they would like to strengthen and ask them to partner with someone in the class. They establish a timetable with this partner and periodically check on the status of progress toward the goal with him / her.

In my experience, having a partner or coach holding you accountable helps move the process along. I have personal trainer I meet twice a week. He is very good at making sure the exercises are done properly. He also holds me accountable to workout. If he did not, I probably would not exercise because business and personal needs always seem to intrude!

Asking someone to hold me accountable keeps me on track which is good for my physical and mental well-being. Would I exercise on my own?  Probably not. As I go into year two, I found that having a coach is critical to achieve my goal of staying healthy.

I have been having issues with my Mac Air since updating the operating system. At a recent session, while I tried to determine why my logins were not working, the Apple associate helping me was new. He tried several options and they did not work. Instead of trying more options he went to his boss and they thought I should go back to the technical person I use.

He could tell this bothered me so he went to another associate and asked him to lend a hand. Sure enough, this other associate solved the problem for me! What I found amazing is that this young associate was willing to go the extra mile to help me out. He did not just quit. He also learned from the more seasoned person how to fix my problem. A win-win if there ever was one!

In the US, the presidential elections have thrown conversations and accusations down the rabbit hole where actual issues get more personal than policy driven. It seems that in our politics today, honesty is clouded. Name calling then becomes the narrative.

In the workplace, sometimes actual issues are skirted around to avoid offending others. The worst thing that can occur is when real issues never get resolved. The elephant in the room gets larger and looms over not what is said, but what is inferred. It is important to dialog honestly without resorting to gutter-speak.

This lesson can be applied to my role. When coaching clients who have not been told or have not truly heard the critical issues holding them back, it is important to get to the heart of the subject. My job is to ask questions that help the client realize what it takes to be successful. For that to occur, they must be honest with themselves. That allows for graceful conversations.

“Figure Out the Things You Don’t Know” came out of a recent interview with Drew Houston, the CEO of Dropbox. That resonated with me because I am in the process of completing a course that teaches a coaching approach that ensures the client will always walk away with a solution to an issue.

The course is a six-month program for 2.5 hours a week. The main purpose for me was to start working toward a master certification with ICF (International Coaching Federation). Going in, I thought if I also learned something new, that would be terrific. However, since I have been coaching clients for more than 20 years, my expectations were low.

How wrong I was! The new learnings have been instrumental in helping me help my clients succeed. I had been so busy with work I fell behind in taking new courses which I used to take at the rate of at least six programs a year. This was an eye opening experience. My recommendation is take a course or program to further your professional or personal life. It just might enrich you!

Joe Lacob, the majority owner of the Golden State Warriors, has worked in venture capital for three decades. This season, Lacob’s sixth as majority owner, the Warriors are on pace to break the league record of 72 wins in a season (which is just 82 games long). I’m a professional listener,” he told me. “There are a lot of smart people in the world, you know. I’m not the smartest. I’m just an integrator.” We can all learn from Joe Lacob.

Recently in a class, the instructor said: I don’t mean to be so direct and abrupt in giving feedback but it is because I want to catch the moment when the correction is made. Well, as good as that sounds, if you are a seasoned professional or just starting out as a coach, mentor or instructor you will go a long way if you using inclusivity in your feedback. Instead of saying something like “It is definitely the wrong approach”, you might say: “A different approach might work like this…”

When you are demeaned, it erects a wall of defense and emotional turmoil gets in the way of what might be a learning experience. Years ago, I learned from a top producer who was quite mean while training me. Did I get it, I sure did. But the scars remain and whenever someone reminds me of her, I run in the opposite direction!