Am I in the right place?
If you are considering my coaching program, I know you have questions. You may even have concerns. No worries … that’s why I created this FAQ page.
So, let’s address everything head on — and by the end of this page, you’ll have the answers to the questions that, I imagine, are on your mind.
You’re focused on doing the work … it’s a full-time job and then some. You need someone watching your back, looking out for you, telling you not only what’s new on the practice development front but also showing you why it works and how it can work for you.
And if you’re a one-person army you only have one-person perspective. If you keep operating this way, you’re putting yourself at an incredible disadvantage: you’re expending massive amounts of energy just to sustain yourself. And you’re not learning, growing, or reaching your full potential because you simply run out of time and effort.
Also, no one you know achieved the rarified status of sports legend, industry influencer, or business icon without a coach. It just doesn’t happen. So I say this with deep respect: What makes you think you can go it alone? And even if you could, why would you want to?
This is a tough question. And the answer lies in how you would select anyone to work with you in any capacity: you ask your friends/colleagues for referrals, you visit their websites, you read their content, you interview candidates, and then go with your gut.
And there are three key questions to keep asking yourself along the way:
- Do you believe what they say?
- Do you believe they can do what they say they can do?
- Do you believe they have your best interests in mind?
Regarding that last question, I tell my clients: I don’t have a cookie cutter approach to practice building. And while I help you turn the practice you have into the practice you want … it is the practice that you want for you, not the one I want for you.
Even when you know you need one, hiring a coach can be a challenge. It’s important to take a step back and look at what you want to get out of the experience.
A coach is someone who tells you what you don’t want to hear, who has you see what you don’t want to see, so you can be who you have always known you could be.
– Tom Landry, Dallas Cowboys Head Coach (1960-1988)
A one-to-one coaching program should offer you:
1. Specific goals and results
In a one-on-one setting, you’ll focus on highly intentional goals aligned with your coach’s specialty. These tend to be short-term, specific targets with clear results attached.
2. Undivided personal attention
You’ll have the direct focus of a subject matter expert all to yourself. For a set and concentrated amount of time, your coach will guide and encourage you. S/he is readily available to provide resources, answer questions, and most importantly, keep you on track.
3. Tactical breakthroughs
The dedicated time with your coach allows you to create an action plan to achieve your results. Together, you collaborate on your desired breakthrough results and determine the steps you need to take to get there. Your progress won’t often stray beyond the area for which you sought help, but you’ll have a tactical blueprint to work from in the area where you did.
Yes, that is how all my coaching is currently done. That said, all one-to-one coaching clients come together three times a year for a 2-3 hour “Accelerator” event for a deep dive on a topic that is of interest to everyone. Past event topics have included pricing, differentiation, one-to-many, scaling, and hiring. The events always include a subject matter expert guest speaker.
A group coaching program should offer you:
1. Strategic thinking
Group coaching is more focused on overall vision and strategy, i.e., the big picture. The emphasis is on new ideas and possibility thinking and applying strategies, tactics, and tools to multiple areas of your practice.
2. Positive peer pressure
You have not only the support of a coach but also the encouragement of the other practitioners who are rooting for your success. If you connect with the members, feel it’s a safe zone for growth, and tell the truth about what you want, you’ll have a built-in group of accountability partners.
3. Community and collective intelligence
Being in a group setting gives you the opportunity to compare notes, benefit from new ideas, and build relationships with like-minded people. Each participant is an expert in something and brings a new dimension to the table. Since many people seeking coaching are outliers in some way, they feel motivated and encouraged by having a community of people who relate to them.
Not yet, but I am working on it!
I think of coaching is a fact-finding experience while mentoring is a fact-transferring experience. Coaches search for discovery while mentors impart discovery … generally in the form of experiences that they have had on their journey to success in a particular field of expertise. A mentor not only has to have experience in a particular field but also a level of success that other people aspire to.
Much of my coaching is coaching and mentoring as I have deep experience in the BVFLS world and a level of success that my clients aspire to. (FWIW, people also normally associate coaching with someone outside their firm while mentoring happens with someone inside their firm.)
I help “mostly” successful BVFLS professionals focus on the art and science of building/growing their practices so that they can get more time, money, and freedom out of the work they do. And I say “mostly” successful because I find many practitioners hit a time or income ceiling and never have the impact or make the money they are capable of. They are stuck in “Stability” mode and are not achieving the version of the successful practice they envisioned when they started this work.
I define practice building as turning the practice you have into the practice you want. That is, everyone has their own idea of what a successful practice looks like to them. Some practitioners want more money … others want more time (and less stress) … most want the freedom that time and money provide. Bridging the gap between the practice you have and the practice you want is the transformation my coaching offers.
It depends! It depends on where you’re starting, where you want to end up, and how much time and effort you can invest on a weekly basis to get there. And I know that’s a milk-toast kind of answer. That’s why I cushion the uncertainty by giving you a month-to-month “lease” on our work together after the first three months.
The genius of people with successful practices like Hitchner, Mercer, Trugman, Pratt, Grabowski, Fannon, et al. is something we admire. But their genius is just many years of work/effort/dedication that others could have invested in … but didn’t.
We often assume talent or intelligence is innate … that people are born with “it.” Yet research shows focus – and its siblings, consistency and persistency – is more important to success than raw talent or high intelligence. This applies to building a practice.
So, whatever it is that you want to be a genius at, it is well within your reach when you do the work with monomaniacal focus and show up consistently and persistently.
Because everyone says they do good work! But how do you prove good work?
Thus, in addition to doing good work, it takes Authority to build a practice. Authority is your true competitive advantage, and it stems from:
- Having specialized knowledge AND advancing your unique perspective of it.
- Being known for that expertise AND getting recognized for it.
Combining the points above, I hope you can see that:
- You can’t be a generalist and have Authority.
- You can’t have Authority if no one knows you exist.
When you know how to MARKET (create awareness about who you are and what you do), SELL (convert interested prospects into paying clients), and DELIVER (convey your results as solutions instead of services) you will have all the tools necessary to get away from The Practice You Have and build/grow The Practice You Want.
Here’s what you get:
- Begin with a deep-dive JumpStart Interview to understand your needs/goals.
- Receive JumpStart Brief with 3-12 month tailored plan to get started.
- Immediate access to all resources and materials.
- Twice monthly 1:1 coaching sessions (CPE; can self-record).
- Unlimited email/text message support between calls.
- Weekly Practice Builder BYTES emails (where you hear about everything first).
- Topical Practice Builder ACCELERATOR coaching event every four months (CPE).
- Practice Builder BOARDROOM Facebook community (private).
My current client roster includes BVFLS practitioners in all three categories. However, I collaborate primarily with professionals who run 1-3 person practices, want better clients, better work, and better fees but struggle to find the time to focus on these things, and are able to unilaterally implement the strategies and tactics we discuss to accomplish those things.
There isn’t anything unique about the practitioners I work with. Except one day they decided they wanted better outcomes (more time, more money, more freedom) from their practices and were willing to invest in the work to make it happen. So really, that’s it.
The best way to get started is to schedule a ‘fit’ call with me, here. On a 20-minute call, I’ll ask some questions to determine if and how I can help you. If I feel like I can’t help you, I’ll let you know straight away … and I’ll try to point you in a better direction. But if I feel like I can help you, … we’ll book a follow-up strategy session to talk about the next steps.
Any coaching program is not an inexpensive investment of time or money. My program is no exception. But you also have to ask yourself, “What is the cost of not hiring me?” And, “What is the value of a transformation?”
The current investment for new coaching clients is $1200 per month. It is priced to yield a monthly 8-10x ROI on the average fee for every new client that you would not have otherwise obtained without our work together.
You do not! I ask my coaching clients to give the coaching program 90 days. That gives them a chance to see if we are a mutual fit and calculate the positive ROI from the early results they are getting. For that, I ask that new clients pay upfront for three months of coaching. But after that, we go month-to-month. If for whatever reason you want to stop coaching, you simply stop (or pause) and there are no hard feelings about being held to a long-term contract.
My coaching program is for practitioners who:
- Are confident about the work they do and don’t understand why they can’t sell more of it.
- Want to magnetically attract their ideal clients and not be afraid to repel those who are not.
- Are interested in augmenting their traditional 1:1 client service work with a 1:many product/service.
- Want to use their new-found time, money, and freedom to pursue a personal or professional passion.
My coaching program is not for practitioners who:
- Are not already technically competent at their craft.
- Just want more clients and not more for clients (or for themselves).
- Are unable to unilaterally implement the strategies/tactics we devise for getting the clients they want at the fees they deserve.
- Don’t value helping other appraisers and contributing to the profession just as much as they value making money.
I have been fortunate in that past and current clients have favorably acknowledged my coaching program. Here are just a few of the testimonials I have received, and you can read more on my LinkedIn profile.
Many practitioners say they want to build/grow their practices and do something meaningful with the time, money, and freedom they get from their transformation. After many years as a BVFLS practitioner and coach, I can tell you that few put in the work required to do that. I am here to work with a select few who are willing to make the effort.
So before I take you on as a client, I first do the best I can to assure that we are a mutual fit. I ask all sorts of probing questions about you and your practice in a Zoom call to weed out tire kickers. If we’re a fit, if you have 3-5 hours a week to devote to implement the strategies and tactics we discuss, if you put in the effort consistently and persistently, and if you really want to make a change … there is a very high likelihood that my coaching program will work for you.
Yes, in the sense that I bring the same toolbox to every coaching engagement. There is seldom a problem that I haven’t seen before since most problems distill down into a client wanting more time, more money, or more freedom from their practice.
But no, in the fact that a client and I design an individualized game plan to solve their specific problem. And it’s my job to know which tools – in which order – will create their vision of a successful practice. Then, I further support them with access to a library of resources and help from a community of fellow practitioners to keep them informed, motivated, and accountable.
I do! I do! Thanks to Zoom, we can track your cumulative time in all our coaching calls. At the end of the calendar year, my Client Success Manager takes that time, divides by 50 minutes, and issuse a CPE certificate for the Communications and Marketing field of study. If you are a coaching client for an entire year, this will amount to about 25 hours of CPE.
This is a tough one for me to answer the way I am going to since you might misunderstand and write me off because of it. But I don’t provide references you can contact because my past/present clients did not sign up to give you advice … and that’s what usually happens when prospects make these inquiries.
Also, the work I do for my clients is confidential, as my work with you will be. However, there are two dozen or so recommendations on my LinkedIn profile, and you might be able to chase some of them down.
First, I have 25+ years’ experience in the BVFLS world, including 20+ years as a solo practitioner and a like amount of time as a multi-program instructor for NACVA. As a result, I know what challenges practitioners like you face.
Second, I practice what I preach: between March 2010 and March 2022 (12 years!), I leveraged my coaching program’s activities and accelerators in my own practice so I could live full time in an RV with my wife and our dogs and travel throughout the US and Canada.
Third, I’ve been coaching practitioners like you since 2013, and as far as I know, I am the only BVFLS professional who coaches only BVFLS practitioners.
I offer a 6-week, 6-hour Practice Builder BOOTCAMP. It is workshop training for larger firms to help their practitioners of all stripes build their authority and be more efficient, effective, and profitable in their marketing to leads, prospects, clients, and referral sources. All the sessions are live (and recorded), and everyone gets CPE (Communications and Marketing).
Have a vision for your practice. And this is important because, based on my experience, the one thing that will get you from where you are to where you want to be is your vision for your practice. Vision is more important than having great marketing. It’s more important than using great technology. It’s even more important than doing great work … because we know people who do less than stellar work yet have stellar practices.
Knowing where you’re going—having a vision—is the one element that separates successful practices from struggling ones. Watch the movie 12 Strong. In one scene, soldiers on horseback are negotiating a cliff edge at the top of a deep canyon. The leader says, “Don’t look down – look forward. The horse goes where you look.” It’s a great metaphor for our practices. If you’re a practitioner with a vision for your future, I can help you get there.
Ah … the $64,000 question. And I have two answers. First, the right time to hire me is when you get stuck. When you realize you are a “mostly” successful practitioner but have reached a limit on the impact you can have or the money you can make based on the way you are running your practice.
Second, months (or years) after you realize you are stuck but didn’t know if you wanted to do anything about it. Or, as Tony Robbins said, “… when the pain of staying the same is greater than the pain of change.”
You are in luck! I’ve got several. First, you can take a Practice Builder ASSESSMENT, here. There are 10 quick questions, and your answers will help you get a sense of how well your practice is working for you.
Second, I write a semi-monthly newsletter focuses on the “art and science” of building/growing/scaling a practice. If you’re already a subscriber, many thanks! If you’re interested in subscribing, you can sign up here and also download a free guide that will give you a better sense of the work you like doing, the clients you enjoy serving, and alternative ways of pricing your services.
Third, you can participate in Practice Builder SNAPSHOT here. With this tool, you can benchmark six of your firm’s KPIs against your revenue-size peer group so you can evaluate the effectiveness of your practice
Third, I run the ‘Practice Builder ROUNDTABLE’ group on Facebook, and you will find immense value in being a member of the community. Plus, there is a secret bonus to be had when you join! If you are interested, you can request to join here. If you’re already a member, excellent!
Last, I have a YouTube channel you can navigate to here. If you prefer watching over reading, my video playlists bring practice building to life.
Yes, there are several. Here’s my top 10 list in alphabetical order by author:
- Time’s Up by Paul Dunn and Ron Baker.
- Company of One by Paul Jarvis
- How Clients Buy by Tom McMakin and Doug Fletcher
- Marketing Made Simple by Donald Miller
- Book Yourself Solid by Michael Port
- Oversubscribed by Daniel Priestly
- The Everyday Hero Manifesto by Robin Sharma
- They Ask, You Answer by Marcus Sheridan
- The Automatic Customer by John Warrwillow
- Traction by Gino Wickman
