Dani Tan: [00:00:00] Welcome back to the mini series that I'm doing on a coaching Q and a common questions and misconceptions that come up when it comes to coaching. I'm sharing my take, my answers and perspective for the common questions that I get asked around coaching in general. And so this one is a hot topic. It's about finances. So is coaching too expensive? Is it the right investment? So we'll talk about this. And I would say that when it comes to a financial question of Is it the right investment? Is it the right price? Is it too much? I would say it spans even bigger than just coaching. When you are thinking about your finances or purchasing something at all, the thing that it comes down to is your ability to assess risk.

Your ability to understand if the investment that you're making will yield the results that you want it to, and is it truly in alignment with what you want? And so when it comes to our finances, we have a whole bunch of deep layers when it [00:01:00] comes to our finances. So depending on what your lived experience is, you might have a higher sensitivity to financial investments. You might have a higher, sensitivity to. How you think about money or, how money affects your decision making skills. And so I will share from personal experience. I grew up in a low income household. I grew up where, I had, examples of not understanding how to deal with money. Folks living paycheck to paycheck. I had folks who, you know, When they did have money, they would spend it.

They didn't know how to invest it. There were no conversations about loans or interest rates or credit cards or credit card scores, none of that. So I grew up very much in a scarcity mindset when it came to making investments and finances in general. I definitely for a long period of time had a hypersensitivity to, The idea of debt. There was a big fear around debt. When I graduated college, I had 25k in, um, in debt and I had no idea that there were, loans taken out of my name for me to go to school. I thought the school was covered. [00:02:00] So there was lots of conversations not had around finances. So from the moment I graduated college to finding out that I had 25k in debt, I realized that, you know, I had to figure out a lot about finances for myself to create safety because I already had this lack of.

financial abundance growing up, but on top of that, I had a lack of financial literacy. And so I spent from the moment I graduated college up until today, I spent so many hours, I don't even know, years of spending over reading books, consuming, learning, taking courses to understand all the things to really feel like I'm empowered when it comes to my finances. So. Just so you know, I went from not having any credit card being able to take me when I graduated college, having no credit score because of all these things that happened that I had no idea about, to having any credit card that I want will come find me to having a great credit score to paying off all my student loan debt. and now of course, having a cushion, building a business, being able to travel.

So. I understand what it feels like to come from negative and then to [00:03:00] be able to grow and to create abundance and make it sustainable. But I also know between that entire journey of what it is to constantly, constantly, constantly fight your mind of Trying to challenge what you were, born to believe about finances and to really fight it, to be able to have this opportunity of growth and making investments and believing that I am good with money, to believing that I am good with investing, to believing that I know how to make the right decisions, because maybe for a long period of time, we didn't have any of those, those strengths or those beliefs in us. So. When it comes to finances, I'm a very big advocate for financial literacy.

I'm a very big advocate for, being able to learn and explore and talk about money and the transparency of money. Just because I know that maybe some of us, myself included, especially for board environments where that was not the case, not to anyone's detriment, just because that's just how it was in an educational standpoint. And so when it comes to this and I'm, I get asked, you know, the question about like, Oh, I don't know if it's too much money. I don't know. If I can make the investment, I'm not sure I'm not the kind of person to say, [00:04:00] Oh, well, you should do it because you want to make this happen for yourself. That's not where I go. Actually. I think it's really important to, and we talk about this in all facets of coaching when it comes to creating your goals, when it comes to learning skills, when it comes to any part of coaching, it's learning how to have.

The ability to assess risk. So how do you assess risk for yourself? Because anytime we are in any kind of, region or area of growth, we're going to have to assess risk because we, our brains will default to comfort. Our brains will default to normalcy. Our brains will default to what is familiar. So whenever we want to grow, we have to know how to assess how to step out of our box, how to step out of our comfort zone to grow. So when it comes to finances, I always think about how do you assess Risk when you are making an investment, regardless of what it is, that's one. And then the other one is too, is do you know your numbers? Do you have a sense of security when it comes to your numbers? Do you sit down and have an idea of how much [00:05:00] my bills are, how much my debts potentially may be, how much I want saved, what are my aspirational goals for my investments?

Do you have a financial plan? Because. Where the anxiety, the stress and the unsureness comes from comes from a place of not knowing comes from a place of uncertainty. So I always say it's very important to have some kind of plan for yourself when it comes to your finances, even if that plan seems risky or pie in the sky, because we're entrepreneurs that will come that will come. And so making sure that you have that financial, you know, outline for yourself of, okay, what do I need in the. Plan A, Plan B, and Plan C. Plan A, that I'm living in abundance. Plan B, that maybe, you know, I can't take every single trip that I want to take, And then Plan C, of like, bare minimum, if I need to take care of myself, what would my plan be?

And I find that those different plans help us feel supported and secure with any choice that we decide to make in addition to Of course, being able to know what our risk tolerance says. [00:06:00] So what is your risk tolerance? So how much of a buffer do you need in your emergency savings or how much of a buffer do you need in your business for length of runway to know if I had zero clients come in for three months, would I feel okay? Would I have zero clients come in for six months? Would I be okay to cover everything that I have going on? And so understanding what your risk tolerance is, how you assess it, what your financial plan is, as well as your backup plan is super crucial for any investment that you make.

Now, the next thing is when it comes to your decision making, how do you make decisions when it comes to your investments? I like to have for myself a rule of thumb. So depending on how big the investment is, is how much time I will wait to make a final answer on it. So the first thing that I always do, if I'm looking to make a really big investment, I'm absorbing everything that is available and free. If I'm looking to make an investment in some kind of program, I'm trying to make an investment in a coach. If I'm trying to make an investment, even if it is just like for a trip, I will first research everything that I know that is important for me to know. So if I'm going to work with somebody for me, I [00:07:00] know, okay, what is their communication style?

How do we work together? What are they providing? And I will start to deep dive everything possible. If they have articles, if they have podcasts, if they have videos, anything they have for free, the email list, I will absorb all of it. The same thing. If I want to make an investment in like a program or a trip, I will research the reviews. I will research. If they have any other media coverage on them, so that way I can have an understanding of a baseline of, okay, what is the foundation of this investment that I want to make? And I say this for everyone and anyone to do, um, on myself included, which is why I create so many resources for people to absorb. So you feel confident as a buyer, you want to feel confident in what it is that you're going into.

So I think that is really important is to assess, like, how do you make strategic decisions In your investments and assess risk. And then the other piece outside of that is like, what is the next step outside of that? So once you have that foundational piece, what do you not get answers to from your research that you need to get? And then then setting up the time with that person to [00:08:00] get those additional questions vetted and answered. And knowing that like, you are the buyer, you have the power. So to make sure that. Don't worry about that people pleaser that's coming up or they're feeling too bad or feeling too guilty. Ask those direct straight questions because at the end of the day, both parties want to have a good relationship.

And the best way to have that is to have really clear, direct conversations about what you're curious about and what you want to know. And I think that is really, really good to have too. so that way on both sides, you know, what's up. And then outside of that is like, what timing do you need to give yourself a cap? Because here's the thing If I let something run for too long and I'm still ruminating on it. That usually tells me that it's something that I want to do, but I'm just letting fear overtake. So I'll give you an example for myself. I knew that I wanted to hire a VA for a very long time, and I kept ruminating about it. My brain was like thinking of all the different decisions of why not to do it.

Oh, but you wanted to hit this level of revenue. You haven't hit it yet. So maybe you should wait or. Oh, but you're so [00:09:00] good at like streamlining process and systems and, automating things. Like, do you really need somebody or, Oh, you know, if you bring somebody in, it's going to take more time to get them ramped up versus I'm doing it. My brain was trying to create safety of like, Hey, it's better for you. If you don't invest in paying for somebody to do stuff, you can keep that money for yourself. Or, Hey, maybe you should wait till a certain milestone and then you can do it. Or, Hey, you already know how to do this. So just do it So it was creeping in. But I noticed that even though I did all the research on all these VAs and I knew exactly who I wanted to work with, even though I, you know, potentially could do a test project and I had been given referrals and recommendations by people and I had watched and see all the people that she had supported, I was still really nervous.

And I even had set up the call and I was like, you know what? I can't take this on right now because I'm about to go on this trip. It's not the right time. So then I canceled it. I realized that after. All of the research, making the call and canceling it because I didn't feel like the right time or it wasn't perfect. That six months went by and I was still ruminating and thinking about, Oh, I wish, I [00:10:00] wonder what it would be like. I wonder what it would be like. And so I finally did book the call and got them going, but I had to make the decision tree for myself. And what I did was I did the research. I finally booked the call. I asked the direct questions, even though I felt uncomfortable, I felt bad because I was like, Oh, this person has been recommended.

They've been referred. They're so nice. I felt almost guilty to ask some questions that I really wanted to make sure we would be alignment on, but then it was all okay. And then I had to say to myself, if this didn't pan out, in our three month contract, you know, what would be the takeaways for me? how would I feel? And I'd be like, no, at the end of the day, I will know that I have at least tried. to work with somebody else and get help. I would at least know that the bare minimum is that I have tried this experiment. I try to get support and either I'm going to yield results or maybe I won't. And then at the worst case, this is how much I would lose in this investment in the course of three months.

But how much more would it have cost me to continue to go another three months, another six months of not having help That would have cost me more. And so I think these are the things to think about is, you know, given your [00:11:00] timestamp as well. So if we're going to think about an idea that we want to make an investment, how much time are you going to give yourself? Like, are you like, I am, if I keep thinking about this after a month, then I'm done, like, I just got to sign up and do it, or if it's been six months and I know that I've waited too long. So knowing that piece for you too. So for me, depending on how big the investment is, is how much research I will do up front is, how I'll write down my direct questions to ask them when I finally meet with them.

And then I usually give myself a timestamp of after this amount of time, I'm going to stop because I know that it's not about, trying to catch somebody to convince them. Yuck. No, it's about knowing that our minds are going to try to. Our minds are going to try to coach us back to quote unquote safety, which is what is familiar. So knowing and being able to catch that and say, no, no, no, no. Actually, I do want to do this. I just have a fear of doing it because it's uncomfortable or new. So, that's just, I'll just show you. That's an experience on me, but I have my clients too, who were nervous. I had one client who had signed up. Um, this is what I used to do three [00:12:00] months. Packages and she signed up to do three months and she's like, I just don't know if I'm able to achieve all the things that I want to achieve, but I'm worried about making the investment.

And, I was like, let's just start with where we're at and let's see how you'll get there. And I'll create a plan with you. And obviously I'm going to support you regardless. so the three months went by and I think for her, you know, she was like, what's the worst that will happen is three months. It doesn't pan out. It doesn't pan out. obviously not everyone has that approach, but. So we went the three months and she realized, Oh my gosh, we got so much done in the course of three months. we had done three different versions of her resume. We had practiced her having direct conversations with her leadership team, her manager. We were able to have her start talking to different CEOs at companies that she wanted to interview at.

And I was like, this is absolute insanity, but it's also a Testament to her because she did jump in diving to get the work done. But we ended up extending. She wanted to extend and work together for even longer. We didn't extend for three months to six months. We ended up extending for over a year. We worked together for a year, and we worked together for a year, not just on her career, but on her leadership, [00:13:00] on her ability to do time management, on her ability to have these direct conversations, on her ability to be visible, and it just continued on even past just her getting a new role. But for her, she knew what the investment was. She knew that she wanted to make this investment because she wanted to change what her life looked like.

She went from going to an office every single day to getting a fully remote role. she went from working in an industry that was archaic and like, it felt like it was going instinct to going to a newer industry where that is a way more innovative. Just so much more exciting things going on that she's actually like challenged and excited. and she also went from a place where she was scared to ask to go to the doctors to a place where they're like, yeah, no, go do what you need to do. You're an adult. It's fine. But she knew that the investment was so much bigger than just the, uh, monetary amount for the period of time we're together. She knew that it was going to help really move her forward.

And. Become, you know, one of her own of who it is that she wants to be. And so that's just like one take of it. But I've had other clients who wanted to move, move States. They wanted to be [00:14:00] able to move from one state to another. And that is not just about, Hey, I'm paying this investment to get support, to move. It's. You're changing your lifestyle, you're going from, from maybe living in a city where you are in, let's say like California, and you want to move to New York, that's a complete different overhaul, right? And so being able to have the support to change your life, what you're surrounded by, whether it's your environment, whether it's museums, whether it's art, whether it's music, whether it's just the, you know, the people that you're around and surrounding yourself around, like that is not, that's.

Not just, you know, a one time thing that is you creating a whole new chapter in your life that you get to tell time and time again, that will be a part of you and be forever, which I just think is is amazing, too. So because I can go on forever. Um, yes. Have I gotten clients crazy salary increases for sure anywhere from 10 to 50k to doubling their salaries. I've gotten people double promotions, not one, but two promotions in the course of a year, not once, but multiple times with clients. And those things happen, but that's not the stuff that, you [00:15:00] know, Is a soul thing that lights me up. It's the things that change people's lives and the course of their lives, because that is the stuff that will sit with you forever, right?

Yes, of course, those things do, but these folks have really changed their lives in such big ways. But it's to again, bringing it back when it comes to finances. It's not about, just a number. It's about understanding your decision making skills, being able to trust yourself of how you assess risk of how you make decisions with money, of how you assess if you've gotten your return on investment of how to advocate for yourself and having those conversations when you're making those investments of how to do the research. And this is all tied back time and time again to all different types of coaching that we do. So hopefully you found this helpful and you know where to find me and I will catch you again soon.