“Our job in this lifetime is not to shape ourselves into some ideal we imagine we ought to be, but to find out who we already are and become it.” - Steven Pressfield
Howdy! I’m Davida, the digital manager at Storm Cloud Marketing. I’m also a graphic designer by trade, so I'm able to pitch in whenever the creative team needs me.
I have to admit, when I first joined the team at Storm and heard that we’d be working with an executive coach, I was kind of baffled. Aren’t those guys for the suit and tie types at giant corporations, who manage hundreds of employees? What would a local marketing agency in Southwest Missouri need an executive coach for? Surely a small business with such a great culture can manage matters like this on its own? Maybe I was wrong.
At our agency, the entire staff communicates with Dan. We all have individual calls on a regular schedule that works for us, including the business owners. And, we also have a regularly scheduled call as a team. The latter happens to be my favorite. I appreciate that team call because it gets us all scratching past the surface together, bouncing new ideas and opinions around.
There are a plethora of things that Dan Chiodo helps our agency with through coaching and training. I couldn’t possibly cover all of them in one blog, especially since they are ever-evolving, but below you’ll find my perspective on some of them, starting with what I feel is most important.
Nurturing our Culture
We have a remarkable “culture” here at Storm. The definition of that word might have a different meaning for each company that uses it. When some hear it, visions of company parties and shenanigans might come to mind. Sure, for us, it does include the occasional 2-minute dance party, a game we invented called flippy dart, or a team chili cookoff, and recently one of our calls drove the decision to purchase a shuffleboard game for the office, but it’s so much more than the fun we have.
For us, it’s what we use to cultivate growth. It gives each of us a voice and brings us closer together. It’s the attitude we approach everything with, it’s our integrity and our work ethic. It’s the way we choose to interact with each other and our clients. But a good culture doesn’t develop just because you have a crew of talented, positive individuals who like to have fun. It takes much more than that.
Coaching that comes from a trained professional with a different perspective who doesn’t have an in-house bias has helped our team to open better lines of communication that allow us to engage with and challenge each other in new and different ways.
Identifying our Strengths and Weaknesses
At Storm, we’re all multi-faceted. We all bring multiple skills to the table and have to continuously adapt to changing trends, a fluctuating market, and daily curveballs. Coaching gives us new ways to sharpen our existing strengths and skillsets, to become more self-sufficient, and to become more empowered leaders. That’s right! We all lead here.
Dan is familiar with and regularly assesses our team’s strengths and weaknesses. Working with a coach has helped each of us to identify where we shine and can make the largest impact for our agency and discover skills we may not have known we possess. These newly identified skills can then be nurtured and grown.
On the other hand, coaching also requires us to be honest about the things we might struggle with and helps us form a plan to change or develop existing behaviors. Are our pitfalls something we can improve upon or are the tasks associated with these shortcomings better suited for someone else on the team? When we take this valuable, ego-free approach we’re able to make sure that the right people get put into the right roles. It’s also been handy in identifying when one of us needs to move into a new role or how our current role should be evolved.
Increasing Productivity and Focus
Coaching has proven to be a key resource for improving our productivity. We’ve learned different methods for weighing the important against the urgent. This is one of my favorite lessons and it’s helped tremendously at keeping us on task and ensuring that only true fires interrupt our scheduled tasks.
We’ve been able to develop innovative solutions and streamline processes that have caused unwarranted stress for our team and in doing so, we’ve been able to expand time for other services and offerings. We’re ALL always thinking like owners: How can we each be better for the team? How can we each contribute and grow the agency? What can we research and discover on our own that will improve a process or a client relationship?
Increasing productivity doesn’t always mean making huge changes. For example, I’m a bit distracted, very energetic, and occasionally can be hushed from across the room for making too many random noises in our open office environment. While working with Dan, I was able to learn that a simple pair of headphones and some acoustical jams help keep me quiet and focused during scheduled blocks of work time. As I write this I’m listening to a playlist labeled “acoustic focus instrumental chill”.
On the opposite end of that, when any of us gets too antsy, he’s encouraged the freedom to walk away from our desk and take a brain break. This could take the form of a quick walk around the block to work off some of that energy or a little fun, cue the shuffleboard table I mentioned earlier. When we return we’re clear-headed and able to get back to work in a more productive manner.
Setting and Achieving New Goals
Working with a coach helps us not only to define our goals but also to clearly define why they are important to us. What does achieving them help us do? How does it transform the agency? How does it transform us as professionals and peers?
We’re also able to build solid, time-oriented action steps so that we don’t just state our goals but work toward them promptly. Those action steps get us in the game. After all, it’s better to be out on the field getting kicked around a little than to spectate from the stands or stand on the sidelines.
We’re able to consistently move toward our agency's visions and missions using tactics we’ve developed in our coaching sessions.
Opening the Lines of Communication
I know I touched on this in culture, but it deserves a spotlight of its own. Through coaching sessions, we’re encouraged to be more open and honest with each other about our ideas, whether that means building on someone else’s idea or disagreeing altogether. And, when all of our minds are working together instead of having one person dictate, it’s a beautiful thing. We’re better communicators, innovators, and creators when we are one collective energy and we’re able to be more open to feedback.
Learning to communicate and listen more openly and honestly with each other also helps us to communicate more authentically and effectively with our clients. We’ve learned to be better listeners, listen actively versus reflexively, look for non-verbal cues, practice empathy, and have learned to understand people better. Because of these things, we’re able to build better relationships with our clients. In our industry, that’s an invaluable tool.
Becoming Better Problem Solvers
Coaching helps us think differently about solving problems. We’re able to see things in more than just black and white which means we’re inspired to work collectively to explore new territory, remove obstacles, and find unique solutions. We’re also able to function better in high-pressure, fire-type situations and maintain our chill, growth-oriented mindset.
When we learn how to be better problem solvers, we’re not the only ones who benefit. It carries over to our clients and our community. In marketing, we solve problems every single day, multiple times a day. That’s what we do here. We find pain points, address them, and find long-term, replicable solutions that alleviate that pain for our clients.
So, what would a local marketing agency in Southwest Missouri need an executive coach for?
In the last two years, my stance toward this question has changed drastically. Working with an executive coach has been one of the most productive experiences of my life both professionally and personally. I believe that it’s helped to mold our agency into the masterpiece that it is in regards to how we approach each other, our culture, our work, and our clients.
