My two-cents on professional boundaries.
I wanted to just quickly talk to you about something that came up for me this morning.
It comes up a lot, I think, for coaches: how do you set that professional boundary between almost like becoming your clients’ friend? Is it okay? Where is the boundary between professional and personal?
I was thinking about this and what I came up with is that the most important thing you can do is live true to your values in your business. This is what we as coaches espouse and hold in the container in our clients.
For me, one of the values that’s really most important when I work with my clients is authenticity. If that means that I have to break down a barrier that might be considered a “professional barrier,” like by sharing a personal story, or by using a swearword, or just by saying, “You know what? Let me tell you, that’s bullshit what those people are saying to you,” in other words inserting your opinion and blurting it, which by the way is a coaching skill, I don’t know, I feel like that’s part of being a great coach. That’s part of being, for me anyway, a great coach. That’s part of why, I think, my clients hire me. And certainly, I feel like if I can’t be that person with my clients and share personal stories and anecdotes, and use swearwords, and just be myself 150% with them, while still holding professional space, of course, but if I can’t be myself and a little less formal, I guess, then I feel inauthentic in the sense that it’s just not a match for me to be with that client.
I’ve had this coming up for me a couple of times over the last week or so, and I’ve had it come up before with other people who have asked me, “How do you handle this?”
Frankly, there’s always that question of you shouldn’t be friends with those that you are serving in a professional way, and I think that’s true to a degree, but I think if you’re able, and after 10 years of coaching I feel pretty confident that I’m able to do this where I can take off coach hat, put on friend hat, and wear those two at different times but with the same person in the same period of time, then that’s totally fine.
Just think about that. Professional boundaries: do what is most authentic to you. That’s why people hire you. That’s why they work with you. That’s why they love you. That’s why I love you, too.
Have a good day.
What are your thoughts? How do you approach professional boundaries? Please leave me a comment below!
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