Imagine for a moment, the joy of discovering that you’re about to become a parent. The excitement, the curiosity, the wonder… But then couple that with a deep underlying sense of fear and anxiety and dread…
Now, imagine for a moment being a single mother.
The statistics are against you.
Barely 50% of single mothers in the U.S. are employed full-time, and almost a third are jobless. Among those who are laid off or looking for work, less than a quarter receive unemployment benefits.
If a single mother is able to work, her earning power lags significantly compared with men’s. The wage disparities are even greater for women of color. And a single mother’s income places her far below a mother who is married.
Varian Brandon was a single teenage mom who refused to be a statistic…
A Very Conscious Choice
Varian is a friend, a client, and a founder member of 4PC.
And 26 years ago, when she became a single mother, she made a very conscious choice.
She would do whatever it took to raise her son as a confident young man and create an incredible life for him.
She spent 22 years in the corporate world as a sales leader for a Fortune 25 company. She sold $750 million of products and services and managed multi-million dollar clients.
Back in 2001, Varian had the tiniest seed of an idea that she could become a coach herself, after she experienced working with her very first coach.
But the only world she knew was the corporate world. How would she ever become a Professional Coach?
Well, where you put your attention, your energy goes. And exactly five years later, Varian was on Amazon when The Prosperous Coach popped up as a recommended read.
She bought it on her Kindle and stayed up all night reading the entire book.
She was drawn in by The Prosperous Coach Approach because it felt totally different to everything that was being taught to coaches online.
And she took a risk and emailed me.
She was surprised when I personally emailed her back. And two months later, she flew across the country to join us at one of our Intensives.
A month later she joined one of my group coaching programs.
And then she joined another.
And then she became a founder member of 4PC.
And then she joined our Source Team.
And now she’s been helping us put on 6 Intensives a year for the past two years.
You’re Not A “New Coach”!
One of the most important things I do when I meet with an entrepreneur, a leader, an executive or a business owner who is transitioning into coaching is to mess with their thinking.
You see, almost every time, I catch them thinking of themselves as a “new” coach.
And what I need them to understand is that coaching is just one of the many leadership skills that they have been using and honing – sometimes for decades – in their former career(s).
When I met Varian she was a “new” coach with 22 years of leadership experience…
She was a “new” coach with 22 years of experience in the corporate world…
She was a “new” coach with 22 years of experience in complex, high-level negotiation, mediation, communication, handling conflict, and high-risk sales situations…
If you’re a “new” coach – or even an experienced coach – with a track record of success as a leader, a business owner, an entrepreneur or in the military, we created 4PC just for you.
And if you’d like to hear my recent interview with Varian about her 24-year journey to become an extraordinary coach – she truly is one of the most inspiring people I know – watch the video below:
Love. Rich