"Are you listening to your head or your heart?"

I've spent my whole life working in retail, and whilst I loved that industry, it didn't give me what I needed. I felt like there was something missing and I was just on this big mouse wheel! I'm now building capability within corporate retail on how to mentor internally and how to create development programs, especially around women who want to be in leadership. I'm working with young women in retail to own their own destiny from an early stage. My goal is to not let any woman who has the aspiration to be a leader in a very volatile and hard industry, to not feel that they can own that destiny and be all they need to be and throw away their boundaries!

Q: How long you've been a student for and what inspired you to become a coach?

I wanted to be a coach as I've spent my whole life working in retail, and whilst I loved that industry, it didn't give me what I needed, which was I loved coaching my team, I loved inspiring others to be their best, and sometimes that's not necessarily the way you're allowed to operate. I felt like there was something missing and I was just in this big mouse wheel.

So my goal not just in my work life, in my nature is to be able to be there for others and to help. And guess what? Corporate retail doesn't necessarily allow that to do you to do that. So I took time out from my normal life and decided to look at how I could actually build, what I felt was intuitively my nature and find a course that was going to actually leverage that. What I've done now is step away from my day job and become a coach and consultant back into retail on exactly these subjects.

Q: Tell us about why you decided to take that jump into coaching? Were you terrified in the beginning? Were you excited? I was absolutely terrified, because it's something that you believe you can do. But until you actually step out of the comfort zone of what you're great at around that it's bloody scary!

Then I questioned, is this my ego talking or is it actually my intuition and gut talking. So, I struggled with that for a very long time and I actually got coaching myself to get out of my own. The other reason, it was extremely scary as I'm the breadwinner and I was on a really nice income and all I could think about was, am I going to cause my family to lose all they love, which is the lovely property I'm on. You know, we're very privileged to be in a place where it actually inspires us every day. So those things are really fearful to go through!

So I had to look at it in a way that I could absolutely dedicate myself to understand, is this me? And can I do it and be okay if it was? And if I don't try, I won't know!

Then second to that was to let go of what was actually holding me back, which was that job. So I looked at my finances. I had really big conversations with my family and I set us up to enable me to have a go at this. And that was the pivotal thing that changed. How I entered into this, to how I was holding myself back from not doing it and thinking something else was going to happen. Which we all know it doesn't.

Q: When you made that decision to become a coach, how did things change?

I think it turned from an idea, into actually realising that there's a passion here and an action to be taken, to make that happen. I'm not doing what my intuition said, which is “you need to go and help people and in whatever way that turns up for you that's okay. But until you give yourself the space to do that, you're not going to be there for people”. An interesting thing but three months into the journey of me not being in my day job and pursuing this. My son came up to me and said, Nan's just said that you guys had a great conversation and you know, you've been married to Dad for 25 years and she's never felt that you two were connected and I'd sat back on that. And he said, it's because you haven't been available to be there. And we appreciate that that was then, but it's so beautiful to see that you are available. I think that was a huge thing for me is that's all I want it to be ultimately is available. That was a big trigger and it was about three months into the journey. Q: What has it been like going back to study? For the first three months. I thought, what the hell have I done? I can't go back to this. At the same time overwhelmed with wanting to learn as much as I could, as fast as I could. Because I thought I've got to make money! That became almost a factor that stopped me from engaging with what I was actually having the opportunity to do, which was learn. I had three resets. The first one was you can't keep going at this pace and not do something. Because all you're doing is taking information in and right now you're still not confident that you can apply. And there's a bit of fear of, can I do this? And you’ve got to get yourself through that. So when I reset, I changed my way of using the resources that the school gives you. The way I did that was to actually focus on the mentoring that we get, group sessions and looking at how I learnt to take advantage of that. Which then put me out there in a different environment. Then the big change happened when I said, let go of the learning for a little and go try out! So I got fully into pro-bono’s and my triads, and I thought, Hey, nothing happened other than I got to experience this, and I got to add a little bit of value and I can continue to add value after that. And so that whole dynamic changed for me when I did that, I knew what I needed to learn, whereas before it was a theory about what I needed to learn.

It's okay to take a different approach and it's okay to jump into the deep end and be vulnerable in front of a client and feel free to do that with your other students and you're okay to do it with people who are in your network. Just turn up with who you are. I was very lucky to have a great network having been in retail and corporate. And as soon as I put myself out there, they came!

Q: So. tell us a little bit about what you're doing now?

I got the opportunity to work back with a major retailer within a group of businesses and actually be an executive coach for their leadership in merchandise, which is my specialty. That has just been extended another six months, which is fantastic! I'm now building capability within that business how to mentor internally and how to create development programs, especially around women who want to be in leadership.

The second thing I have, set up is I'm working with young women in retail to own their own destiny from an early stage. So that often comes back to who do I want to be in all parts of my life. So, dare I say it, I love the wheel of life as an exercise to start that, and then to give them the tools and networks to actually own their own career. My goal is to not let any woman who has the aspiration to be a leader in a very volatile and hard industry, to not feel that they can own that destiny and be all they need to be and throw away their boundaries!

At the moment I've got, um, four or five students as I call them that are going through this journey on a six-month program and I'm just starting to build that credibility. And hopefully, that becomes a bigger part of, my suite of opportunities!

Q: What would you say to someone who's thinking about joining the school and becoming a coach? The first thing is to find out as much information as you can and see how it sits and resonates with you. Sit there with it to understand truly what you're listening to. Are you listening to your head or your heart or your gut? Then I would have conversations with, people you trust. You know, you're inner circle that can give you that sense of balance because your mind probably is going to tell you all the reasons why not. So get some people around you that say, why should I?

Then, absolutely go! There are a number of ways to enter into the school and make sure you understand that because you don't have to leap in headfirst. You can dip a toe if that's what you need to feel comfortable, but don't let anything stop you from finding out! From getting in and from trying! Trust the reasons why you're doing it!