Paradigm shift: a buzz phrase worthy of exploring. What is it? How do we create it for ourselves as a coach and/or as an entrepreneur?

A paradigm shift isn’t just a change- Change is the end result of a paradigm shift. An authentic paradigm shift is about TRANSFORMATION.

Change results in using different means to the same end. Transformation results from shifting into different attitudes and mindsets.  Change rarely leads to transformation, but transformation always leads to tangible change.

Look at it this way. The form of our thinking already exists: hence, information. Growing means we need to actually change the form itself, hence, transformation.

A paradigm shift starts with examining the way we think and what we believe. And so it is with marketing. We think that a paradigm shift in marketing would mean DOING more or better things like using updated technology, smart phones, web strategies, blogging, and social media.

But transformation, which is more about how we are BEING, happens in the mind and heart. How do we foster that?

Jack Mezirow, the ‘father’ of Transformative Learning said that learning occurs when we rethink our frame of reference, challenge our assumptions and beliefs, and decide to make a conscious plan for redefining our world–“becoming critically aware of one’s own tacit assumptions and expectations and those of others and assessing their relevance for making an interpretation.”

First, an individual has to become aware of holding a limiting or distorted view. If the individual critically examines this view, opens herself to alternatives, and ultimately changes the way she sees things, she has transformed some part of her personal paradigm.

What is tricky about transformation is that we equate past experience with TRUTH. A bad experience buying a car or renting an apartment means sales people and brokers are shady. Disappointment the first time we actually saw the burger from that infamous commercial means that marketing is tantamount to deception.

What are your ingrained perceptions of marketing? What feelings come up when you think about having to market yourself?

It may take a significant event, like not being able to sustain your business, to lead you to question your assumptions and beliefs about marketing.  In my 30 years of marketing experience, I’ve come to see that there is a way to transform mindsets of FEAR into COURAGE, SCARCITY into ABUNDANCE, CONFUSION into CALM, PERFECTIONISM into ADVENTURE, IMPATIENCE into EASE.

Without a paradigm shift in your marketing mindsets, you’ll be caught in the same old struggles as before. Your business will be stagnant and your efforts will yield meager results.

What would be possible if you approached your coaching practice with these mindsets transformed?

Rather than being STOPPED BY FEAR, enthusiasm would propel you forward to speak about what you do with confidence.

Instead of making excuses such as not having enough time to try new things, you’d use courage to explore new ways of marketing.

“No” would not derail you, and you’d understand that making mistakes is HUMAN and OK.

Marketing would stop being this thing you hate, and resurrect itself as something you are excited to do.

You would adapt new tools, strategies, and ideas to make your messaging memorable.

Your marketing would lead you to new experiences, people, and conversations that you had never imagined.

You would give up your fixed belief of marketing being hard and take on the ease and grace of marketing yourself authentically.

An authentic paradigm shift allows you to see a truth that already existed, but was mucked over with years of negative experiences.

True transformation happens when we get CONSCIOUS. It leads to lasting change that you can truly build the future on.

Are YOU ready to give up old mindsets in favor of ones that work?

Copyright 2010 Paulette Rao, MCC                            All Rights Reserved

Paulette Rao, MCC is an executive coach, mentor coach, speaker, trainer, marketing expert, and founder of the Conscious Coaching Institute, which is dedicated to the training and development of coaches. Through her OneSource^TM and Conscious Marketing^TM training programs, Paulette helps coaches develop mastery, get credentialed, and create sustainable revenue doing what they love.

Paulette’s OneSource^TM course is a comprehensive ICF credentialing program aimed at assisting coaches in developing in the ICF competencies so they are superbly positioned to pass the ICF credentialing exam with confidence. Through Paulette’s Conscious Marketing^TM classes, she helps coaches gain the clarity and confidence to easily attract the clients they most want to work with to consistently make money doing what they love. More information about both programs, along with more information about Paulette, can be found at www.ConsciousCoachingInstitute.com.

Creating a successful practice requires that we learn new skill sets and mind sets. Developing new skills requires taking in new information and applying it over time. New mindsets, however, are more challenging because we’re often not aware of the ones we already have! They’re below the surface. They are tacit assumptions and beliefs that are operating, but without our conscious awareness. We may not see them, but we do experience them through our tangible results.

Disempowering mindsets can be dangerous because they’ve been so deeply ingrained for so long that you believe them to be “true”.  It’s not a matter of being true or not. It’s a matter of whether they serve you. If they don’t, it’s time to think about creating new ones.

This requires taking an inside out approach. Meaning, first look at how you think about marketing yourself to get to the root cause of your behaviors and disappointing results. You could have a first-class marketing plan that you paid a bunch of money to a marketing expert to create, but if you don’t deal with your inside first—what’s driving you—it won’t matter.

Once you look inside and identify your stoppers or stallers, you can get cracking on the outside, crafting your key marketing messages and writing an impactful marketing plan. Then, and only then, will you start seeing the results you want and deserve.

When I started my consulting and coaching practice I struggled with how to speak naturally about what I did for people. I hated the idea of “selling” myself. I felt shy about it and feared rejection. I wanted my dialogue to feel confident, easy, and authentic—like talking about a food preference. I knew had to think of marketing in a new way if I wanted a shift in how I was feeling. I had to create new mental mindsets that would open the door for me to speak in a natural way about the results people or organizations get from me.

My first step in going inside out was to literally question the definitions I held for selling and marketing. What meaning did I assign to these words and how were those meanings affecting me?

Prior to venturing out as an entrepreneur, I spent three decades as a sales and marketing leader in a corporate environment. It was about killing competition, getting last look for an unfair advantage, fire in the belly, and bringing home bear. I reflected on the language and concepts that were “hardwired” in my brain. And through my coach training, I learned how simple it is to create new wiring–all it takes is mindful attention.

It became glaringly obvious that the fear and mental mindsets that led me to “success” as others defined it in the previous career were negatively impacting my ability to show up authentically as the conscious entrepreneur I am today. I had to re-connect with my, as yet, unspoken mindsets that would support a vision of myself as someone who stands for commerce with conscience.

At first, thinking in a new way about marketing myself had me feeling stuck. I couldn’t find my essential kernels truth under all the muck. The way I wanted to show up and speak about my gifts felt murky. Simply noticing this, time and again allowed for the crack in the foundation of my previous thinking.

Eventually the crack became a chasm and, in that space, my true belief system lived. At first, uttering the new mindsets aloud felt like rote affirmations, but over time, I grew into them.

I believe that marketing is revealing who you are and what you offer, authentically and naturally, in order to attract and engage the people you most want to work with. It’s about falling in love with what you’re offering every time you talk about it and, then, inviting others to experience that.

And selling is no more than facilitating a process whereby you enable someone with a problem to make a decision they already know they want. It’s delivering a solution to a person seeking it, creating an exchange of value. Analogous to our role as a coach in that we hold a process that creates a space for someone to find their solution.

I invite you to explore your current mindsets around marketing and selling. What meanings have you assigned to these concepts? Journal whatever comes to mind and see for yourself where you stand. Once you can identify your current “inside” reality, look around “outside” to see what support you can garner to transform your mindsets to support your vision for yourself as a profitable, conscious entrepreneur.

Copyright 2010 Paulette Rao, MCC                                          All Rights Reserved