Championing the coaching profession in Ghana

Although fairly new, coaching is an extremely fast growing profession around the world. It is now classified among the high earning professions especially in the USA. A Pricewaterhouse Coopers study commissioned in 2007 by the International Coach Federation found that part-time coaches averaged annual salaries of $26,000 and full-time coaches were averaging $82,000. Most professional coaches charge fees in the range of $150/month to $400/month for a package of 3 scheduled sessions per month. A very manageable caseload for a full-time coach is around 25 clients per month. Gross income projections can therefore be estimated by multiplying the number of clients desired by fees within that range taking local economics into consideration. Twenty-five clients, for example, at $250/month generate $75,000/year. Twenty-five clients at $350/month is $105,000. Even when those Dollar signs are replaced with Ghana Cedi signs, it is still fantastic earning for asking questions for a few hours a day. Coaches who specialize in executive, corporate and leadership coaching often charge considerably more ($600 to $1,000+/month), but prospective coaches are however, encouraged to make conservative projections when considering the field and take their local economy into consideration.

But just how important are coaches and why do they get paid so much? To understand this one must first consider the fact that; the most successful people you see around doing great things have personal coaches you don’t know about. Most coaches don’t mind being the power behind, it’s the nature of the job. As Ghana’s foremost performance coach Katey Aklie puts it;

“our job is to get others to reach their aspirations; that is how we achieve our dreams”.

Some of the aspirations they want to reach are billion dollar ventures. Consider the following scenarios:

Case 1: Imagine if you run a business worth $20 million that is under performing because of two or three key people. You are loosing money on a daily basis because of these two. A coach comes along and gets them to start ticking and your earnings for the year quadruples because of improved performance. What would that be worth to you and your organization? Wouldn’t you give 10% of your 20 million for that kind of results?

Case Two: Your teenage son is lives in the F zone at school and you are worried he will never make university. You have tried everything and nothing has helped. A coach comes along and places him among the top five in his class. What will that do for his future and what monetary value will you place on that? There are parents who will give the world to have that kind of help; they just do not know who to turn to.

“As coaches work behind the scene; accepting your place as the power behind is the mentality you need to be a good coach. It is always about other people and their aspirations and never about you. You succeed only when others succeed”. –Katey Aklie

In Ghana the seeds have only just been planted and it is developing roots really fast. Internationally certified performance coach Katey Aklie, affectionately called HOPEMAN by most is the force behind this growth and he and his team estimates that Ghana alone needs about ten thousands coaches who will shape the destiny of this nation. He insists that our politicians, business people, professionals and everyone else are functioning around 30% of their true capacities. They could really benefit from the services of a coach by just spending an hour with him/her per month. Coaching will move them to the next level and that will reflect on the national output. He also believes that youth coaching is probably one of the most needed niches at this point if this nation is to have a better future. While he conceded that the general public is not used to the idea and do not know how to use coaches, he says that things are changing as more coaches are trained and. They will through their practice show everyone else the value of coaching. He said:

“It is like everything else, you have to start from somewhere but we are already alarmed at the level of change. The thing is that Ghana already has many people who call themselves coaches. The only problem is the lack of right skills to do the job so people can actually see the benefit of the service”.

Currently he is focused on training more coaches and guiding them into the new career area. We will open new options for revenue generation for counselors, teachers, pastors and other professionals who have the inclination to help people reach their best by simply retooling them with coaching skills. There are quite a few people who call themselves coaches without really understanding what is involved. Some think it is a cool tag for motivational speaking and going around telling people to do things no one knows will work. The first training program is intended to certify all these folks who clearly have an interest and a passion to help people improve, put them into the new association and help them build their practices. This is the reason why the cost of training has been cut down by 50%. They will begin to make change as we certify and license them to start taking the profession to the next level.

The next training session begins on the 3^rd of November. The five day training is collaboration between the Performance Academy and the OD institute--Africa’s only graduate School of Organizational Development headed by the world renowned OD consultant Prof. Noble Kumawu. Everyone with an interest in coaching or helping people to be their best (youth workers, teachers, pastors, counselors, managers and just about anyone) is invited to join the groundbreaking training program to prepare themselves for the coming flood of opportunities.  Call   0201197700, 0268388560 for information on the training program.