Telling A Client Failure Story (It May Be More Valuable Than Any Client Success Story I Could Tell)

Hello and welcome to the inner game of Entrepreneurship Podcast. I'm your host, Sarah.

And I want to tell you a client failure story. So often, people tell client success stories

and client success, success stories are great. But I got some client failure stories. And I think

they are really important for people to hear. And I want you to have an opportunity to understand

what it looks like for a coaching container to fail with a client. So I want to tell a story of a

client that I had several years back. This person had a very successful creative business. And she

was making between 30 and 50 K months, kind of bouncing back and forth between 30 and 50 K months.

Her business was a blend of products one-on-one services and group services. She had a very strong

personal brand. She had thousands of followers on Instagram. And she was the kind of personality

that people really listened to her. When she went live, she had hundreds of followers on the live.

People really paid attention to the things that she said. When she dropped a product, it would sell.

She knew that she wanted to scale her business to seven figures. And all of the ingredients were

there. She knew she could do it. Now at 30 to 50 K months, a seven figure business is 83 K a month.

So she didn't even have that far to go. Double to two and a half times the monthly revenue would have

gotten her there. She knew that she had all of the ingredients there in terms of audience demand,

brand awareness, people loving her, people loving the products. But she didn't know why she couldn't

get to that next level. The most she had ever made in a month was 50. And that was a month where

she pushed really, really, really hard and nearly burnt herself out. And then the following months were

10 K, 20 K, 15 K because she was so burned out that she wasn't pushing as much in the marketing.

So I get in. There's no systems. There's no real back end to speak of. She has personal systems for

the way she makes the products. She has personal systems for the way she deals with clients. She has

systems for the way that she delivers the group work, right? There's there's delivery systems,

but there's no operational systems. There's no marketing systems. There's no

delegation systems. There's no project management systems. There were no financial systems. She

didn't separate her business from her personal finances. And even in 30 to 50 K months, she was

cash broke almost all the time. And some of that was because she was working so much that her finances

were really going a lot to DoorDash, UberEats, taking Uber's conveniences to kind of keep her

going. And then shopping splurges because she would be exhausted from how hard she was working.

She'd be like, I deserve a treatment. She would buy stuff. Right. So back end was a mess.

And she comes to me and she's like, want to scale, know that I can, but I can't figure out why I

can't do it on my own. Now, the other thing is that like many of my clients, she was a multi-hyphenic

creative. She also was a multi-media artist. And she wanted to focus on both careers. But right now,

the products and services were taking up so much space that she didn't really have as much time

as she wanted to focus on her art. And she had a vision where the multi-media art supported the

business, the business supported the art that they were an ecosystem that were co-branded together,

that people who knew about her through her business were finding out about her art,

the people who knew about her through her art would find out about her business. She really wanted

that, but she didn't know how to make that happen. She also had a very large goal of seeing her

products become mass produced, move out of in-house production and into being sold in major retail outlets.

Big, big goals. I came on board and I said, this makes sense to me. I know how to do this.

I reverse engineered her brand. And I came back with a very detailed brand map of, here's how we do

this project. Here's what it looks like when it's all built. Here's how the art thing functions.

Here's how the business part functions. Here's how we build this out step by step. Here are the

systems that we need to build. Here are the frameworks that need to be put in place. Here's how we

need to redesign your schedule. Here are the people we need to hire. Here's the way that we need to

start to engage. Now, the thing I need you to know is the founder is your days are going to change

radically. Right now, you're running this operation like a scrappy art hustler, right? Like a DIY

solo per noir. You started your business on vibes and charisma and hustle. You had good ideas.

You put them out, people bought from you, and you never really built any systems on the back end

because you were just moving based on the need for cash and fusion. And that was working for you.

You've done quite well for yourself like that. You've built a following. You're making a significant

amount of money. You're not keeping enough and we can fix that, but you're making money. So you've

done pretty well like this, but you have reached a critical moment where this is as far as you can

go like this. You could stay like this for as long as your body will allow it. Essentially,

you can stay like this until you fully hit burn out, but you will not be able to scale this because

scaling means more. It means more everything. It means more clients. It means more money, but it also

means more production. It means more emails. It means more chargebacks. It means more customer service

requests. Everything that is working and everything that isn't will be amplified, right? That's what

scaling means. It just means more. And we don't want to scale this. This current system is not

scalable. There is no way to do more of what we're currently doing. Your body will not allow it.

The only thing that can be done at this point is to change the infrastructure behind this business.

And that's going to mean you change. It's going to mean that your days look different, right? When

you're moving out of being the person who literally is the doer, you're the talent, your hands

or in the mock, you are making the products to products being mass produced.

Hours of your days aren't spent making things anymore. Hours of your days are spent in meetings.

You're going to be sitting down with people. They're going to be making it. You're going to be

testing the things they make and giving feedback. You're not going to be creating all of your

own branding and marketing anymore. There's going to be a team and you're going to be in meetings

with that team giving them feedback on their work. We have to take all these things off of your

plate so that we can free you up to be over here in this other place that needs and wants more

of your attention for you to reach your goals. Your role is going to become a lot more

about guiding a team. It's going to become a lot more about oversight, about setting tone,

about delegation and about showing up as the talent in the places that only you can, right? The

places that require your face and your voice, but not being the person who hands has their hands

in every single thing. It's going to require you to change the way you communicate with people.

It's going to require you to create and stick to plans and not just work completely off of

inspiration. Are you prepared for how much you're about to have to change? Because this will not work

if you don't change how you operate on the day to day. Like everyone does, she said,

of course, no problem. Let's do it. I'm so down and we got started.

Now, I'm going to pause the story right here and I'm going to tell you in my 10 years of experience

of coaching and actually farther back than that because this applies to personal training too,

so 20 years of experience in coaching. There are two types of clients.

Client one is the person who takes this information, right? They take the plan. They take the

strategy. They take there to do list and they get to implementing. And as they're implementing,

something happens, right? They are confronted with themselves. They go to delegate and the person

doesn't do it exactly right and they want to pull all the work back fire, the person and do

the work themselves. And they're like, oh, I see why this happens. They go to delegate and they

don't even want to do it because they feel control issues come up and they feel really protective

and precious about the product and they feel like no one else is going to do it as well as they are

and so they just do it themselves. And they're like, oh, okay, I see the problem. They create the plan

and then they notice, oh, I actually kind of don't want to stick to the plan because I have a new idea

and I'm more excited about my new idea than I am about the plan. And so I want to ditch the plan

even though everyone is already working on the plan. I want to change it all. Oh, it's me.

But hi, I'm the problem. It's me. And in that moment, client number one calls their coach. They

reach for me. They reach for the person they're working with. They lean into the container that

they've brought on board to help them change. And they say, I see it. It's happening right now. I am

so uncomfortable right now. I totally want to go back and do my old thing. I am freaking out. I want

to fire everybody. I want to go right back to the old plan. I'm doubting that this is going to work.

Right. I'm freaking out. They hit me on boxer. They schedule a call. They come to me and go,

it's happening. I am trying to execute and I am coming up against the part where I have to do

something different and I'm so uncomfortable right now. That is ideal. That's what we want as coaches.

That's what we want to have happen. Because when you catch yourself in the moment of struggle

and you bring that to the appropriate channel, you bring that to the coaching relationship,

you're vulnerable, you're honest. You say it's happening right now and you let your coach support

you through it. You take the opportunity to use the container as it is meant to be used. And I get

to co-regulate with you through the challenging moment. I get to stabilize your nervous system

through the challenging moment. I get to work with the limiting beliefs. I get to work with your

mindset. I get to coach you through the new behavior. I stabilize you in that moment so that you can

complete the challenge of doing the new behavior in the same old circumstance where you would normally

go backward. And then you get to be proud of yourself. You get to go, oh my gosh, I did it.

I did something different. And then you get to experience a new result. Then you get to experience

the confidence that comes from evidence that the new way of doing things does in fact produce a

different result. And it's working. And you feel really good about it. And then you want to do it

again. And let me tell you, that's where personal development, that's where growth gets kinky,

right? It gets that existential tink cooking because you can get hooked. I'm like, oh,

that feels good in a in a hard way, right? In a like, oh, it is uncomfortable in that moment where

you're like, oh, it's me. Okay, I didn't think it was me. I didn't think that this was hard for me.

I didn't think that I was going to feel challenged. I didn't think I was going to feel exposed.

I didn't think I was going to feel resistant. But I do. And I am. And I'm scared. And I'm so

uncomfortable. And I don't want to do like, change is hard. Actual change is hard. And so

it's very uncomfortable. And then being exposed and vulnerable to bring that to someone and say,

oh, my God, here it is. This is a moment. Like, all of this is uncomfortable. But when you do it

and you get to watch yourself grow, it's amazing, right? I was a dance teacher. I'm still a dance

teacher. It was a personal trainer, right? This is exactly the same as physical work.

Learning a new exercise is hard. It's physically challenging, literally like your body is burning,

you're shaking. You're so uncomfortable. And your coach is correcting your form. Your coach is

pull up here, breathe right here, try it again, do it like this. And then when you nail it,

but the high, the euphoria that comes from nailing this challenge and seeing yourself as someone

who is capable of growth and change, it's like, ooh, oh, I love that. I can do hard things. That

feels good. I'll do it again. I want more, right? So that's client number one.

Client number two faces that moment where something happens and they feel challenged and

here's the sliding doors moment. They go the other way. Client number two is going to face this

moment where they see themselves and they want to go back into their old way of operating. They

want to go back into their old pattern and they do not bring it to the coaching container.

They do not tell their coach. I'm struggling. I'm doubting. I'm scared. I'm noticing my

self-feeling resistance. They don't say anything. Instead, what happens is they're in my work,

I call it your survival archetypes. I use Carolyn Mrs. Survival Archetype framework for this.

So they're survival archetypes. Your subconscious survival strategies come online and start running

the show. That is going to look like frequently avoidance, right? So for that person, it might look

like they're avoiding the inner work. They shut down to themselves. They're not available for

like, oh, it's me. Their cognitive dissonance is too uncomfortable. So they start avoiding the work

and then they start avoiding the coaching container entirely. They stop talking. They stop

voxering. They stop booking calls. They're paying. They're paying me thousands of dollars and

they are not showing up. I have had this happen more than once. And then I as the coach, I'm reaching

out and I'm like, are you okay? What's going on? I'm starting to sense avoidance. Is there something

going on over there? How can I support you? What do you need? What's coming up? Right? I will do

that a bit to start to build the safety that this is what you bring to me. This is especially for

people with a long history of hyperindependence. It's hard. It can be hard. I have space for that.

I've successfully coached people through that first initial like, oh, I'm allowed to tell you

and I'm like, please tell me. That's what you have me for. I'm here to help you in the moments where

you're struggling with implementation. That's what I'm here to do. I'm here to co-regulate with you

in the challenge. So I will coach people through that. But when somebody's in full avoidance and

shut down, they're not available to be coached through it. So they won't come back to the

container. Now, sometimes if they're really hard into this jag of avoidance and shut down,

they're feeling very confronted. They're like, oh, no. Right? Deep down. I didn't think it was me.

I didn't think I was the block. But what I'm seeing right now is that you're asking me to be

different. And I'm mad. I'm mad that I have to be different. I'm mad that I have to change

deep down, even though you told me that I was going to have to change and that I was going to have

to be different. I really deep down thought I could throw money at this. I thought my assistance

would handle everything. I thought you were going to handle it. I thought that once we started

doing this, that it was just going to happen and be fine. I didn't really think that this was

going to be a struggle for me. And now that it is, I'm mad. And sometimes as a coach,

unfortunately, that gets directed at me. People are like, I'm mad at you. I'm not this

outfit in personal training. I've had it happen in dance. Right? I'm mad at you. You're pushing me.

That is something I can take. I'm available for it. Right? I have coached people through

that place too. If people are available to be coached through sticky emotions, we can work

through it. But some clients, this is as far as they can go. And with this particular client

back to my story, right? So that's client one client one goes, I'm freaking out. I need help. They

let themselves be coached through the freak out. They feel some success. They move forward. And

then they're ready to do it again. They continue to do that until the plan has been all the way

implemented. They see change. They see success. Client number two hits the point where it is

emotionally sticky for them. They shut down. They get avoidant. They get defensive. And if that cannot

be repaired in the coaching relationship, they withdraw from coaching. So when we're talking

about this client failure story that I'm telling which one do you think she was? Obviously client

number two. This is not, I'm not here to dunk on anybody. This is, I say this all was so much

compassion. I've just witnessed this split so many times. And I don't see it talked about. And

so I really want to address that this happens. And every coach I know has experienced this

with clients. When you're doing growth work, when you're doing personal change work with people,

it is a space where people are volunteering to expose things that feel really tender about

themselves. And it takes a certain willingness to open yourself up to do that work. And some people

might think they're ready. They might even really want the result. But they're not actually ready

to face the level of personal development, the level of inner work, the level of growth required

from them to get the result that they're looking for. So sadly with this client, she was a client

be type. She got avoidant. She started shutting down. With this particular client, one of the things I

noticed, and I've experienced this with clients before, is that the way that she handled anxiety

was by making plans. Many of us handle anxiety by making plans. That is not unusual.

But the way that it would play out in the business was it would be late at night. She would start

feeling anxious of like revenue or sales or is this plan going to work? And she would create a

whole new plan. So the next meeting she would set up, she would come to me and she would say,

here's what we're going to do. And I'd be like, wait, we had a plan. What happened to this huge

plan that we were working on that we started implementing last time? And she'd be like, I don't

want to do that anymore. And I would try to coach her back. Like, remember, this was the goal.

Remember, this is what you said you wanted. What is changing? Are we sure this is what we want?

And it kept happening. Her team members were quitting because she would create a plan. She would

delegate things. People would go start doing work. They would do all this work. They'd bring it

back to her and she'd be like, that's not important anymore. We're doing something different.

And they were so frustrated. Right. Imagine that's your boss. They were so frustrated. They're like,

what am I even doing here? Why is it that I'm doing all of this work and the work that I'm doing

isn't being used or honored? I don't even know if you sent me to go to a project. If I'm going to go

eight, eight hours on something and then you're going to tell me we're not doing it anymore. I can't

work like this. I quit. People were leaving. And I brought that to the container. This is what I'm

seeing. I think that what we're seeing is that in moments where you're anxious, your way of

managing anxiety is to plan. And that is completely relatable and understandable. But we need a new

anxiety management strategy. What I want to have happen is in moments where you're scared that

things aren't going to work. You go look at this task list for our current plan. You pick an

available one for you and you do it and you start working on any task from the plan we already have.

Let's see if we can get this to shift for you. Not available for that, right? Yes, yes, I'll try it.

The next time we met, there was a whole new plan. So I'm sharing that only to say that our

survival archetypes are really sneaky and frequently sound like strategy. And in the work that I

do with people, that archetype would be the saboteur. It's like, oh, I am worried that the thing I'm

working on is not going to work. I'm going to risk vulnerability. It's too important to me.

So I should just go do something else. I should delay this. I should put it off. We should table this.

We should start a whole new project instead. That's a saboteur energy. It is not uncommon. Things

like that happen. We just have to recognize when it's happening that there's no way for you to

reach your goals if you're operating like that. And we have to learn to operate a new way.

And of course, this client left the coaching container. And now, far later, I can see on social

media that nothing has changed in their business, that they never actualized any of the goals that

they brought when they came to coaching with me. They have not changed the way they do business.

They have not changed their offerings. They have not changed the fits and starts of random launches.

They have not changed their system of getting a new idea and changing the plan and just launching

a new offer. They have not created systems. They've not created any repeatable offer structure.

They have not scaled. And I am not surprised to see that.

And the reason I'm sharing all of this is because I'd say all the time that any strategy is only

as good as the nervous system of the body that has to execute the strategy. No amount of revenue,

no amount of strategy, no amount of planning, no number of team members.

Is going to allow you to bypass the personal evolution required

for you to get new results in any area of your life. I have terrible news. Change only happens

if you change. And it seems so, duh. But we really do dilute ourselves sometimes,

we trick ourselves into thinking that change is possible, that new results are possible without

us having to change anything, without us having to confront the ways that we are currently being,

that work for where we are right now, but will not work where we want to go.

They will not work in the new environment we're craving. And success in growing your business,

in scaling, but really success in anything is not just about having a good plan.

It's about whether or not you're going to face yourself and how you behave

when the plan is hard, because there's going to be parts of the plan that are hard.

There is no way around it. And sometimes I think people expect when they come into coaching,

that they're going to be given the plan and that A, they're going to be able to execute it with

just no challenges. And B, that's what's expected of them. And I tell my clients all the time,

I don't expect you to not be challenged by this. I don't expect this to be easy for you. I

expect it to be hard, not constantly, and not every bit of it. But my expectation is this plan

is going to challenge you. You're going to hit a cap somewhere. My expectation is that you're

going to hit a day where trying to do this is going to bring you face to face with a limiting

belief with an old pattern, with a safety habit, with a way of being, that is going to bring to

the surface for you. This is it. This is the challenge. This is my current threshold.

This is as strong as I am going back to the personal training example. This is it. This is as far

as I go. And my expectation as your coach is that when that moment happens, we get to work. That's

where I get excited as a coach. Any of my powerhouse clients, any of my private clients can tell you

sometimes when they come to me and they're like, oh, I am blocked right now. I have a deep one.

I just realized that this thing, this thing, this thing is tied to this thing and I feel like this

and I'm totally shutting down. And I'm like, oh, fun. Everybody jokes about it now. And they're like,

oh, I hear you in my head when I'm in these moments going, oh, fun. To me, that is fun. I'm like,

now we get to work. When it's easy, that's great. We all know this, right? On days that we're not

challenged, we go to like a beginner level class or something and we just get to be the strongest

person in the room. We get to be the most accomplished person in the room. That's fun. And it's

good for our ego and it feels nice, but we're not growing, not really. We're only growing

when we have the experience of like, oh, this is the edge for me. I am challenged right now.

And then we get to go to work. We get to dig in. We get to be like, yeah, you've never passed this

level before. You've never gotten past this point before and today you're going to.

This is where the work happens. That's my expectation as a coach is that when you, the A,

that you will struggle or we're not pushing you far enough, we're not trying hard enough,

your goal isn't big enough. You will struggle and that when you struggle, that's where our work

lives. That's where you have, that's what you have a coach for. Because if you could navigate

through that moment by yourself, you would have done it already. It wouldn't be your cap.

There will always come a point where you need outside eyes on how you're doing things. And this

is not just for other people. This is for me as well. I have coaches. I have an excellence

management team. I have therapists. I have the people I go to when I hit those walls. That's what

it's for. The pursuit of excellence in anything, the pursuit of continual growth in anything

is going to require outside eyes. You're always going to hit a point where like, I don't know what

I'm doing wrong. I can't see it. I know that I'm doing something wrong. I know we're not wrong. But

that like the way that I'm doing things will not get me past this level. I know that I'm hitting a

wall, but I don't know how to get through it by myself. That's why you have a coach.

And when you hit that moment, you have to trust your coach. You have to rely on the person

that you're paying to support you in that moment. You have to let them see you in your mess.

And that takes a lot of vulnerability. Scaling is a mirror. Business is a mirror.

Relationships are a mirror for your deepest shit. And coaching isn't a magic wand. Hiring a

coach doesn't solve these things on its own. The coaching relationship is a container, a safe space

for that confrontation between you and the limitation. And when you grasp that, when you crave that,

when you go into the coaching relationship, wanting it to be that, the existential

kink of, I'm going to come to you in these moments where I am having a reckoning with myself.

I see what I want. I see the way I'm blocking it. And I don't know how to get through it. Help me.

If you're willing to do that, you will continue to grow. And if you're not willing to do that,

you will continue to stay where you are. And you might blame the coaching programs that you've

joined, the coaches that you've worked with, the external circumstances around you. I think this

is one of the reasons a lot of people don't join one on one programs. I think this is the reason

a lot of people will not allow themselves to get into close proximity. Because if you only join

massive programs or DIY courses and keep trying to do all the work alone, then every time you

hit that in a wall, there's no one to show it to. There's no exposure. You risk nothing and you stop

at the same points over and over and over. And you say, that wasn't the right curriculum,

I'm going to buy another one. That wasn't the right group program for me. But did you use the group?

Did you go to the group? Did you allow yourself to be visible? Did you allow yourself to be exposed?

Did you come to the coach that you were working with and say, here's what I'm struggling with.

Did you utilize the resources that you were paying for or did you stay hyper independent?

Did you stay avoidant? Did you work in private? And then say, this isn't working for me.

I place this upon your altar, something to consider.

If you're hearing all of this and you're like, oh, yeah, I'm, I am client one. I am the person who

like, I want to be challenged. I want it. I want help. I want support. I want to be

co-regulated with I want someone who can hold me through that messy middle of change. I want

someone who can catalyze me and support me. And again, co-regulate with me, stabilize me

through the scary growth periods where I feel challenged. And you're recognizing that you're like,

oh, yeah, my business is doing pretty well, but it will not scale the way it is now. I don't have

systems. I don't operate like a CEO. I'm not comfortable delegating. I don't allow myself to have

a team. I don't structure my days in such a way that it allows me to have a dedicated time to

think about the running and the growth of the company and not just being the talent and the

doer and the person who's up to my elbows in the muck all the time. I am launching off of vibes

in hustle. I don't really have a long term plan for how things work. If you're like, okay, that is

me. And you know that you've gone as far as you can go alone. You've gone as far as you can go

in courses. You're ready for the exposure that comes with bringing those moments of challenge

and frustration to someone and saying, here's my mess. Help me. Then I am the coach for you.

And I would love to work with you. So if you're relating to this and being like,

shit, this is the help I need, please feel free to hit me up. You can DM me on Instagram at

intuitive edge coaching. You can email me intuitive edge coaching at gmail.com. You can go to my website

intuitive edge coaching.com and you can apply for powerhouse mastermind. You can apply to work with

me one on one. But this is the work. You cannot separate the business strategy from the personal

development. You cannot separate the inner mastery from the outer strategy because no matter what the

strategy is, you are the person who has to implement it. And there will come a time where your success

requires you to change the way you're showing up, the way you're leading, the way you're operating,

the decisions you're making, the things you're saying yes to and the things that you're saying no to.

The work that I do is for the person, the CEO behind the company. And there is a big shift in

identity, in leadership, in the way that we show up and lead from being the doer, from being the

talent, from being the scrappy solopreneur hustler into being the CEO of a company. Those people

operate differently. They show up differently. There are trade-offs and some of those trade-offs

are challenging. And if you know that that is the threshold that you're at, that is the work that

I do. And I would love to support you through it. So if this resonates for you, I'd love to hear

from you. Also, if it was just helpful for you to hear what it looks like when coaching doesn't

work out the way that somebody's hoping it would. And that was valuable for you to hear. Maybe even

more valuable than just hearing clients' success stories. I'd love to hear that from you as well.

I always welcome sharing your feedback on these episodes. I always welcome your shares. I love

it when you all email me and DM me about these episodes. So keep it coming. I like this to feel

like a two-way conversation. So I'm not just shouting into the void all the time. That's what I have

for you today. Kill of you. Bye.

That's our episode for today. Thank you so much for taking the time to listen to this. I know

there are so many things that you could be doing with your day. So many things you could be listening to.

And it means so much that you are here in this community. If you enjoyed this episode, please

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and it helps us grow and sustain this brilliant community of entrepreneurs dedicated to doing

the inner work. Thank you so much for being here. Kill of you. Bye.