“Ignoranti quem portum petat nullus suus ventus est” – Seneca- Epistulae Morales Ad Lucilium, letter 71
(“If a man does not know to which port he is rowing, no wind can be favorable to him.” )

The wind is one of the most unpredictable natural forces and with all our technology it is impossible to predict its direction and strength. That hasn’t stopped the wind being used as the main source of propulsion for thousands of years for movement at sea.

The sails – for those like me, incompetent in the field – are something magical and fascinating: while it’s easy to admit that a boat can be pushed by the wind, it’s almost impossible to understand how it can steer left while the wind is pushing it to the right, or how it manages to go forward while being pushed in the opposite direction. What’s more, with the right maneuvers, a sailboat can end up with two or three times the wind speed.

Clearly, anyone can reach their desired destination when the wind happens to be blowing in a favorable direction, but only a professional sailor is able to use it when the wind is blowing in other directions. What is interesting is that the wind is an impersonal force, which we cannot influence: we can choose between complaining that it is not blowing in the direction we want, or we can learn to use the sails in such a way that – whatever the direction of the wind – they will take us to the desired destination.

This comparison has come to my mind insistently lately, because of the growing number of people complaining about “crisis”, “economy”, “government”, “Europe”, “globalization” etc.

A chorus of complaints, which in the end have only one thing in common: how well things were working in 2006/2007 while now nothing is working. It is clear, therefore, that a period of economic boom like the one in Romania a few years ago represents exactly the idea of the wind at the stern: no matter what you did, money was coming in, growth was continuous and, therefore, it was enough to let yourself be carried by the flow of an expanding economy to achieve results.

Now that this flow has taken a different direction, it’s easy to get discouraged and complain about the situation, but we forget that capable people continue to do good business and make a profit, despite the so-called crisis.

If we fail to get results and blame the environment, it means two things:

-we don’t have clear objectives and we get carried away;
-we don’t know how to move independently of the wind.

What does all this have to do with business coaching? The essence of coaching – whether at a personal or business level – is to discover your potential, choose your objectives and use the available resources efficiently. In conclusion, it’s clear that if we don’t know where we want to go, we can only take the easy way and let the wind take us; but then we shouldn’t complain when we end up in a place we don’t like. In the same way, admitting that we know where we want to go, we must know the right technique.

Teaching this technique is not the job of a coach: there are lawyers, consultants, economists, and experts of all kinds. But it is obvious that the technique is not useful if our objectives are not clear; moreover – and this is a frequently neglected aspect – it is useless to know the technique if we do not have the will to implement it (how often do we say to ourselves “Yeah, I know I should do X, but…”).

For choosing goals and keeping the necessary focus and motivation, working with a coach can really be a revelation.

At company level, the business coach is the one who helps top management to discover the potential and define the company’s objectives, mission and values; at the same time, he or she forces managers to stay focused on the chosen objectives.

At the middle management level, the coach ensures that the values and objectives have been effectively understood and are correctly communicated to subordinates, so that the whole structure moves in the same direction. To continue the boat metaphor, if team members are rowing in different directions, there will be a lot of work, a lot of fatigue, a waste of resources, and the boat will move slowly and not necessarily in the desired direction.

This brings us to the fundamental points on which a coach works:

-Clarifying the company’s objectives.
-Clarifying values.
-Mastering the technical aspect.
-Aligning human resources.

Practically, in order for our business not to be a boat in the wind, we need to clarify the following:

-Know WHERE we want to go.
-Know WHY we want to get there.
-Know HOW to get there.
-Let’s verify that each team member understands and shares these principles.

I would add the magic question that every entrepreneur should ask himself and that is worth an entire marketing course:

WHO pays us (Or who should pay us…) and WHY?

Even if you are not yet ready to entrust yourself in the hands of a business coach, who will deepen this work with more professionalism and efficiency, ask yourself these simple questions and you will discover, that they can improve your results in an amazing way.

Happy navigation!

by Bruno