You're listening to the Life Coaching Secrets Podcast, episode 197. Did you know that life coaches are needed now more than ever? I'm Frank Macri, founder of Thriving Coach Academy. I've trained over a thousand coaches and helped them launch their own successful coaching businesses. If you want to make an incredible income and impact as a coach, and have a lot of fun doing it i'll show you exactly how to get it done this is life coaching secrets
Hey everybody, welcome to the show. I've got a very special guest today, one of our graduates of Thriving Coach Academy. Yamato Yoshioka is joining us and he's going to give you a little bit of an insight into his coaching business that he's been running for some time now. So welcome to the show, Yamato. I'm so excited to have you here. yeah thank you frank for having me excited to be a part of this today yeah
Cool. Well, you work with leaders and specifically those who are at mid-level management, those who are at the executive level, but also entrepreneurs who are looking to create. a life that they actually enjoy so we're going to go into that in this episode we'll talk about what led you to work with this niche we'll go over uh what are some of the the different signs that
People have some of the challenges that you help them with. So why don't we first start with the niche itself? So what led you to support mid-level managers, executives, and entrepreneurs? Well, really the origin is my life story woven in as well. So 10 years ago, I lost my wife and the mother of my first three children to breast cancer.
And that's when the boys were five, three and one years old. And it's, don't worry, it's a happy ending. I'm remarried now with five children. So no need to worry about that. But that was a really tough time for me. And at the time, I was a fast rising, high potential leader, one of the youngest managers in a Fortune Global Top 50 company.
And obviously my life circumstances woke me up to a deep, painful realization that life is so much more than the professional success I was striving for at the time. And looking back on it now, I really see that as a personal calling from the universe for me to do something more than the path that I was on. I'm on a mission to support leaders lead better lives, both professionally and personally. Powerful. Nice. Very inspiring. So you right now are working.
Just for everyone's awareness, part-time, but I know in the very near future, you already have the plan and you will be moving towards full-time coaching. Congratulations. Yes, excited about that. Thank you, Frank. Very exciting. So let's talk about what are some of the things you look for in your audience, in your network, to know that they are... a fit for your type of coaching? What are some of the signs that people are struggling with the challenges that you help them with? Sure. There's
There's a few. The first one I'll mention is the constant pursuit of achievement and high performance. There's a high commitment and perfectionist tendency in a lot of the people I love to work with, and they're always doing extra. They're always trying to control the situation to achieve professional outcomes and performance.
and it's really taxing on them and the second item is relationships and this is both at work and at home at work it's their reputation and their high performance kind of keeps them held back from perhaps fully trusting their team members to do and perform at the levels that they perform at. And it creates distance for them in the personal relationship and they feel that. And also, you know, there's so little energy then to come home.
and have great relationships at home so there's there's personal relationships under tension as well and sometimes they're secretly suffering from from these relationships and Perhaps the last one I'll mention is a desire to... constantly meet the expectation of others. And again, this is both professional and personally. The work pressure is from the supervisors, their board, or executives if they're middle managers.
the peers and their teams it's a constant pressure and then they come home and then their family commitments are also you know never never slowing down so You know, I work with a lot of clients that try to meet all of that. And it's a persistent overwhelm, constantly on the verge of burnout and, you know, certainly neglecting their personal wellness.
Those are the signs that bring clients into my world to work with. And we usually have a conversation around those points on how I might be able to support them. Makes sense. So it's kind of like your life looks really amazing on paper, right? Your resume, you've got all these achievements, successes, accolades, but.
Behind the scenes, things aren't so great with that overwhelm potentially leading to burnout, your personal wellness that's been neglected. You can get this constant push to achieve. while also having some challenges with team members, but also relationships. Is that what I'm hearing are the main signs that you look for? Yeah, absolutely. And you hit the nail on the head there. They're seen as successful.
So they have very few places to actually go like talk this through. Right. Because yeah, because others see them as that and they're relying on, on, on my clients. And so. There's no space for them to go. That makes sense. Yes. So many people rely on them and they probably wonder, well. Who can I rely on? Like, who can I talk to to navigate the stresses and challenges and the pressure in my life? Very good. OK, so you you look for these different signs and let's talk about.
Just people like this in general, what are some of the perhaps myths, beliefs, expectations, or in Thriving Coach Academy, we call them the rules. What are some of the most common rules that you hear? in your clients when you start working with them? The one that I always seem to have my senses on is they believe that they should be satisfied with the success that they've worked so hard to achieve to date and
You know, they really try to convince themselves of that. Oh, I love this. I'm doing this. This is great. And try to, you know, trick their mind into believing that. But their body and their energy actually tell them something different. And the, you know, you talked about the rules, you know, that's in TCA, the rule change usually goes along the lines of. The truth is you can want more than what you have and that you can redefine success. And it's not selfish to want more.
And that's really important because of the dependency of those around them on my clients, they feel like they're selfish. And that's something that we really tried to reframe around. Powerful. Okay. So realizing that. It's okay to want more. It's not selfish to want more. You can redefine your own success. And I like how you also mentioned how, you know, when you.
On the outside, while things might look great, on the inside, your body and your energy feels like something's off. That's powerful. All right, give us another one. What's another myth that your clients typically struggle with? Yeah, so some of them are still high achievers and they still want more professionally. And one of the greatest myths that we also work through is sacrificing your...
personal wellness is a necessity to sustain or increase your performance professionally. And it's so not true. It is if you don't change your behaviors and habits and your thoughts around how you approach life. But that's one thing that's a total myth. You can have it all. And, you know, I work with my clients to do that. I love it. Yeah. It's just one of these classic.
You can have one, but not the other that a lot of us are conditioned to believe, right? Like you can have the success, but not the health. You can have the success, but not the fulfillment. And you've got to sacrifice one for the other. It's pretty wild how that's just something that so many people think is a choice that they have to make. They have to let go of one in order to have the other.
Yes. Well, absolutely. Like the term work-life balance in itself, like balance indicates compromise and you can't have one without, you know, without sacrificing the other. When I hear that word, I cringe because I want people to know that you can actually have both. There you go. Yes. We're checking out the idea of work-life balance. Love it. Okay, cool.
I like that you're sharing one of those beliefs that you have, which is really not getting away from that work-life balance and thinking you have to sacrifice one for the other. What are just overall some of your other ideas or beliefs that you have around this topic? Well... One of the things that I work with my clients, and it takes a lot of repetition, is I have them really slow down to speed up.
And what I mean by that is most high achievers, high performers have gotten to that place by high productivity and high efficiency. And so they believe that if they continue to do more and more of that. that they'll ultimately break through. But it's the old Pareto principle or the 80-20 rule. By the time they're already that efficient,
to get more efficiency has diminishing returns. And that's when they feel it in their emotions and their body. And so to actually get to the next level of, say, productivity or achievement. they actually have to slow down and create white space and really think things through. It's not a matter of running faster, but slowing down to speed up. So that's one of the things that I work with clients on.
Before we even go past that one, I'm feeling kind of called out in a way. This is something that... I had my piano teacher on the podcast a while back and she just talked about the adult brain and how we learn as adults. And this is one of the most common.
things that she's telling me is slow is fast. You have to go slow in order to eventually go fast. So it's totally aligning with what you're saying is slow down to speed up. And I'm someone who could fit into this category as a business owner people you work with and it's true like you just feel like you've got to have be as productive as possible go as fast as possible be as efficient as possible but you know you that could also
That could also slow you down in the long run It sounds it's kind of ironic the way it sounds but you really do like you're saying have to slow down to speed up Yeah, absolutely. I love that. In the long run, you're not getting ahead. And, you know, some of the societal pressures really put all of us into this area. And I'm no different as well. It's something I work on as well.
And actually, the clients, as they work through that, inspire me at the same time. Very cool. Nice. All right. So you also you have the. Tell us about this inverted golden rule. You had mentioned it to me a little bit earlier. What is the inverted golden rule all about? Yeah, I love it because I love working with people-centered leaders.
they're they're just such great people and i'm inspired to to work with them and get the get the opportunity to work with them and with these types of people the inverted golden rule means and maybe i'll back up a little bit the context is they're usually telling their team hey it's okay be with your family take a vacation don't take your work phone with you right but then they don't do it themselves. So the inverted golden rule is do for yourself what you say to others.
And it's a really important item for these fabulous people-centered leaders to be able to see that for themselves as well. One of the things that we go over in the academy that's coming up, and I'm sure you probably recognize this with your clients, are the masks that we talk about the mask and how people wear these masks too.
maybe feel a sense of belonging and i'm hearing a lot of your clients probably having some of the perfectionist mask and also the people-pleasing mask as well yeah yes And what's funny about this is we'll talk about, you know, kind of leadership assessments later, but people think that their team members don't notice when they're not following their own rules that they're saying, but they absolutely do.
So you're telling people to go home early, enjoy, and then they know that you come in early and stay late and answer emails on the weekend. And people know that, actually. So the inverted golden rule is really, really important to model the behaviors that you're teaching and saying to your team as well. Put on that oxygen mask first before you put on others' oxygen mask. That's exactly it. And, you know, for parents, what are you modeling for your children, right? There's so many layers to it.
Beautiful. I'm sure you dive deep with your clients on unpacking all those beliefs there. All right. And you also have this, there's the idea around savoring. experience over success that you had we talked about this earlier why don't you tell our listeners what this means this is another one that i i'm a work in progress but celebrating the journey over the success
The issue that I see with these high achievers, high performers is they're constantly resetting their bar of their own bar of success. And so they achieve one milestone. They'll literally celebrate it for 30 seconds. And then they've reset their next goal. And they forget to realize that this is a journey. And it's not all of these sprints that don't have any space in between them. And so I help clients really, you know, savor that journey.
co-discover their intrinsic motivations because most of their goals are externally defined outcomes but really get into those intrinsic motivations as well so that they can truly celebrate it when they when they achieve something I love this one, especially, and I might steal it in an episode I'm working on. A lot of our listeners have been writing a book throughout this year. And it was very interesting because right when I finished the book and it went to editing.
I immediately was like, oh, well, let me start a second book. It's so wild how when you are a high achiever or business owner, entrepreneur, like the people you work with. You can just finish something and automatically you're into the next goal. And there have been times, especially as an entrepreneur, and I want a lot of our listeners are entrepreneurs or aspiring entrepreneurs.
There's no one there that's there to celebrate you. You've got to celebrate yourself. You don't have the boss that's congratulating you because you are the boss. So I remember when I finished like for the hundredth episode of the podcast. um a year or two ago i'm like let me just get let's get balloons let's just do something yeah Like the big one, zero, zero, and we're up to 200 episodes. So I'm like, when it's things like this or the book launch, you know, it's important.
And even as I'm saying it out loud, I realize I still got to work through the part of me that's like, well, why do I deserve to celebrate that? Do I really need to? And as you're talking about it, it really is so.
important and essential to savor the success the experience the journey and celebrate yourself as you go this is so good yeah and and as and as i mentioned i i have to model it myself too and as you open the show with I'm transitioning from my career into a full time and I'm blocked out that transition time just to relax and take a breath because I know in myself that.
I'll, you know, I'll end on Friday and Monday morning I'll, I'll be right at it. And I said, no, I need to, I need to model what I'm, what I'm teaching as well. Very nice. Good. Listen to that, everybody. Make sure you savor your success and all of these exciting things in your life as you achieve them. Okay, so...
We got a good sense of some of the core beliefs and ideas that you help people really integrate. So are there any kinds of other ideas or stories that... you might want to share with with our listeners here yeah it i guess this one is a bit of a surprise to me but the second and third order effects of my clients doing their work has been a pleasant surprise. And what I mean by that is, as an example of corporate executive, the wife of a corporate executive.
Recently started exercising regularly, seeing her husband start as part of the work we were doing and changed her healthy habits. And the same executive told me that. the team members that he was modeling a people-centered leadership structure around, they're now doing that to their members. So now he has impact two layers deep. So one at home, two layers deep. And another example is a vice principal at a very large elementary school. He's so great. He's such a positive, energetic leader.
And empowered his staff to lead the same way. So, of course, that communicates and translates down into the students. But what he also said to me was more and more staff members thanking him. for how that positive energy made life changes at home for the staff. So there's all these second, third order effects that are happening, which I never really anticipated, but I started to see.
why I love working with leaders. They're like an acupuncture point. If you get this one person to model these behaviors, they have an outsized impact because they're so influential already.
And that's been something that I wasn't aware of until the clients started making changes. That's awesome. That ripple effect that people might not realize happens when they... prioritize themselves they do the quote selfish thing they thought they shouldn't be doing but by prioritizing themselves they're having that ripple effect on their team on their family which is incredible wow it's it's been it's been a
an amazing surprise and something that's so inspiring and you know seeing my clients have so much impact to the people around them Nice. Great. Okay. So let's talk about, now that we have a good sense of who you work for and some of the types of things you're looking for with your clients, how would you describe... your coaching style. So, you know, in the academy, we really encourage our coaches to
start to figure out what's their unique way that they want to show up and coach people. So, and there's no right or perfect way to coach. So what would you say your coaching style is like? Definitely a sense of calmness I bring and depth as well. And how depth shows up during, during our sessions is I gave lots of room and lots of silence.
And I find that, you know, the type of people I work with, they're looking for solutions all the time. Like their mind is high performing and high revving. And when I just give them space. That's the relaxation. That's the depth. That's the profound insights in those moments that they need that they don't get elsewhere. As I said, they run a very efficient, productive life generally.
That silence and holding that space for them is something that I think comes from my style, but also it resonates very much with as a need and a space for the people I work with. I can imagine that's transformational to finally have somebody, a professional, just to give you that space, bring that calmness.
that they probably don't experience elsewhere. And whenever I meet or see a successful person, it's one of the questions I think right away, who is their coach? Who is their mentor? Because it's so true. Growing up, I used to think, oh, successful people, that's just something that they create on their own. But the reality is there's a coach.
Sometimes multiple coaches. There's a team behind every truly successful person, especially those who are successful and fulfilled. There are coaches like you who are there to. allow them to, you know, not even just allow them, but encourage them to get to the place that they're at in their life and not burn out or fall apart. Yeah, absolutely. There's a.
There's your own belief systems. And then there's support systems that really allow you to be who you are. And I see myself as a support system to my clients. Yeah. Yeah. And, you know, like we talk about coaching versus therapy and both are great, but especially with the clients you work with, they're not, they're not looking to maybe process childhood or, you know, they're not looking to go into trauma.
They are just looking for a coach like you who can give them room to breathe and hold space, figure out, you know, what's why they're feeling so much pressure, why they're feeling this. need to achieve so much and allowing them to you know have that fulfillment that goes just beyond in health that goes beyond like the outer success that they have um
Loving it. Okay. So let's talk about now your unique way that you work with your clients. You have a bundle, a series of sessions that you, you provide with your clients, right? In addition to some other tools. Yeah, usually. The initial work together is usually four to six months. And I really listen to what the client needs as we're getting into that relationship.
At the end of the day, it's totally bespoke and customized to what the person needs, but generally it's four to six months. How I usually start is we'll do a leadership 360 assessment. And I also do a life 360 assessment. And so there's this between those two things, there's this holistic individual 720 assessment where we really understand.
what's happening inside the life of that individual. And from that assessment, we'll identify areas we want to work on. Usually it's one or two key areas to start. expanding a strength and improving an area of development. And this is something the client wants to change. And we usually co-discover what those items are at the beginning.
that impacts both the professional and personal life. And then we work on the strategies, the mindset, the skills and habits to roadmap themselves to that ultimate vision that they want for themselves. side by side with them through that journey. Beautiful. I love it. So you start out with that 720 assessment. So figuring out what the leadership area looks like and then overall what their life is like.
then working through the mindset from there. Okay. Was there anything else in your process or framework that you wanted to share? No, but what I will say is I actually went, went back and looked at.
the most recent five clients that finished. Yes. Tell us. And because I've, I've actually, you know, started to capture some, you know, quantifiable metrics around it. And I, i measure five things and so the average five or the the average of the past five clients so their vision from beginning to end improve 1.5 times
So they're looking to improve more things in their life than they originally set out to do. The strategy assessment, you know, how they strategically go about their life was 2x. The mindset was 2x. The skill sets that they have 1.75 times. And then the habits and energy of how they operate every day was 2x. And so... In six months, people are experiencing a different life. And I'm really proud of the clients because those kind of shifts don't just naturally occur.
Me asking questions in our sessions, of course, pokes at things, but the self-awareness and the commitment to put those changes into their life, you know, I'm inspired by my clients as they achieve these. transformational changes incredible incredible wow okay cool so totally transforming their life i love how it's just within six months
You know, having this bump in their vision, strategy, mindset, skill set and energy. That's incredible. Like when you said the energy is 2x, the mindset, the strategy 2x, 2x for both. That's so cool. All right. So let's see if you. You have some kind of resource that you have available to people that might be interested in your work. So why don't you tell us about what that resource is? Sure. There's a couple of free resources on my website.
One is, you know, just helps understand who you are as a person. There's a personal values workbook. It's pretty self-explanatory. You can download it, work through it, really gets...
identifies and discovers your core values and how you live into them today. So it's actually a really great self awareness tool. And the second item is I also have a link to be able to conduct a leadership self-assessment and and i offer a complimentary debrief session so you can understand what that assessment's saying in a profound way and yeah it's complimentary if people want to
work with me, that's great. If not, at least they know the areas that they should focus on in their own leadership. Very good. And we will put the links to access Yamato's website. Get your hands on those resources. I will put those links in the show notes. So I highly, highly encourage any of you listening that if you feel like this could be some work that could benefit you or if you know somebody who. might really benefit from this, then send them over to Yamato's website and
You know, I remember clearly Yamato as a student in the academy and his coaching is top tier. He is an exceptional coach. So check out his stuff. See what he's up to. And I know it's only going to keep expanding from here. It's so awesome. He'll be making this big transition from part-time to full-time coach, which is just so great that you're going to have even more.
time to devote to your clients and have even bigger results. So I want to congratulate you, Yamato, on the success you've already had. You've already begun working with clients for a while now and been seeing results. So it's just awesome to see what you're up to. And I appreciate you sharing how you got into this niche and just some of the work you've done with your clients. Thank you so much for sharing this with our listeners.
No, thank you, Frank, for having me and the vote of confidence on my impact going forward. Really appreciate it. Cool stuff. All right, everyone, check out those links again in the description in the show notes of this episode. Otherwise. We'll catch you on the next one. Bye. You'll learn our coach's secrets. I'll see you on the next one. inside.