Client Spotlight: Rochelle Coleman

Rochelle Coleman is the National Sales Director of Commercial Consulting Services at Microsoft Canada. When she came to Frame of Mind Coaching™, she noticed a few things that indicated that her experience was going to be different than typical executive coaching. 

The first thing that stood out to Rochelle was the amount of attention that went into making sure that she was matched with the perfect coach. “I’m a very direct person and so is [FOM Coach] Dave,” says Rochelle. “If the alignment at the start wasn’t right, coaching would have gone down a very different road.”

The second indicator that FOM Coaching™ was unlike other executive coaching was her first coaching session. Rochelle was able to open up about her personal relationships right away. “I realized that this was going to run much deeper and that I needed to make a commitment that was more significant than just getting on the phone with an executive coach to talk business,” she says.

“Once I got into it, it was really about me and what I was willing to put into it,” says Rochelle. “While Dave was there on-demand, whenever I needed him, I put in the work by journaling habitually.” 

By the middle of her coaching experience, the people in Rochelle’s life started noticing changes in her. “I used to judge others and think that they did me wrong deliberately,” she says. “I learned that everybody does things out of love and to assume that they have positive intentions.”

Together Dave and Rochelle explored why she would phrase things a certain way or assume that others had negative intentions. Rochelle gained powerful coaching skills to use with her team, like changing her sometimes negative language and asking questions in a softer way. 

“I learned that just changing a word can change your perception or how someone else responds to it,” she says. “In my one-on-one time with my team, I’ve been able to teach them to assume positive intent.” 

Rochelle’s team used to be highly dependent on her to accelerate their careers. “I’ve been using what I learned from Dave to relinquish some responsibility and to ensure that my team understands the ownership that they have on things,” she says. “A big change for me was bowing out of certain things that weren’t my responsibility and coaching my team to take them on.”

She used to think that it was easier to take over and do things herself, but she discovered that that was disabling her team. “I still have many things that I have to reactively get involved in, but my team feels more confident,” she says. “By me backing away a little bit, they feel less dependent on me.” 

Rochelle finds that she’s able to get everything she wants done in a day, including workouts and singing in her bands. “I give myself from 6-10pm every evening to do what I need to do,” she says. “I’ve given myself more sleep and more opportunities, and I’ve adjusted my calendar to have Monday mornings and Friday afternoons off.” 

Dave also helped Rochelle evaluate her core values and see where some of her values could be reprioritized. “That was highly valuable to me because I learned how I operate,” she says. “He also helped me realize that I was tolerating certain behaviors because I had PTSD and imposter syndrome from a previous job.” Dave helped Rochelle see how those beliefs weren’t serving her and showed her how to let go of the past. 

“Coaching is hard to explain to others, but the only thing they need to see is the change that took place for me,” she says. “It was a personal journey that I won’t forget.”