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This is a bit sensationalized. > "In the first year alone, I spent $14,000 working with my life coach, and in the years that followed I probably spent $100,000

by cj 3y ago

This is a bit sensationalized. > "In the first year alone, I spent $14,000 working with my life coach, and in the years that followed I probably spent $100,000," she says. She also spent thousands of dollars on additional courses and mentorships with other life coaches that her primary coach recommended. "I got sucked into it." If they weren't getting value out of it, why continue the sessions? I have an executive coach I meet with every other week. No psychology background, etc, but a lot of experience coaching people similar to me. She is insanely expensive, but I'm ok with that. In my experience, the majority of these type of uncertified coaches don't go out of their way to mislead people into thinking they have more training than they do. For that reason I don't really consider it a scam. (I'm sure there are money hungry sketchy coaches that mislead people, but that exists in every industry)

smohare 3y ago
It’s a bit more nuanced. An individual practitioner might not have malicious intent, but the industry itself could largely be fraudulent. Take for example a well meaning physic or purveyor of some pseudoscientific medical modality. The very existence and promotion of ineffective alternatives scams society as a whole, since the general public and by extension free markets are notoriously terrible at evaluating efficacy.
zmgsabst 3y ago
Tangent, but what is an “executive coach” and why do you see her?
- ykonstant 3y ago
  It is like Plus, but instead of added leg room, it's got a wider overhead.
- rwmj 3y ago
  It's someone who offers you business advice. I know someone who uses one for their business. In my opinion it's just someone who spouts common sense truisms and then charges lots of money for it, but he seems to like it. A lot of overlap with life coaches.
  - mnky9800n 3y ago
    Some people just like hearing they are right. Like the Indian guy in silicon valley who tells the guy what he says is enlightened.
- cj 3y ago
  It's like a therapist but focussed on your business life rather than personal life. They typically work with other executives / business owners. Sounding board for talking through employee issues, managing people, or whatever else is going on in the business. Basically things that would go over the head of a normal therapist.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
vundercind 3y ago
I’m watching this happen to someone I know. Similar stories abound. The way they rack up so much spending: 1) Cult-like sales tactics. I don’t mean that as a simple put down, I mean literally a lot of the same tactics cults use to gain recruits. “If it’s not working, you just haven’t committed hard enough, this is your fault” is universal, but far from the only example. 2) A pattern of coaches-coaching-coaches. Almost nobody makes money coaching normal people, in these systems. The actual market for that is tiny, and the number of people offering such services is enormous. Newbies drop out after muddling along for a year or two (paying coaches before and after starting their own thing) OR “graduate” to trying to coach coaches (for which they’ll need a coach, who will also try to refer them to their coach when they’ve gotten as much out of them as they can—it’s almost a self-organizing pyramid scheme). This intersects with #1 because they constantly demonize ways out of this cycle, especially getting a normal job (“ew, gross, yuck, don’t you want to be your own boss?”) > In my experience, the majority of these type of uncertified coaches don't go out of their way to mislead people into thinking they have more training than they do. Oh, and this part? Lying about their personal history, past entrepreneurial work, success at coaching, sometimes media coverage they’ve had or clients they’ve worked with, et c, is nearly universal. Many also hold bullshit credentials from other coaches who’ve reached the top of the pyramid. They also often have very misleading offers, especially for group-course sorts of things. I’ve been going down a bit of a rabbit hole on this since discovering the whole thing exists, and have been surprised both at how huge it is, and how similar all the people doing it look, as far as the ways they exaggerate to “sell themselves” and the ways they scam with their offerings (but if there’s one thing these scam courses teach, it’s… how to scam. Like, really, that’s often the only material curriculum) [edit edit] oh and you’re unlikely to “naturally” end up seeing this stuff if you’re a guy. The industry is overwhelmingly women, selling to other women. Many bill themselves as “helping women succeed and become entrepreneurs” and otherwise have a feminist coat of paint on their operation, which is incredibly gross because their business model is scamming women.
- specialist 3y ago
  > coaches-coaching-coaches This is the punchline of all the self-help books reviewed by the If Books Could Kill podcast.
tivert 3y ago
>> "In the first year alone, I spent $14,000 working with my life coach, and in the years that followed I probably spent $100,000," she says. She also spent thousands of dollars on additional courses and mentorships with other life coaches that her primary coach recommended. "I got sucked into it." > If they weren't getting value out of it, why continue the sessions? Because Homo economicus is a lie, and real people don't act like that in real life. It's worth considering the full quote: > Angela Lauria, 50, discovered life coaching when she was struggling with postnatal depression and had been recently fired from her job. Initially interested in a coaching programme focusing primarily on weight loss, Lauria signed up for a $2,000 (£1,595) retreat. "In the first year alone, I spent $14,000 working with my life coach, and in the years that followed I probably spent $100,000," she says. She also spent thousands of dollars on additional courses and mentorships with other life coaches that her primary coach recommended. "I got sucked into it." That sounds like a desperate person with a lot of serious problems casting out for a lifeline. Life coaching presented itself as that lifeline, so she grabbed on and persisted because she hoped it would work.

by cj 3y ago

smohare 3y ago

It’s a bit more nuanced. An individual practitioner might not have malicious intent, but the industry itself could largely be fraudulent. Take for example a well meaning physic or purveyor of some pseudoscientific medical modality. The very existence and promotion of ineffective alternatives scams society as a whole, since the general public and by extension free markets are notoriously terrible at evaluating efficacy.

zmgsabst 3y ago

Tangent, but what is an “executive coach” and why do you see her?

ykonstant 3y ago
It is like Plus, but instead of added leg room, it's got a wider overhead.
rwmj 3y ago
It's someone who offers you business advice. I know someone who uses one for their business. In my opinion it's just someone who spouts common sense truisms and then charges lots of money for it, but he seems to like it. A lot of overlap with life coaches.
- mnky9800n 3y ago
  Some people just like hearing they are right. Like the Indian guy in silicon valley who tells the guy what he says is enlightened.
cj 3y ago
It's like a therapist but focussed on your business life rather than personal life. They typically work with other executives / business owners. Sounding board for talking through employee issues, managing people, or whatever else is going on in the business. Basically things that would go over the head of a normal therapist.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]

vundercind 3y ago

I’m watching this happen to someone I know. Similar stories abound. The way they rack up so much spending: 1) Cult-like sales tactics. I don’t mean that as a simple put down, I mean literally a lot of the same tactics cults use to gain recruits. “If it’s not working, you just haven’t committed hard enough, this is your fault” is universal, but far from the only example. 2) A pattern of coaches-coaching-coaches. Almost nobody makes money coaching normal people, in these systems. The actual market for that is tiny, and the number of people offering such services is enormous. Newbies drop out after muddling along for a year or two (paying coaches before and after starting their own thing) OR “graduate” to trying to coach coaches (for which they’ll need a coach, who will also try to refer them to their coach when they’ve gotten as much out of them as they can—it’s almost a self-organizing pyramid scheme). This intersects with #1 because they constantly demonize ways out of this cycle, especially getting a normal job (“ew, gross, yuck, don’t you want to be your own boss?”) > In my experience, the majority of these type of uncertified coaches don't go out of their way to mislead people into thinking they have more training than they do. Oh, and this part? Lying about their personal history, past entrepreneurial work, success at coaching, sometimes media coverage they’ve had or clients they’ve worked with, et c, is nearly universal. Many also hold bullshit credentials from other coaches who’ve reached the top of the pyramid. They also often have very misleading offers, especially for group-course sorts of things. I’ve been going down a bit of a rabbit hole on this since discovering the whole thing exists, and have been surprised both at how huge it is, and how similar all the people doing it look, as far as the ways they exaggerate to “sell themselves” and the ways they scam with their offerings (but if there’s one thing these scam courses teach, it’s… how to scam. Like, really, that’s often the only material curriculum) [edit edit] oh and you’re unlikely to “naturally” end up seeing this stuff if you’re a guy. The industry is overwhelmingly women, selling to other women. Many bill themselves as “helping women succeed and become entrepreneurs” and otherwise have a feminist coat of paint on their operation, which is incredibly gross because their business model is scamming women.

specialist 3y ago
> coaches-coaching-coaches This is the punchline of all the self-help books reviewed by the If Books Could Kill podcast.

tivert 3y ago

>> "In the first year alone, I spent $14,000 working with my life coach, and in the years that followed I probably spent $100,000," she says. She also spent thousands of dollars on additional courses and mentorships with other life coaches that her primary coach recommended. "I got sucked into it." > If they weren't getting value out of it, why continue the sessions? Because Homo economicus is a lie, and real people don't act like that in real life. It's worth considering the full quote: > Angela Lauria, 50, discovered life coaching when she was struggling with postnatal depression and had been recently fired from her job. Initially interested in a coaching programme focusing primarily on weight loss, Lauria signed up for a $2,000 (£1,595) retreat. "In the first year alone, I spent $14,000 working with my life coach, and in the years that followed I probably spent $100,000," she says. She also spent thousands of dollars on additional courses and mentorships with other life coaches that her primary coach recommended. "I got sucked into it." That sounds like a desperate person with a lot of serious problems casting out for a lifeline. Life coaching presented itself as that lifeline, so she grabbed on and persisted because she hoped it would work.