IAM2209 – Empowering Entrepreneurs and Business Owners Through Coaching

In this episode, we have Reginald Jackson Sr., a leadership coach with a background in the Marine Corps.

He empowers individuals and organizations through his ACR framework, which focuses on Awareness, Choice, Action, and Responsibility.

Reginald emphasizes the importance of self-awareness as the foundation for growth. Recognizing one’s strengths, weaknesses, and external influences is crucial for making informed decisions and setting realistic goals.

Reginald discusses how understanding one’s options and making deliberate choices can steer one’s life and career in the desired direction.

He explains that coaching is future-focused, aiming to help clients set and achieve goals based on their present abilities and aspirations. In contrast, therapy often addresses past issues and emotional healing.

Business Pillar: Journey | Entrepreneurship

Episode Link: episodes/the-power-of-coaching-for-entrepreneurs-business-owners

Check out our CEO Hack Buzz Newsletter–our premium newsletter with hacks and nuggets to level up your organization. Sign up HERE. 

I AM CEO Handbook Volume 3 is HERE and it's FREE. Get your copy here: http://cbnation.co/iamceo3. Get the 100+ things that you can learn from 1600 business podcasts we recorded. Hear Gresh's story, learn the 16 business pillars from the podcast, find out about CBNation Architects and why you might be one and so much more. Did we mention it was FREE? Download it today!

Transcription:

The full transcription is only available to CBNation Library Members. Sign up today!

Reginald Jackson Sr. Teaser 00:00

So and I talked to all of my clients, but I talked to people in general about ACR because it's something really simple. It's something that you can remember. It's four words, awareness, choice, action, and responsibility.

So once again, like I talked about the relationship cycle and how you can look at all types of relationships. You can also look at yourself personally in the things that you do.

Intro 00:23
Hello. Hello. Hello. This is Gresh from the I AM CEO Podcast and formerly the CEO Chat Podcast.

So doing something a little bit different as we ease into the fall from the summer and everybody's traveling a lot more. Life is obviously a lot different than it has been in the last four years, definitely since I started this let alone the last two years or so.

But I had a podcast called the CEO Chat Podcast, which is a lot more of a long form podcast. I didn't really reach the 1400 plus episodes that we did with the I AM CEO Podcast.

So there's a lot more long flowing, a lot more conversational, but might be dusting off the CEO Chat Podcast and bringing that back out.

So with that being said, while considering that, what I wanted to do is go through some of the interviews that I had that were some of my favorites and share those.

It's not gonna obviously be the full entire interview. We're gonna have links in the show notes so that you can go and listen to the full interview.

But I wanted to do some snippets that you can get. You're gonna hear, of course the visibility, either the resources or the connections in each of these different snippets.

So it's gonna be one of those things that's really gonna help you to hopefully learn more about the guest that's on the show, what they do, how they do, why they do it, but also get that opportunity to really learn about some resources that can make you more effective and efficient.

So sit back and enjoy this special throwback CEO chat episode.

Gresham Harkless 01:49

Are there like, any gaps that you wanted to speak to about you, yourself, and how you came to start your business?

Reginald Jackson Sr. 01:55

Sure. So in the marine corps, one of the things that the corps prides itself in is what's called developing subordinate leadership.

You can take young man straight out of high school, teach him the basics of combat and troop leading.

And then at nineteen or twenty years old, he's able to make literally life and death decisions from that training.

[restrict paid=”true”]

Now, of course, you can take that type of training or you can take that method of training and apply it to anything

So in the business world, you start off empowering your people. You train them at the lowest level so they learn how to take responsibility.

First, you need to learn how to lead yourself. So fast forward to answer your question, all throughout my career as a marine and then beyond using that same methodology in delegating responsibilities, making sure people had the tools that they needed, giving them the guidance and then the space they need to make those decisions to grow professionally and personally.

So once I was introduced to coaching, I saw there was a real need to focus on taking that subordinate, leadership development methodology and then take that to the business world, or to introduce people to that in their own life.

So one of the things while it's military in general, but in court in particular is the Marine Corps is full of acronyms. You know, which are words that are made up of another phrase.

So it spells something like ASAP as soon as possible. Bluff, b l u f, bottom line up front. So there are hundreds and hundreds of acronyms.

One of the acronyms that I learned in coaching is ACAR, a c a r. A is awareness. Right? First thing you need to do is pay attention to be aware of the things around you.

C is choice. Once you've created this awareness, now you're able to find choices that you can make. The next A is action.

So once you've decided on a particular choice, then take action. Where most people get caught up is there's this loop between choice and action. Right? Like I know I should do so and so or I know all the things that I have before me, but you just don't act.

Whether it's fear, procrastination, whatever it is, you're stuck between choice and action. Once you take action, then be responsible for the action that you take.

So and I talk to all of my clients, but I talk to people in general about ACAR because it's something really simple. It's something that you can remember. It's four words. Action. I'm sorry. Awareness, Choice, Action, and Responsibility.

So once again, like I talked about the relationship cycle and how you can look at all types of relationships.

You can also look at yourself personally and the things that you do. Very, very good friend of mine, years ago mentioned, or made mention of a phenomenon he had noticed.

You ever notice how you step on the elevator or you'll meet someone in a store or something and you say, how's it going? And go, oh, I can't wait till Friday. Oh, I'm glad I'll be glad. I can't wait till I go on vacation.

And he said people go through life looking forward to things with such, veracity that they create this velocity where they blow through days of the week, and have no idea what happened in between.

So if you're living for the weekend, you got Monday through Friday, you can't account for by Saturday.

And then when Sunday rolls around, you're dreading going back to work on Monday. And before you know it, it's a year later, three laters, five years later.

So, yeah, people just rushing through life. And there's so much of life when you say for instance, use a car and you look at all your choices and then you take action on the choice and then you are responsible.

Here's an example. I'm meeting you for lunch. Right? I leave late. I get to you fifteen minutes late. So I say, Gresham, man, I caught every light, people in front of me driving, like they got nowhere to go.

And I'm not taking responsibility for what I've done in delaying lunch because I was irresponsible.

So the responsibility piece like you got a speeding ticket. Well, he just decided he was going to catch me.

No. Well, if you were speeding, be responsible. Now, on top of that though, when you go back a few steps, most of us get to a point in life where we already know how we're going to act, what reactions come up when things take place.

So the responsible, right, the responsible thing would be look at and think of situations before they occur.

So you can then create a different outcome. Because life doesn't happen to you. Right? I know you've heard before. There are three kinds of people. People that make things happen. People that watch things happen. And people that wonder what happened.

So I wanna be or I am in category number one, people that make things happen.

Gresham Harkless 08:13

Mhmm.

Reginald Jackson Sr. 08:13

So again, things don't happen to you. People are so and so made me so mad. No. They don't. People don't make you mad. Right. You allow yourself to get mad or be angry.

And one of the other things that I like to mention to people is being very, aware of their own speech and communication.

So instead of saying, he made me so mad or that just really makes me angry. Or on the other side, that just made my day.

Consider that everything you do is a choice. So instead of saying, he made me so mad, you can say, I choose to be mad. Right?

And when you pause to redirect your conversation. That's another way of creating awareness.

Gresham Harkless 09:17

Awesome. Awesome. Awesome. Definitely. What and how does a coach help out an entrepreneur or business owner?

Like, what is a coach and, like, what role do they play? A lot of people see coaches, okay, I play basketball. I had a coach when I played basketball. I played football, but I don't do that anymore. I'm not trying to go to the NFL or the NBA.

So what role do you play in helping out a business owner or entrepreneur?

Reginald Jackson Sr. 09:40

Sure. The first thing is to have people be clear on what a coach is and even more importantly, what a coach is not.

So there are three distinctions that I always draw when I explain this to people. So there's therapy, consulting, and coaching.

A therapist is a subject matter expert that looks for healing, some point or point of stress or duress offer you things to begin the healing.

And if you see a psychiatrist, he or she can even prescribe medication. So that's not coaching. Alright?

That's trying to clear things up that happened in the past. A consultant, also a subject matter expert, comes in, makes an assessment, gives you the findings.

They put a plan in place, execute the one, and then they go away. That's not coaching. With coaching, first of all, as opposed to being past, p a s t, past-based as a therapist, coaching is future based. Okay.

Where do you want to be? What things do you see down the road for you and your business? Also with coaching, you as the client are the subject matter expert because nobody knows better than you.

Now the interesting thing about that, though, is as well as you know yourself, there are also blind spots or areas of your personality, or your behavior that you don't notice because you can't see it because you're too close to it.

So what a coach can do is reflect those things. Right? I like to look at it the difference between a mirror and a sponge. Okay. So we all have friends that have great advice. They tell us what we ought to do.

And then, they can even take on our drama. Right? So they they soak up all that energy like a sponge.

A coach will reflect everything. I have no judgment. I have no opinions. I ask all my questions from curiosity.

The more questions I ask you that I don't have the answers for takes me out of the consulting mode because I'm not the subject matter expert.

And it puts you in the driver's seat. So as a coach, it's a partnership. Right? Where you're the navigator. I'm simply the copilot. Right? You're the one. You drive the ship to your success.

Now as a coach, one of the things I want you to be clear on is if we're talking about entrepreneurship, where do you see your business? What are you really committed to? What things are you willing to do?

What things are you not willing to do? What have you tried that was successful? What have you tried that was unsuccessful? Once we are able to identify those things, then I'm gonna ask you, as your coach, I am going to hold you accountable.

I will be your cheerleader. I will be your source of inspiration, not motivation. Motivation is exterior. Inspiration just from the nature of the word is interior. Right?

So if you think of that burning passion that you have as an entrepreneur to have your own business, that's something in is to you.

So I can't make you excited about your business. You have to be excited about your business. But in doing so, the inspiration that you require from time to time needs a little stoking. Right?

And that can be something as simple as having you, again, with ACAR, having you create awareness around the things that you do well or the things that have gone.

Because a lot of times we are our own worst critic. Matter of fact, I saw something on Facebook just a few days ago and it reminded me, about this situation.

So if you're walking up the steps and someone is walking ahead of you and they trip, this is rhetorical.

What would you say to that person? Now, if you're walking up the steps yourself and you trip, what update to yourself?

And if what you say to yourself is less kind than what you would say to the person that tripped on the steps in front of you, that's where the negative self talk starts.

And that's how you are your own worst critic. Oh, how could you be so stupid? Watch where you're going.

You probably now there's some people that would, but you probably wouldn't say that to someone that you didn't know who was walking up the steps in front of you.

Gresham Harkless 14:36

Right.

Reginald Jackson Sr. 14:36

You would tend to be a lot more kind. So that takes me to two things that I always talk to people about.

Patience and permission. Be patient with yourself. Right? If you're a parent and you are teaching your child to do x, tie their shoes, potty training, algebra, you name it, you will oftentimes in the very beginning, at your learning, be very patient with them.

You'll give them the permission to fail. Right? You'll be gentle with them. You'll be encouraging. We don't do that with ourselves.

Gresham Harkless 15:18

Right.

Reginald Jackson Sr. 15:20

For many of us, the bar is so high that we leave no room for error. We could do ten things right and one thing wrong, and we'll focus on the one thing wrong.

So the velocity that we wanna create in our business, we don't keep because we focus on every what we call as a failure.

Outro 15:43

Hello. Hello. Hello. This is Gresh from the I AM CEO Podcast and formerly the CEO Chat Podcast, which we might be dusting off and bring it back that we, the sunset.

So I hope you enjoy that episode. Like I mentioned, the goal is really just to give you some visibility around the guests, where it is around, what it is that they do, and how they do it, and what makes it unique, or get some resources that can help you level up within your business or within your organization as an enterprising individual that you are.

And then, of course, you might even get a different perspective on what it means to be a CEO and have that opportunity to connect with the person.

So I hope you enjoyed that episode. You can, of course, go to CEOChat.co to hear more of that episode.

Also, go to the show notes to actually hear the see the direct link to that episode. But I think it's something phenomenal that we have the opportunity to take the snippets from the longer form podcast and get some really valuable information that can help us love our organizations and our businesses.

So definitely take care, and look forward to talking to you soon.

[/restrict]