The goal of my coaching sessions was to learn how to become a better father. In the end we landed on my business, because it turned out that fixing the problems there would give me more time for my family. But every session brought some new and interesting discoveries.

Thanks to doing (only me) the Gallup StrengthsFinder test, I started to look at my employees from a completely different perspective. It helped me give them tasks that better match their strengths (they didn’t do the test, but my results opened my eyes how unique we all are).

Another step was that I stopped doing tasks where I have no talents. I just started to delegate them to people who are good at them, which took a big load off my shoulders. There is nothing more frustrating than doing work we are not good at.

Another important thing was learning how to handle my strongest talent. My No. 1 is Ideation – I was struggling with the fact that ideas for business development were coming all the time. The problem was there was no way to execute them all. Thanks to coaching I understood that I need to limit and filter those ideas, and then move to execution. But I do that only in areas where I am good and have talents, and where I don’t – I just delegate to people with the right skills.

Thanks to these changes I can already see real financial results. Before coaching I was seriously considering hiring another person. But after a few sessions I realized that we are able to handle all our tasks even though one team member — who had been with us for several years and made a great contribution — decided to move on to new opportunities. I’m grateful for their work, and proud that the company is now organized in a way that allows us to keep delivering great results with the current team.

And about the main goal – to become a better father – the results are not so visible yet, but they are there. Few days trips with family, even with big amount of orders, don’t make me nervous anymore. So I can say things are going in the right direction.

Zibi, Owner of ZIBI Print Shop & Photo Lab, Oak Lawn, IL