August 9, 2025 • 49 mins
Join us in this special episode of The Coaching Inn as we celebrate 30 years of 3D Coaching with founder Claire Pedrick who started the business when her younger daughter was a small baby. She is joined by a panel of coaches who are also mothers. Discover how these women navigate the dual roles of coaching and motherhood, sharing personal stories and insights on work-life balance, professional growth, and the unique challenges they face.
Our guests, Mayuri Hargest, Alice Philip, Katie Poole, Laura Duggal, Beth O'Neill, and Rachel Erasmus open up about their journeys, offering valuable lessons on presence, empathy, and the power of community. Whether you're a coach, a parent, or both, this episode is packed with wisdom and encouragement.
We talk about
- The Storia App and S5 Episode 28 with Elizabeth Uviebinene
- Check out Episode 44 which comes out on 20th August 2025 where Claire is talking to Rachel Morris about her book Working Mother.
- Series 3 Episode 41 Coach as Midwife with Rachel Erasmus
Email info@3dcoaching.com if you’d like to join a future Open Table at The Coaching Inn for Dads
Contact:
- Contact our guests through Linked In
- Contact Claire by emailing info@3dcoaching.com or check out our Substack where you can talk with other listeners.
Further Information:
- Subscribe or follow The Coaching Inn on your podcast platform or our YouTube Channel to hear or see new episodes as they drop.
- Find out more about 3D Coaching and get new ideas and offers in our weekly email.
Coming Up:
- Coach yourself Confident with Julie Smith
- Working Mother with Rachel Morris
Keywords:
coaching, motherhood, work-life balance, 3D Coaching, career transition, leadership, empowerment, female coaches, parenting, professional growth, coaching skills, personal development, work flexibility, coaching journey, maternal insights, career coaching, coaching techniques, women in leadership, coaching community, coaching challenges
We love having a variety of guests join us! Please remember that inviting someone to participate does not mean we necessarily endorse their views or opinions. We believe in open conversation and sharing different perspectives.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:12):
Hello and welcome to this week's edition of The Coaching Inn.
I'm your host, Claire Pedrick, and this year 3D Coaching, which is the company I founded,is 30.
And I know that because my baby is 30.
And I started it three months after she was born.
So I've been in conversations with a number of coaches who are mums in the last fewmonths, and I just thought it'd be really lovely.
(00:41):
to the birthday of 3D Coaching and the birthday of my younger child.
To have a conversation with some mums who are coaches now.
I was thinking this morning of what was it like?
uh And she was born when there were no mobile phones and no internet.
Now, how extraordinary is that?
(01:02):
So now, knowing what I know now, I'm not quite sure how I started a business with neithera mobile phone nor internet.
But I can remember having of coaching calls on a wired-in telephone in the spare bedroom.
So there you are, what a thing.
(01:23):
So that's not how it is now, and so let's introduce our lovely guests at today's opentable.
So, Mayuri Hargest, hello.
Hi, good morning.
I'm Mayuri.
I now live in Birmingham after a couple of years.
Prior to that, I in Wales.
(01:43):
I'm a mum to two little ones.
And actually, when I first came to coaching, wasn't even in a position where I thought Imight be able to become a mum.
So it's been quite a change to land in it.
When I first came to coaching, actually that's where I met Katie, who's also on the call.
We did our training together and I was in the midst of a career transition.
(02:05):
Someone had said to me, maybe it's something you should explore.
And I was at the point of leaving my old role.
So I decided to do some training.
Since then, set up Neon Lioness Coaching uh took two maternity leaves, raised young,beautiful kids.
one who's about to start school in September and now coaching looks more like organisationcoaching in work and a little bit on the side in terms of the self-employed role.
(02:37):
nice.
And your lovely children and you have come on a coach's walk.
Yes we have, yeah, very recently.
It was very lovely to meet them.
Alice Philip, hello.
Hi, great to be here.
My journey started into coaching, I think before I knew the word coaching, when I was ateenager and I was, you know, like most teenagers, wondering what to do and I said to
(03:05):
someone who I thought should know, is there a job that's a bit like a kind of professionalsounding board?
And they said, oh no, no, no, there's no job like that.
And I thought, okay.
So fast forward about 10 years, the charity where I was working put on an introduction tocoaching course led by the uh wonderful Claire and the rest is history.
(03:27):
I did it and I thought, yeah, this was the thing I thought might exist and I love it.
But I kept going with my other career in communications, mostly editing and I actually dostill have two jobs.
um So I work as the managing editor of a magazine called Forced Migration Review, which isbased at the University of Oxford.
(03:49):
So it's about um refugee asylum and statelessness issues and goes to 170 countries and isgreat fun.
But on the other side, still am pursuing coaching professionally.
I've been doing that for the last five years as well.
And I love having two jobs.
It's brilliant.
um And yeah, coaching mostly.
(04:10):
um
younger professionals probably between 20 and 45.
I think it's such an interesting time in life and yeah that's me.
Brilliant.
And I'm so pleased that you became a Because I learned so much from you on that course.
(04:33):
I can't remember what it was now, but there was something that I learned from you that Iuse now.
And what a beautiful thing that is.
uh Katie Poole, hello.
So you know Mayuri So tell us about you.
Oh, there we go.
Thank you all.
Thank you so much for having me.
It's lovely to be here with everybody.
(04:53):
Yes, I'm Katie.
I started coaching in 2019 and came from a long background in education.
So I've been a teacher and a middle leader in education.
And yeah, it's interesting.
My coaching journey has been, you know, through the pandemic.
We started in 2019 and then within a few months we're in.
(05:15):
lockdown at the time my daughter was about three so I've got one daughter she's nine she'salmost ten now.
And yeah so in terms of my work I've mostly coach people who are mission-led who are verymuch you know pour their heart and their soul into working with other people.
So that might be head teachers, a lot of educators and senior leaders in education em butalso business owners are very creative and really focused on creatives as well.
(05:45):
So I also host the Sunday morning journaling club, which is a free monthly journalingsession.
So I really love to curate spaces for people to think in a new way through the medium ofjournaling.
And so now I'm working on blending those two things, the journaling and the coachingtogether, which has been fantastic.
And I am also back in the classroom a little bit as well in the last year.
(06:08):
I've gone in a little bit back in.
So yeah, I've also got those various roles to juggle.
eh
but yeah, also loving it, so yeah.
oh
Brilliant.
Well, welcome, Katie.
And have you heard of Storia from Liz Uviebinene?
Oh no I haven't
She uh has a journaling app.
(06:29):
She was on the podcast a few weeks ago, a few months ago.
And she was introduced to us by Maria Fernandes, who's not here today because her baby isdue any minute.
um Yeah.
Yeah, do, do.
Laura, hello.
Hi there, thank you so much for having me here.
(06:52):
And Katie, your journaling sessions sound amazing.
That Sunday morning for journaling sessions sounds right up my street.
em Yeah, so I'm Laura, Laura Dugle.
I'm a parental return to work coach.
em Quite recently, before that, I maternity return coach.
em And like you, Claire, I know how old my business is because I started it when mydaughter was born.
(07:15):
So it's around 10.
It was a bit hazy in the beginning, so it's around 10 years old.
But before that, I worked in HR and part of my role was, at the time I would have saidmanaging people's return to work and now I would like to think of it as welcoming people
back to work.
But that was part of my HR role, but I hadn't actually had children.
(07:40):
So I think I was sort of, it was quite...
surface level, nothing wrong with it as such, but quite, you know, like what flexibleworking would you like, that sort of thing.
And then when I had my daughter, for me, I felt like it was quite a profound experience.
And I just realized this whole sort of doorway to loads of emotions that I didn't evenknow existed before the whole responsibility piece, just my life just changed in more ways
(08:04):
than I can even list for the better.
And that's what led me to.
go through my own career change and then move into what I'm doing now.
Wow, how interesting to be on one side and then on the other.
Yeah, fantastic.
Well, welcome Laura.
Beth O'Neill, hello.
(08:24):
Welcome to The Coaching Inn.
Hello, hello, thank you for having me this morning.
So my name's Beth, I'm a leadership coach and trainer, ICF qualified.
I've been coaching since around 2017 and I was working as an executive assistant at thetime and we hired within this charity, a leadership coach and I fell in love with
(08:45):
everything that she was saying in the boardroom.
I was just gravitating towards her and she became my mentor and gave me a place on acoaching program.
So I did my initial certification at that time.
And I continued working in different events management, project management, EA roleswhilst doing one-to-one coaching and then joined this amazing coaching company called
Resurgo where I fell in love with training leaders in how to coach.
(09:09):
So was there for about four years as part of the consulting team, designing and deliveringcoaching programs.
But I've always been a bit of an entrepreneur, big dreamer, big visions.
And about two years ago, oh, is it three years ago?
Losing track of time.
My son was about six months old.
I decided to launch my own business.
So I founded Beth O'Neill coaching and we train leaders in how to coach.
(09:33):
we run something called the coaching culture program, but we have a big focus on women inleadership.
So I run a women leadership program, helping female leaders at any stage of theirleadership.
could be brand new managers or CEOs develop these 10 steps to being, to developing theirexecutive coaching presence and being strong, impactful leaders.
And so.
Thanks.
that's my big passion is supporting female leaders.
(09:56):
And are you still working with Resurgo?
I'm still connected with them, but no, no longer working with them.
I have my eye on somebody from Resurgo as a future guest.
Ooh, some amazing coaches in that co-organisation.
Brilliant.
was such a good training ground for where I am right now.
I owe a lot of my coaching, my qualification, everything to them.
(10:17):
They're brilliant.
Great.
Well, welcome Beth and Rachel Erasmus.
Hello.
Hiya.
So I was a midwife in London for about 15 years and I became a co-active coach and alsogot trained with Claire when I was in London.
(10:40):
And that was in about 2013, 2014, something like that.
And then in 2018, I had
my daughter.
So she's now seven.
And the last few years I've been working to build up my business as well, which iscoaching women throughout the whole of their pregnancy, leaving work, pregnancy, birth,
(11:03):
postnatal, and then returning to work.
So it's just been a really interesting journey from various different angles around kindof motherhood.
So fantastic to get to be here with you guys and get to hear from you and share differentinsights.
Yeah, well, welcome.
And I remember you and I had a very deep, meaningful coffee in Starbucks on Charing CrossRoad.
(11:26):
Yes, we did.
We did.
And it was hot, I remember.
Funny what you remember is now I don't remember what we talked about but I remember it wasdeep and meaningful and hot.
haha
And I can even tell you strange memories, but which table we were sitting at, but that's acompletely other, that's the topic for a totally different podcast.
(11:46):
Anyway, welcome everyone.
How lovely to have you here and how interesting to notice that for all of you, there'ssomething about combining your coaching and your mothering.
And some of you are also working in that mother or female space.
And some of you are working in very different spaces.
(12:06):
So as people were introducing themselves, I wonder what you noticed and I wonder what youwant to ask each other.
Mayuri, what did you notice?
I think for me, actually, Rachel, I probably have a question for you in terms of themidwifery and how that relates to coaching, like in terms of the skills you had to use in
(12:32):
one to the other.
Interestingly, Claire and I had a good chat about that a little while ago.
I think one of the really significant things that stood out to me is about presence andhow that gets impacted.
So what I noticed as a midwife is if I was feeling quite tense and quite anxious inmyself, it did have an impact in the room with somebody in labor.
(12:59):
And also the kind of the influence that I would bring to that.
Whereas, and the same thing I notice now with coaching, you know, if I'm quite rattled orif I've got some other stuff running and I'm not managing myself, well, that really
impacts on how the coaching evolves.
So that's one of probably many, many things, but that's something that stands out to me.
(13:21):
And I'll pop in the show notes a link to the episode where Rachel talked in much moredepth about this.
But it's fascinating, isn't it?
Because I think that actually when we're, you're right, when we're rattled, it does reallyimpact the capacity of the other person to be courageous, because we're not being as
courageous as we could be.
(13:41):
Alice, you look like you're emerging a thought there.
Yeah, I was thinking also actually about the beauty of accompaniment.
So with midwifery, it's such an important part of it, isn't it, to be present throughout.
And I had quite a negative experience of having five different midwives before birth umand four different midwives during the labor.
(14:04):
And actually the lack of accompaniment really made a big difference to me because Icouldn't build trust.
And I think that actually what we do as coaches is also so much, it, about
through a period of time uh and yeah the parallel with motherhood of your accompanyingyour child through its life um but sort of seeing it through different stages and um
(14:29):
allowing for change in the other person, being surprised, being supportive.
Yeah so I guess my question kind of to the group is what have you learned from motherhoodthat you've been applying?
in your coaching.
Nice question, who wants to answer that first?
(14:50):
Yeah, lovely question.
Also, I was just off the tail of what Rachel was saying, just brought back memories ofwhen I had my daughter and how important that role of a midwife is that you just don't
realise until you go through having a baby.
And I thought my midwife had magic powers, obviously, because she was just the only personwho was there.
(15:12):
And when you just described that then about presence, there was something in the way thatmy midwife...
held my hand and she just looked into my eyes and she really grounded me and I wasn't acoach at the time and I hadn't begun this journey and honestly I remember after her name
was Dawn I've never met her seen her since but I remember her name because it was sospecial yeah I'm just absolutely right it's such an important role isn't it and to be able
(15:40):
to to give that if it is a positive experience to somebody it's amazing isn't it I willalways remember my midwife she was incredible
Sorry, but I went off track because I was thinking about that.
Yeah.
And then what has motherhood taught about coaching?
And it's interesting because I think as I was sort of going on my walk this morning, I wasthinking about what has coaching taught me about motherhood?
(16:05):
But then it occurred to me as well that, there's a lot of, it's gone both ways, hasn't it?
And I think there was so many, I don't even know if I can answer that question from one tothe other and particularly because.
For me, I've learnt to be a coach and still learning to be a coach and still learning tobe a mother at the same time.
oh But there are things that I think I do now that I don't think I could have done if Ididn't know how to do it.
(16:32):
And part of what you're saying, Rachel, I think is for me, part of parenting that I don'tknow if I would do if I was not a coach is about...
holding space bits and like not rushing to fix something and really, really listening.
(16:52):
So like if my daughter's come home and had a bad day or a good day and just wants to talkabout something, I do think that without coaching skills, I probably would rush in and
either join her in her exciting what, what, or, oh, that's terrible.
What can we do?
You know, like that sort of, and I think I am, I hope.
(17:15):
I hope she would say that I'm quite good at just listening and just seeing like, where isshe going with this before I jump to any conclusions?
em So yeah, that was my initial thought.
Yeah, great.
I love that thought, Laura.
And we've touched a little bit on presence so far.
And I think that's been a really, it's something I've always been passionate about interms of the presence we carry and I train women in executive presence.
(17:39):
I'm always mindful of presence, but I think it's been enhanced even more because of beingpresent with my son.
It's kind like when he walks in the room, even if I'm working, whatever I'm doing, it'slike, put it down, focus on him, offer him my full.
full whole self to listen to him or try to understand whatever he's going through.
So I think enhancing presence with clients, that's increased.
(18:03):
And empathy, trying to slow down, empathize, try to understand, obviously without saving.
Even though I'm a coach, my lead into coaching was more around the goal setting andachiever, and that was my drive to coaching.
So I've had to really work on the slowing down the empathy piece.
I love exploring that tool because it's a challenge and there's so much beauty that comesfrom it.
(18:26):
And I feel like having children has really helped enhance the presence piece.
Mm.
It's interesting, isn't it?
Because we'll go to Katie and then May in a minute.
what's interesting is that sometimes the parenting thing can show up in different ways inthe coaching.
So I often say in supervision to coaches, to coaches who are more my age than your age,how old are your children?
(18:53):
If there's a dynamic coming up between them and the person they're coaching, becauseactually it kind of comes around again and
If we're coaching somebody who is the same age as our children, that can be an interestingthing.
Particularly if they're the same gender.
Katie, what were you going to say?
(19:14):
Yeah, it's interesting.
So my daughter was, she just turned four actually when I trained as a coach and she's nownearly 10.
And as she has developed and changed, obviously my experience has grown as a coach, butit's interesting.
think the first thing when she was very young, when I started out, that really I felt theimpact of the two em interleaving was almost the unconditional positive regard.
(19:39):
And I'd left teaching at that point and
em Well, I'd moved schools and I was considering leaving, but having a child totallytaught me something about unconditional positive regard that then was, I think, had I
trained as a coach before I'd become a parent, I don't know that would have been asauthentic maybe, m which I think that shifted.
(20:04):
And as she's grown, just as Laura said there really, like that sense of, as my daughter'sgrown and starts, she's experiencing different.
dynamics at school and different relationships and those then come home in a way that theydidn't when she was little.
em That has really kind of enhanced my coaching skills and also been influenced by them emin a different way.
(20:27):
The conversation, the listening, the holding space for her.
So it's interesting how it shifted.
one of the things that struck me already massively from this conversation is a sense ofsolidarity.
I don't feel there are many
spaces for, em and there haven't been many spaces for me in my journey to be with coacheswho are mums and particularly who have got younger children.
(20:53):
em And so it's lovely just to be here and hear of other people's stories as well.
Just that, that feels quite powerful from the get-go of this conversation.
Just, okay, and Mimi already talked about this before, but I think it's off of that likeus too, I don't know.
So it's lovely to be in a space where
that you can hear other people's development and the impact as well.
(21:16):
yeah, it's just a real, it surprised me how powerful it feels to be here with peoplewho've also got younger children.
beautiful thing Katie.
Okay,
yes, I think a couple of things have struck me about the conversation as we've just gone,because I would say my kids are still really little, they're still two and four, right?
(21:40):
So Aria is just developing language and she's really fascinating in that my husband and Ihad a conversation this morning in that she knows how to say the words, but she doesn't
necessarily know what they mean.
And I wonder sometimes whether there's a parallel in what we face in terms of coaching,regards that, that someone comes to us and they know what they should be doing or know
(22:04):
what it might look like.
They've seen someone else do it, but they aren't able to embody it because they don'tquite understand it for themselves.
Um, that's something that's come up.
then the other thing that I've been thinking about is like when I first trained to coach,one of the most powerful tools in that was
that we were taught in that was Time to Think, a book by Nancy Klein.
(22:28):
And that's really helped me kind of shape my thinking around how I'm choosing to parent.
don't obviously don't always get it right, because none of us do.
But I think there's been a sense of what's it look like for me to hear my child.
That's come out of that kind of thinking.
(22:50):
what is their voice like, what's their personality like, what are they really trying totell me here?
And like, even when that's quite affronting, or okay, maybe I need to change somethingabout myself here, because maybe I'm not, maybe I'm falling into patterns instead of being
what they need from me right now.
(23:11):
Thank you, Rachel.
There's two things actually I want to share.
One is through the pregnancy, my pregnancy.
was far, a couple of stages was far more anxious than I ever anticipated that I would bein being pregnant.
And the first was just before the first scan.
(23:32):
And the other one was we planned to have a home birth.
We did have a home birth, but, and I worked as a home birth team.
So it was something very familiar to me, but I actually got.
quite anxious again about would she survive and were we making the right choice and was Iputting too much responsibility on myself because my husband didn't know so much about the
(23:53):
context and that was my decision and the journey of that was a really deep one ofsurrender and the recognition was I'm not in control and I'm not in control of her life,
I'm not in control of what happens but there is some intention, there is some...
trust that's needed, there's some letting go that's needed.
(24:15):
And it, I went through that process and actually when it came to the birth, it was areally great experience for me.
But I've never had it put to me so hard in me to let go of control.
And I think that's such an important thing I need to keep bringing back in the coachingspace that I'm not in control and there is a need to surrender and trust and trust the
(24:39):
process and trust what's going on.
And the other thing for me is in uh parenting is I've had to really, and I am learningself-compassion because the emphasis that I've always leaned on is my heart, is my ability
to connect, is holding spaces, those sort of more emotional side of things and how Icoach.
(25:05):
And there are things that come up in me with my child that are not how I want to be.
angry, I can feel like a heat in me that I've never known in my being before.
And there's times where I don't like some of the behaviours and I don't like how I speakand I'm just on this monotone, I'm like, stop the flow, it's not helping anybody.
(25:28):
And it's like, surely I could apply these skills that I've learned as a coach in my homeenvironment and I'm just not.
And then I'm coming out and I'm leading a group of women who've just had babies incoaching groups.
And I've had coaching in it myself just going, you know, this is the reality.
This is hard, holding these different roles and trying to be true to myself and failing attimes and bringing myself.
(25:54):
But the truth is I just, I have to be self compassionate.
And then as I, it increases my capacity to be compassionate for those that I'm alongsidebecause I have to go there myself to be able to hold it for others.
These are my observations.
Thank you.
Don't ask my children if they think I'm a good listener.
(26:20):
Because we can't take it all across.
Because I love what you were describing there about being a human grumpy being.
Thank you, because all of us are sometimes, aren't we?
We can't be this perfect anything.
We can't be the perfect coach.
Mediocre coaching is really good.
(26:42):
Mediocre parenting is also really good.
um And there's no need to aspire to something that we can't achieve.
Because actually, yeah, we want the people we coach to also know that mediocre is great.
Sometimes brilliant is fabulous, but nobody can be brilliant all the time.
(27:03):
Alice.
gonna say something else but the conversation has moved on to an interesting space so I'lljust flow with it like a coach.
It's making me think about the challenges, I guess we were talking about the positives ofuh mothering and coaching at the same time and I realised I hadn't introduced who my child
(27:24):
was, how old they were, so my son is two, he just turned two a couple of weeks ago and soI think he's the youngest on the call.
uh
And I actually went back to coaching.
took three months off coaching, but a whole year off my other job.
And I went back because I really missed it.
(27:49):
I wanted to go back, but it was really challenging to try and work out with breastfeeding,you know, how that was going to work.
I didn't have a very regular timetable with my child.
And
I'll maybe share my experience first, but I'm interested to hear how some of you cope withsome of these practicalities, I guess, of motherhood and coaching.
(28:10):
I devised this plan where I would say to a client, yes, I can coach you.
So was mostly people that I was already coaching.
I can coach you, but I need you to give me a two hour window and I will call youimmediately after a feed and I will know that I can give you a whole hour of my attention.
And it worked and it was wonderful.
(28:32):
It let me coach, but it set the expectations in a way that I could fulfill with myclients.
And I didn't take on too many, but it gave me confidence.
for the first time after the birth, I just felt a little bit of familiarity, like I wasbeing myself in a different way because becoming a mom, you know, it's still very recent
to me, but it's such as you described Laura, such a huge experience that actuallysomething familiar of using a skill that I knew was
(28:59):
was in me, was still there, was really comforting.
And also, just to be present with somebody else in somebody else's world was so releasing.
For me, just, love, I mean, maybe part of I love about being a coach is just beingcompletely absorbed in somebody else's space and not having to think about anything of my
own.
And so to just for an hour have nothing to do with the intensity of early parenting andjust be present with this other person was...
(29:27):
actually really great.
I couldn't do more than one a week, but you know, it was a really positive em outcome, buta challenge to work through.
So just wondered from other people, what challenges do you think have come up withcombining motherhood and coaching and maybe some tips of how you've got through them?
Because I'm at the youngest end here, so I'm going to learn from all of you and applythese things over the coming years.
(29:56):
I think it's so important to acknowledge the challenges and they will all be different atdifferent stages for different people with their different contexts of course.
em I think one of the most, the things I've struggled with the most and I've had to reallywork on is em shift from a feeling of limitation to acceptance, limitation in terms of
(30:21):
time in which to develop and run a business.
kind of bookended by the school run, which seems to, I feel like I drop her off and then Igo and pick her up straight away, an hour later.
Things like the pandemic had a massive impact, were a huge challenge in terms of when mydaughter went back to school, we were hit by, she was hit by illness repeatedly every two
(30:43):
weeks for about two years, which was a massive, like her attendance was really poorbecause she just got hit by all the different bugs and illnesses she'd missed out on while
she was at.
we were off because she was off school.
em But also in accessing CPD opportunities, even now I find it really tricky.
Most CPD opportunities that I come across tend to be that late afternoon, early evening,which is for me the worst time, it's where I need to be most present.
(31:13):
So I'll say the worst time.
The worst time to access anything outside of my family, but it's the time for me to bepresent for my daughter.
These limitations, I've struggled with what I've perceived as limitation for a long time.
I've really had to self-coach and through my own coaching and supervision, really try toaddress my perception of it.
em To become more accepting, more accepting of the stage of life that I'm at, real, try topractice real gratitude for the stage my child's as well, that she won't be in the primary
(31:43):
school forever.
That will be a stage that is already, time passes so quickly.
Trying to be present and grounded and focus on what I can do rather than what I can't hasbeen something that I've turned to with more flexibility as I've practiced it.
(32:03):
yeah, definitely that question of what can I do is something I've come back to quite alot.
Great question.
And I can remember increasing my hours as my kids went from nursery into primary schooland then into secondary school.
So my working days got longer and I never have worked in the school holidays.
(32:29):
because it didn't seem to have made a difference to my business.
So I still have 16 weeks off because it didn't seem to have a bad effect.
So why would I want to work more?
So it's really interesting that we can learn to do some stuff.
And as you say, Katie, there's something about not making it a limitation.
There's something about optimizing it.
Myari.
(32:51):
Yeah, so I think similar to what Alice said, I was going to say something else and now theconversation has flowed.
So what I've just come to is something I've been talking to myself recently about is theidea of lack or abundance and which mindset I'm going to choose.
So I'm going from that idea of like thinking of the limitations and what's going to stopyou versus what is available.
(33:14):
And so things like I kept saying to myself, I'm not able to really
In my, in my circumstance right now, I work four days a week in an organization.
So in terms of, then Friday, which is my day off is what I call my day with my kids.
So that idea of being present, being there.
(33:35):
And so for a while I was like, well, there's no time for me to really give to thisself-employed thing.
This thing I absolutely love doing.
And it felt like a massive sacrifice.
And I think that's the thing that.
Maybe I'm still in a bit of process with this idea of sacrifice for all of these thingsthat you love that you've somehow got to find time and balance and joy around because they
(34:01):
are all joyous and yet they all require this push and pull.
And then the other thing I'm thinking about is like them coming to that idea of acceptanceof, okay, this is the season I am in, recognizing one it's a season.
and two, recognising well what can I do right now.
(34:21):
So you know I volunteered to do a session in our team meeting at work where I could givesome coaching skills to the rest of my team and get them to experience some of it.
I choose to do my one-to-ones as coaching sessions, one because that allows me to add thehours and two because it's better for them and it's better for me if I choose to do it
(34:44):
that way.
nice.
And so, and then three is just where are the opportunities?
So I've taken some annual leave because my son's graduated from preschool this afternoonand this happened to be this morning.
yeah, like find where the opportunities are that work with your timing.
Thank you, Mayuri.
(35:04):
I was actually just going to say something really practical that was for me when I had ablock of coaching sessions booked in after my daughter was born in London.
And I'd done them prior to having her and I was ready to do them after she was born.
And it got to, she was about five months, I think, after she was born, they were due tohappen.
(35:27):
And it was a couple of months before it.
And I just thought,
I cannot, I cannot see her leaving me for more than an hour or two at all.
I cannot conceive of getting out of bed and her being okay and getting on a train andgoing into London.
It was like, it was just impossible.
And I think at that point, I just thought I'm going to have to let go of this whole griefbooking that I've got.
(35:53):
But there was that kind of, again, you what is possible, Murray, like you were saying,what is possible?
And luckily, obviously, there is the internet.
So I kind of proposed to them and said, look, is there any way of breaking it up over amuch longer period of time instead of over like a week, doing it over a few months and
having like chunks a couple of hours a day over several months?
(36:13):
And then I managed to get my parents to look after my daughter twice a week for two hoursa time to do it.
And I was expressing and it was...
It was a really, really big piece of work to do to achieve, I think it was 20 hours orsomething of coaching that had been booked.
But I think there was two things for me in that.
(36:35):
One is how much work is required to do the thing that you want to do, like the logisticsof making something happen that women experience with small children.
I think the other was I felt incredibly proud of myself for coming up with somethingcreative and the support that
got enrolled and having that and finding that it was possible.
(36:56):
But I think I also realized it was more than I had capacity for sustainably at that point.
And so in my situation and the dynamic that we had, I had to acknowledge that, like youwere saying, Murray, there was a sacrifice that I needed to make for a period of time.
so for the next, it was about three years, I didn't coach and I was...
(37:19):
fully entirely with my daughter and we tried to send it to nursery and she wouldn't go.
So I, you know, she was home with me longer than I had intended, first of all, but it wasthe right time for her.
and it was, it was hard being able to lay that down because it was the thing that I lovedthe most and I knew I wanted.
But also that thing you were speaking about, about a season and that was that season.
(37:42):
And over the last few years, there's been a, like a fanning back of the dreams andpassions and
skills and the things that have been part of me that they remain like Alice you werespeaking that it's still there and there is immense satisfaction in being able to start
emerging back into the world that I held that was mine to inhabit and I feel like now is aI'm inhabiting in a different way and maybe a fuller way because of the journey that I've
(38:10):
had to do.
Thank you, Rachel.
Yeah, I I forgot what I was going to say because it's just, it's so, oh it's just lovely,isn't it?
Being around, having this conversation and recognising that there's everything everybodyhas said, I've just nodded along and gone, yeah, I recognise that.
(38:33):
And it kind of makes me wish, like looking back that I had, I think when I started tobuild my business,
I really had a sense of being alone, of like being alone in motherhood and being alone inbuilding a business.
And at the time that I was starting what I was doing, didn't really exist.
(38:54):
calling myself a maternity return coach wasn't even a thing.
And just this sort of feeling of, um yeah, like real aloneness of, don't know, just reallyenjoying the solidarity today and really enjoying m the conversation and recognizing that.
there are these experiences that run through all of us.
(39:15):
uh
And I think for some of us, we have to pretend that we're not parents in part of our work,because that's not a place that we take that bit.
So it's not that we're pretending we're not parents, but it's just something we don'tacknowledge that part of our identity.
So this is a place to acknowledge.
(39:35):
And also, I just want to say this is a shout out to several coaches who wanted to be heretoday and are probably in labour.
uh We stand with you.
Yeah, we stand with you.
And by the time you listen to this episode, your baby will hopefully be sleeping a littlebit sometimes.
(39:58):
Yeah, I'm really appreciating the insights and tips.
It's taken me back to those first few years and like you said, balancing childcare andbreastfeeding and everything.
So my son's three now, he's in nursery.
He's been in nursery since he was about one and we kind of extended the times from liketwo to three to five days.
And so what I practically try to do is when I'm working with my corporate clients is...
(40:21):
is shortening the day.
So it's like nine 30, 10 o'clock start finishing at four 30.
So I just give myself that buffer time to travel, to do the nursery pickup andprioritization and time blocking.
It's really hard to finish a gig and then go straight to pick up, which you haven't had asmuch time to reflect, to make notes.
So it's like the next morning blocking that hour review what happened.
(40:42):
So I have to really manage my time so much better and
My business coach about a year ago was like, the best you can do is hire a VA or an EA tosupport you so that you can delegate, you know, the parts of the business that you don't
need to do.
So I've been working with an executive assistant for a few months now.
It's brilliant.
So great to hand off things that aren't my strengths and also aren't growing the businessor bringing me life in order to focus.
(41:06):
But it is hard at that early stage in terms of investment costs and delegating, but I'mreally excited to see.
how much more I can grow and the business can grow with getting that extra support.
So that was recommended to me.
The first hire is an assistant.
Absolutely.
That was my first hire.
My first hire because I didn't have a mobile phone and because I wanted the phone to beanswered, I hired an answering service and they were, they still exist.
(41:34):
They're called Moneypenny and they used to pick up the phone and as though they were meand somebody rang up one day and said, um and she said, I'm sorry, Claire's in a meeting.
Well, actually I was watching children's TV and she said, I know she's there.
Well, I was present in my house.
(41:54):
The person who was answering the phone was present somewhere else in the United Kingdom.
And I was watching children's TV.
But the face of the business was clearly that there was somebody present at all times, butI wasn't there.
I didn't have to pick up the phone.
That was a great thing.
mean, now with people don't make phone calls anymore, do they?
(42:14):
So it doesn't matter.
You don't need that.
So what an absolute delight.
to speak to you all today.
And this is kind of the beginning, I imagine, of some kind of other conversation becausethere's something about tribe, isn't there?
We need to find our tribe and it feels as though there's a connection between you lovelypeople.
I'm gonna pop your details in the show notes so that you can grow your tribe.
(42:38):
uh Other people can connect with you.
But as we finish, I just want to ask each of you.
What's one thing that you're taking from this call?
For yourself.
Laura.
This has been a lovely conversation.
(42:58):
I'm so pleased to have been part of it.
So thank you so much for the invite, Claire.
em And I think I'm taking with me a reminder.
I think it was something that you said, Katie, about em perspective, about like someoneelse.
think everybody said it in their own way, actually, about season, about perspective, aboutjust doing what you can do, both as a parent and as a business owner and as a coach and,
(43:21):
you know, just in any point.
m Yeah, perspective is my takeaway.
Yeah, I think for me, it's just a reminder of how important it is for women and formothers to connect with one another and be seen and be heard and just have those spaces to
(43:44):
just be honest.
It's such a human need and as women, it's a really, for me, it's a very fundamental kindof need to be connected.
I like the word tribe as well.
Great,
I think as I'm leaving, there's a couple of things that are weaving around.
So one, as everyone else said, thank you so much for the invite to the conversationbecause it's been um quite cathartic actually to hear several others' experience of what
(44:15):
this looks like and that it isn't always a linear line.
And I think the second thing I'm thinking about is intersectionality.
So that idea of
us being a mum, I've got some other stuff going on in my life so how does that inform howI show up, what do my kids need to mean that I can or can't show up in different ways and
(44:41):
the idea of acceptance and friendship and solidarity and all of that.
Thank you.
Well, thank you all for saying yes.
Beth, what are you taking away?
I think similar, just that reminder of acceptance and with the go-go-go of running abusiness and raising kids.
(45:01):
And especially if you've got big dreams, you know, it can be really challenging to belike, okay, what's possible?
What support do I need?
What help do I need?
And knowing that, you know, we don't have to be super moms, super heroes.
Just figuring out, you know, what's, what's the season I'm in, what's possible, where canI stretch, but also where can I get that support and being really confident in that.
(45:23):
Because when we.
lead and coach from that place of peace and confidence and competence and yeahcontentment.
We really release something in the women that we're working with.
I love that.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Katie!
oh Just a reflection for me of the journey that I've been on and being privileged enoughto be on and still be on.
(45:46):
um And also excitement about where it can go.
feel bit uplifted actually would be the word.
A bit reassured, bit uplifted, a sense that there's so much more to come.
And all these different facets of who we are actually can, rather than seeing them ascompeting, they can also combine to make something really beautiful.
(46:09):
And I think that I heard something the other day that said, I'm exactly where I'm supposedto be.
It's like a little mantra of wherever we think we should be, actually we're always exactlywhere we're supposed to be.
yeah, just hearing everyone's stories has just been really powerful and just thank you somuch for creating this space for us to all share them.
(46:31):
Pleasure.
Alice.
think the fact that listening to everyone confirms for me that coaching can make you abetter mum and being a mum can make you a better coach.
And so just being excited that my son's early too.
listening to you all and seeing how different stages, you know, he can hardly talk.
(46:53):
When he starts to talk, there'll be new things I'll be learning.
So just that excitement of going forward with that.
But I also have a question and I wonder if there's a future podcast, Claire.
of dads reflecting on how being a dad makes them um a different coach, being a parent, Ireally like that movement called Parenting Out Loud, which is for men to be more vocal
(47:16):
about how parenting impacts them at work.
And I just loved it here, a similar conversation, see what were the same things and whatwas different maybe of their experience.
So that's the question that I'm taking away.
So dads who are listening, if you'd like to be on a podcast about dads and coaching, uhping us an email info@3dcoaching.com and we will set something up to have another great
(47:44):
conversation and do connect with these lovely people.
uh If you uh if you would like to details are in the show notes.
uh
I just wanted to end with a postcard that my mum gave me 30 years ago and it says, Iwanted to go and change the world, but I couldn't find a babysitter.
And my mum could see something in me that I couldn't see in myself because actually peoplenow say that I am changing a little bit of the world.
(48:12):
But there was a lot of time when I was just doing a little bit or a little bit more and alittle bit more and over time, you know, because these are children of matter.
And, you know, there's a time for everything, isn't there?
And yeah, I just want to encourage people with that.
So thank you all for listening.
Thank you for coming, Mayuri, Alice, Katie, Laura, Beth and Rachel.
(48:37):
And we'll be back next week with another episode.
Bye bye.
Hello and welcome to this week's edition of The Coaching Inn.
I'm your host, Claire Pedrick, and this year 3D Coaching, which is the company I founded,is 30.
And I know that because my baby is 30.
And I started it three months after she was born.
So I've been in conversations with a number of coaches who are mums in the last fewmonths, and I just thought it'd be really lovely.
(00:41):
to the birthday of 3D Coaching and the birthday of my younger child.
To have a conversation with some mums who are coaches now.
I was thinking this morning of what was it like?
uh And she was born when there were no mobile phones and no internet.
Now, how extraordinary is that?
(01:02):
So now, knowing what I know now, I'm not quite sure how I started a business with neithera mobile phone nor internet.
But I can remember having of coaching calls on a wired-in telephone in the spare bedroom.
So there you are, what a thing.
(01:23):
So that's not how it is now, and so let's introduce our lovely guests at today's opentable.
So, Mayuri Hargest, hello.
Hi, good morning.
I'm Mayuri.
I now live in Birmingham after a couple of years.
Prior to that, I in Wales.
(01:43):
I'm a mum to two little ones.
And actually, when I first came to coaching, wasn't even in a position where I thought Imight be able to become a mum.
So it's been quite a change to land in it.
When I first came to coaching, actually that's where I met Katie, who's also on the call.
We did our training together and I was in the midst of a career transition.
(02:05):
Someone had said to me, maybe it's something you should explore.
And I was at the point of leaving my old role.
So I decided to do some training.
Since then, set up Neon Lioness Coaching uh took two maternity leaves, raised young,beautiful kids.
one who's about to start school in September and now coaching looks more like organisationcoaching in work and a little bit on the side in terms of the self-employed role.
(02:37):
nice.
And your lovely children and you have come on a coach's walk.
Yes we have, yeah, very recently.
It was very lovely to meet them.
Alice Philip, hello.
Hi, great to be here.
My journey started into coaching, I think before I knew the word coaching, when I was ateenager and I was, you know, like most teenagers, wondering what to do and I said to
(03:05):
someone who I thought should know, is there a job that's a bit like a kind of professionalsounding board?
And they said, oh no, no, no, there's no job like that.
And I thought, okay.
So fast forward about 10 years, the charity where I was working put on an introduction tocoaching course led by the uh wonderful Claire and the rest is history.
(03:27):
I did it and I thought, yeah, this was the thing I thought might exist and I love it.
But I kept going with my other career in communications, mostly editing and I actually dostill have two jobs.
um So I work as the managing editor of a magazine called Forced Migration Review, which isbased at the University of Oxford.
(03:49):
So it's about um refugee asylum and statelessness issues and goes to 170 countries and isgreat fun.
But on the other side, still am pursuing coaching professionally.
I've been doing that for the last five years as well.
And I love having two jobs.
It's brilliant.
um And yeah, coaching mostly.
(04:10):
um
younger professionals probably between 20 and 45.
I think it's such an interesting time in life and yeah that's me.
Brilliant.
And I'm so pleased that you became a Because I learned so much from you on that course.
(04:33):
I can't remember what it was now, but there was something that I learned from you that Iuse now.
And what a beautiful thing that is.
uh Katie Poole, hello.
So you know Mayuri So tell us about you.
Oh, there we go.
Thank you all.
Thank you so much for having me.
It's lovely to be here with everybody.
(04:53):
Yes, I'm Katie.
I started coaching in 2019 and came from a long background in education.
So I've been a teacher and a middle leader in education.
And yeah, it's interesting.
My coaching journey has been, you know, through the pandemic.
We started in 2019 and then within a few months we're in.
(05:15):
lockdown at the time my daughter was about three so I've got one daughter she's nine she'salmost ten now.
And yeah so in terms of my work I've mostly coach people who are mission-led who are verymuch you know pour their heart and their soul into working with other people.
So that might be head teachers, a lot of educators and senior leaders in education em butalso business owners are very creative and really focused on creatives as well.
(05:45):
So I also host the Sunday morning journaling club, which is a free monthly journalingsession.
So I really love to curate spaces for people to think in a new way through the medium ofjournaling.
And so now I'm working on blending those two things, the journaling and the coachingtogether, which has been fantastic.
And I am also back in the classroom a little bit as well in the last year.
(06:08):
I've gone in a little bit back in.
So yeah, I've also got those various roles to juggle.
eh
but yeah, also loving it, so yeah.
oh
Brilliant.
Well, welcome, Katie.
And have you heard of Storia from Liz Uviebinene?
Oh no I haven't
She uh has a journaling app.
(06:29):
She was on the podcast a few weeks ago, a few months ago.
And she was introduced to us by Maria Fernandes, who's not here today because her baby isdue any minute.
um Yeah.
Yeah, do, do.
Laura, hello.
Hi there, thank you so much for having me here.
(06:52):
And Katie, your journaling sessions sound amazing.
That Sunday morning for journaling sessions sounds right up my street.
em Yeah, so I'm Laura, Laura Dugle.
I'm a parental return to work coach.
em Quite recently, before that, I maternity return coach.
em And like you, Claire, I know how old my business is because I started it when mydaughter was born.
(07:15):
So it's around 10.
It was a bit hazy in the beginning, so it's around 10 years old.
But before that, I worked in HR and part of my role was, at the time I would have saidmanaging people's return to work and now I would like to think of it as welcoming people
back to work.
But that was part of my HR role, but I hadn't actually had children.
(07:40):
So I think I was sort of, it was quite...
surface level, nothing wrong with it as such, but quite, you know, like what flexibleworking would you like, that sort of thing.
And then when I had my daughter, for me, I felt like it was quite a profound experience.
And I just realized this whole sort of doorway to loads of emotions that I didn't evenknow existed before the whole responsibility piece, just my life just changed in more ways
(08:04):
than I can even list for the better.
And that's what led me to.
go through my own career change and then move into what I'm doing now.
Wow, how interesting to be on one side and then on the other.
Yeah, fantastic.
Well, welcome Laura.
Beth O'Neill, hello.
(08:24):
Welcome to The Coaching Inn.
Hello, hello, thank you for having me this morning.
So my name's Beth, I'm a leadership coach and trainer, ICF qualified.
I've been coaching since around 2017 and I was working as an executive assistant at thetime and we hired within this charity, a leadership coach and I fell in love with
(08:45):
everything that she was saying in the boardroom.
I was just gravitating towards her and she became my mentor and gave me a place on acoaching program.
So I did my initial certification at that time.
And I continued working in different events management, project management, EA roleswhilst doing one-to-one coaching and then joined this amazing coaching company called
Resurgo where I fell in love with training leaders in how to coach.
(09:09):
So was there for about four years as part of the consulting team, designing and deliveringcoaching programs.
But I've always been a bit of an entrepreneur, big dreamer, big visions.
And about two years ago, oh, is it three years ago?
Losing track of time.
My son was about six months old.
I decided to launch my own business.
So I founded Beth O'Neill coaching and we train leaders in how to coach.
(09:33):
we run something called the coaching culture program, but we have a big focus on women inleadership.
So I run a women leadership program, helping female leaders at any stage of theirleadership.
could be brand new managers or CEOs develop these 10 steps to being, to developing theirexecutive coaching presence and being strong, impactful leaders.
And so.
Thanks.
that's my big passion is supporting female leaders.
(09:56):
And are you still working with Resurgo?
I'm still connected with them, but no, no longer working with them.
I have my eye on somebody from Resurgo as a future guest.
Ooh, some amazing coaches in that co-organisation.
Brilliant.
was such a good training ground for where I am right now.
I owe a lot of my coaching, my qualification, everything to them.
(10:17):
They're brilliant.
Great.
Well, welcome Beth and Rachel Erasmus.
Hello.
Hiya.
So I was a midwife in London for about 15 years and I became a co-active coach and alsogot trained with Claire when I was in London.
(10:40):
And that was in about 2013, 2014, something like that.
And then in 2018, I had
my daughter.
So she's now seven.
And the last few years I've been working to build up my business as well, which iscoaching women throughout the whole of their pregnancy, leaving work, pregnancy, birth,
(11:03):
postnatal, and then returning to work.
So it's just been a really interesting journey from various different angles around kindof motherhood.
So fantastic to get to be here with you guys and get to hear from you and share differentinsights.
Yeah, well, welcome.
And I remember you and I had a very deep, meaningful coffee in Starbucks on Charing CrossRoad.
(11:26):
Yes, we did.
We did.
And it was hot, I remember.
Funny what you remember is now I don't remember what we talked about but I remember it wasdeep and meaningful and hot.
haha
And I can even tell you strange memories, but which table we were sitting at, but that's acompletely other, that's the topic for a totally different podcast.
(11:46):
Anyway, welcome everyone.
How lovely to have you here and how interesting to notice that for all of you, there'ssomething about combining your coaching and your mothering.
And some of you are also working in that mother or female space.
And some of you are working in very different spaces.
(12:06):
So as people were introducing themselves, I wonder what you noticed and I wonder what youwant to ask each other.
Mayuri, what did you notice?
I think for me, actually, Rachel, I probably have a question for you in terms of themidwifery and how that relates to coaching, like in terms of the skills you had to use in
(12:32):
one to the other.
Interestingly, Claire and I had a good chat about that a little while ago.
I think one of the really significant things that stood out to me is about presence andhow that gets impacted.
So what I noticed as a midwife is if I was feeling quite tense and quite anxious inmyself, it did have an impact in the room with somebody in labor.
(12:59):
And also the kind of the influence that I would bring to that.
Whereas, and the same thing I notice now with coaching, you know, if I'm quite rattled orif I've got some other stuff running and I'm not managing myself, well, that really
impacts on how the coaching evolves.
So that's one of probably many, many things, but that's something that stands out to me.
(13:21):
And I'll pop in the show notes a link to the episode where Rachel talked in much moredepth about this.
But it's fascinating, isn't it?
Because I think that actually when we're, you're right, when we're rattled, it does reallyimpact the capacity of the other person to be courageous, because we're not being as
courageous as we could be.
(13:41):
Alice, you look like you're emerging a thought there.
Yeah, I was thinking also actually about the beauty of accompaniment.
So with midwifery, it's such an important part of it, isn't it, to be present throughout.
And I had quite a negative experience of having five different midwives before birth umand four different midwives during the labor.
(14:04):
And actually the lack of accompaniment really made a big difference to me because Icouldn't build trust.
And I think that actually what we do as coaches is also so much, it, about
through a period of time uh and yeah the parallel with motherhood of your accompanyingyour child through its life um but sort of seeing it through different stages and um
(14:29):
allowing for change in the other person, being surprised, being supportive.
Yeah so I guess my question kind of to the group is what have you learned from motherhoodthat you've been applying?
in your coaching.
Nice question, who wants to answer that first?
(14:50):
Yeah, lovely question.
Also, I was just off the tail of what Rachel was saying, just brought back memories ofwhen I had my daughter and how important that role of a midwife is that you just don't
realise until you go through having a baby.
And I thought my midwife had magic powers, obviously, because she was just the only personwho was there.
(15:12):
And when you just described that then about presence, there was something in the way thatmy midwife...
held my hand and she just looked into my eyes and she really grounded me and I wasn't acoach at the time and I hadn't begun this journey and honestly I remember after her name
was Dawn I've never met her seen her since but I remember her name because it was sospecial yeah I'm just absolutely right it's such an important role isn't it and to be able
(15:40):
to to give that if it is a positive experience to somebody it's amazing isn't it I willalways remember my midwife she was incredible
Sorry, but I went off track because I was thinking about that.
Yeah.
And then what has motherhood taught about coaching?
And it's interesting because I think as I was sort of going on my walk this morning, I wasthinking about what has coaching taught me about motherhood?
(16:05):
But then it occurred to me as well that, there's a lot of, it's gone both ways, hasn't it?
And I think there was so many, I don't even know if I can answer that question from one tothe other and particularly because.
For me, I've learnt to be a coach and still learning to be a coach and still learning tobe a mother at the same time.
oh But there are things that I think I do now that I don't think I could have done if Ididn't know how to do it.
(16:32):
And part of what you're saying, Rachel, I think is for me, part of parenting that I don'tknow if I would do if I was not a coach is about...
holding space bits and like not rushing to fix something and really, really listening.
(16:52):
So like if my daughter's come home and had a bad day or a good day and just wants to talkabout something, I do think that without coaching skills, I probably would rush in and
either join her in her exciting what, what, or, oh, that's terrible.
What can we do?
You know, like that sort of, and I think I am, I hope.
(17:15):
I hope she would say that I'm quite good at just listening and just seeing like, where isshe going with this before I jump to any conclusions?
em So yeah, that was my initial thought.
Yeah, great.
I love that thought, Laura.
And we've touched a little bit on presence so far.
And I think that's been a really, it's something I've always been passionate about interms of the presence we carry and I train women in executive presence.
(17:39):
I'm always mindful of presence, but I think it's been enhanced even more because of beingpresent with my son.
It's kind like when he walks in the room, even if I'm working, whatever I'm doing, it'slike, put it down, focus on him, offer him my full.
full whole self to listen to him or try to understand whatever he's going through.
So I think enhancing presence with clients, that's increased.
(18:03):
And empathy, trying to slow down, empathize, try to understand, obviously without saving.
Even though I'm a coach, my lead into coaching was more around the goal setting andachiever, and that was my drive to coaching.
So I've had to really work on the slowing down the empathy piece.
I love exploring that tool because it's a challenge and there's so much beauty that comesfrom it.
(18:26):
And I feel like having children has really helped enhance the presence piece.
Mm.
It's interesting, isn't it?
Because we'll go to Katie and then May in a minute.
what's interesting is that sometimes the parenting thing can show up in different ways inthe coaching.
So I often say in supervision to coaches, to coaches who are more my age than your age,how old are your children?
(18:53):
If there's a dynamic coming up between them and the person they're coaching, becauseactually it kind of comes around again and
If we're coaching somebody who is the same age as our children, that can be an interestingthing.
Particularly if they're the same gender.
Katie, what were you going to say?
(19:14):
Yeah, it's interesting.
So my daughter was, she just turned four actually when I trained as a coach and she's nownearly 10.
And as she has developed and changed, obviously my experience has grown as a coach, butit's interesting.
think the first thing when she was very young, when I started out, that really I felt theimpact of the two em interleaving was almost the unconditional positive regard.
(19:39):
And I'd left teaching at that point and
em Well, I'd moved schools and I was considering leaving, but having a child totallytaught me something about unconditional positive regard that then was, I think, had I
trained as a coach before I'd become a parent, I don't know that would have been asauthentic maybe, m which I think that shifted.
(20:04):
And as she's grown, just as Laura said there really, like that sense of, as my daughter'sgrown and starts, she's experiencing different.
dynamics at school and different relationships and those then come home in a way that theydidn't when she was little.
em That has really kind of enhanced my coaching skills and also been influenced by them emin a different way.
(20:27):
The conversation, the listening, the holding space for her.
So it's interesting how it shifted.
one of the things that struck me already massively from this conversation is a sense ofsolidarity.
I don't feel there are many
spaces for, em and there haven't been many spaces for me in my journey to be with coacheswho are mums and particularly who have got younger children.
(20:53):
em And so it's lovely just to be here and hear of other people's stories as well.
Just that, that feels quite powerful from the get-go of this conversation.
Just, okay, and Mimi already talked about this before, but I think it's off of that likeus too, I don't know.
So it's lovely to be in a space where
that you can hear other people's development and the impact as well.
(21:16):
yeah, it's just a real, it surprised me how powerful it feels to be here with peoplewho've also got younger children.
beautiful thing Katie.
Okay,
yes, I think a couple of things have struck me about the conversation as we've just gone,because I would say my kids are still really little, they're still two and four, right?
(21:40):
So Aria is just developing language and she's really fascinating in that my husband and Ihad a conversation this morning in that she knows how to say the words, but she doesn't
necessarily know what they mean.
And I wonder sometimes whether there's a parallel in what we face in terms of coaching,regards that, that someone comes to us and they know what they should be doing or know
(22:04):
what it might look like.
They've seen someone else do it, but they aren't able to embody it because they don'tquite understand it for themselves.
Um, that's something that's come up.
then the other thing that I've been thinking about is like when I first trained to coach,one of the most powerful tools in that was
that we were taught in that was Time to Think, a book by Nancy Klein.
(22:28):
And that's really helped me kind of shape my thinking around how I'm choosing to parent.
don't obviously don't always get it right, because none of us do.
But I think there's been a sense of what's it look like for me to hear my child.
That's come out of that kind of thinking.
(22:50):
what is their voice like, what's their personality like, what are they really trying totell me here?
And like, even when that's quite affronting, or okay, maybe I need to change somethingabout myself here, because maybe I'm not, maybe I'm falling into patterns instead of being
what they need from me right now.
(23:11):
Thank you, Rachel.
There's two things actually I want to share.
One is through the pregnancy, my pregnancy.
was far, a couple of stages was far more anxious than I ever anticipated that I would bein being pregnant.
And the first was just before the first scan.
(23:32):
And the other one was we planned to have a home birth.
We did have a home birth, but, and I worked as a home birth team.
So it was something very familiar to me, but I actually got.
quite anxious again about would she survive and were we making the right choice and was Iputting too much responsibility on myself because my husband didn't know so much about the
(23:53):
context and that was my decision and the journey of that was a really deep one ofsurrender and the recognition was I'm not in control and I'm not in control of her life,
I'm not in control of what happens but there is some intention, there is some...
trust that's needed, there's some letting go that's needed.
(24:15):
And it, I went through that process and actually when it came to the birth, it was areally great experience for me.
But I've never had it put to me so hard in me to let go of control.
And I think that's such an important thing I need to keep bringing back in the coachingspace that I'm not in control and there is a need to surrender and trust and trust the
(24:39):
process and trust what's going on.
And the other thing for me is in uh parenting is I've had to really, and I am learningself-compassion because the emphasis that I've always leaned on is my heart, is my ability
to connect, is holding spaces, those sort of more emotional side of things and how Icoach.
(25:05):
And there are things that come up in me with my child that are not how I want to be.
angry, I can feel like a heat in me that I've never known in my being before.
And there's times where I don't like some of the behaviours and I don't like how I speakand I'm just on this monotone, I'm like, stop the flow, it's not helping anybody.
(25:28):
And it's like, surely I could apply these skills that I've learned as a coach in my homeenvironment and I'm just not.
And then I'm coming out and I'm leading a group of women who've just had babies incoaching groups.
And I've had coaching in it myself just going, you know, this is the reality.
This is hard, holding these different roles and trying to be true to myself and failing attimes and bringing myself.
(25:54):
But the truth is I just, I have to be self compassionate.
And then as I, it increases my capacity to be compassionate for those that I'm alongsidebecause I have to go there myself to be able to hold it for others.
These are my observations.
Thank you.
Don't ask my children if they think I'm a good listener.
(26:20):
Because we can't take it all across.
Because I love what you were describing there about being a human grumpy being.
Thank you, because all of us are sometimes, aren't we?
We can't be this perfect anything.
We can't be the perfect coach.
Mediocre coaching is really good.
(26:42):
Mediocre parenting is also really good.
um And there's no need to aspire to something that we can't achieve.
Because actually, yeah, we want the people we coach to also know that mediocre is great.
Sometimes brilliant is fabulous, but nobody can be brilliant all the time.
(27:03):
Alice.
gonna say something else but the conversation has moved on to an interesting space so I'lljust flow with it like a coach.
It's making me think about the challenges, I guess we were talking about the positives ofuh mothering and coaching at the same time and I realised I hadn't introduced who my child
(27:24):
was, how old they were, so my son is two, he just turned two a couple of weeks ago and soI think he's the youngest on the call.
uh
And I actually went back to coaching.
took three months off coaching, but a whole year off my other job.
And I went back because I really missed it.
(27:49):
I wanted to go back, but it was really challenging to try and work out with breastfeeding,you know, how that was going to work.
I didn't have a very regular timetable with my child.
And
I'll maybe share my experience first, but I'm interested to hear how some of you cope withsome of these practicalities, I guess, of motherhood and coaching.
(28:10):
I devised this plan where I would say to a client, yes, I can coach you.
So was mostly people that I was already coaching.
I can coach you, but I need you to give me a two hour window and I will call youimmediately after a feed and I will know that I can give you a whole hour of my attention.
And it worked and it was wonderful.
(28:32):
It let me coach, but it set the expectations in a way that I could fulfill with myclients.
And I didn't take on too many, but it gave me confidence.
for the first time after the birth, I just felt a little bit of familiarity, like I wasbeing myself in a different way because becoming a mom, you know, it's still very recent
to me, but it's such as you described Laura, such a huge experience that actuallysomething familiar of using a skill that I knew was
(28:59):
was in me, was still there, was really comforting.
And also, just to be present with somebody else in somebody else's world was so releasing.
For me, just, love, I mean, maybe part of I love about being a coach is just beingcompletely absorbed in somebody else's space and not having to think about anything of my
own.
And so to just for an hour have nothing to do with the intensity of early parenting andjust be present with this other person was...
(29:27):
actually really great.
I couldn't do more than one a week, but you know, it was a really positive em outcome, buta challenge to work through.
So just wondered from other people, what challenges do you think have come up withcombining motherhood and coaching and maybe some tips of how you've got through them?
Because I'm at the youngest end here, so I'm going to learn from all of you and applythese things over the coming years.
(29:56):
I think it's so important to acknowledge the challenges and they will all be different atdifferent stages for different people with their different contexts of course.
em I think one of the most, the things I've struggled with the most and I've had to reallywork on is em shift from a feeling of limitation to acceptance, limitation in terms of
(30:21):
time in which to develop and run a business.
kind of bookended by the school run, which seems to, I feel like I drop her off and then Igo and pick her up straight away, an hour later.
Things like the pandemic had a massive impact, were a huge challenge in terms of when mydaughter went back to school, we were hit by, she was hit by illness repeatedly every two
(30:43):
weeks for about two years, which was a massive, like her attendance was really poorbecause she just got hit by all the different bugs and illnesses she'd missed out on while
she was at.
we were off because she was off school.
em But also in accessing CPD opportunities, even now I find it really tricky.
Most CPD opportunities that I come across tend to be that late afternoon, early evening,which is for me the worst time, it's where I need to be most present.
(31:13):
So I'll say the worst time.
The worst time to access anything outside of my family, but it's the time for me to bepresent for my daughter.
These limitations, I've struggled with what I've perceived as limitation for a long time.
I've really had to self-coach and through my own coaching and supervision, really try toaddress my perception of it.
em To become more accepting, more accepting of the stage of life that I'm at, real, try topractice real gratitude for the stage my child's as well, that she won't be in the primary
(31:43):
school forever.
That will be a stage that is already, time passes so quickly.
Trying to be present and grounded and focus on what I can do rather than what I can't hasbeen something that I've turned to with more flexibility as I've practiced it.
(32:03):
yeah, definitely that question of what can I do is something I've come back to quite alot.
Great question.
And I can remember increasing my hours as my kids went from nursery into primary schooland then into secondary school.
So my working days got longer and I never have worked in the school holidays.
(32:29):
because it didn't seem to have made a difference to my business.
So I still have 16 weeks off because it didn't seem to have a bad effect.
So why would I want to work more?
So it's really interesting that we can learn to do some stuff.
And as you say, Katie, there's something about not making it a limitation.
There's something about optimizing it.
Myari.
(32:51):
Yeah, so I think similar to what Alice said, I was going to say something else and now theconversation has flowed.
So what I've just come to is something I've been talking to myself recently about is theidea of lack or abundance and which mindset I'm going to choose.
So I'm going from that idea of like thinking of the limitations and what's going to stopyou versus what is available.
(33:14):
And so things like I kept saying to myself, I'm not able to really
In my, in my circumstance right now, I work four days a week in an organization.
So in terms of, then Friday, which is my day off is what I call my day with my kids.
So that idea of being present, being there.
(33:35):
And so for a while I was like, well, there's no time for me to really give to thisself-employed thing.
This thing I absolutely love doing.
And it felt like a massive sacrifice.
And I think that's the thing that.
Maybe I'm still in a bit of process with this idea of sacrifice for all of these thingsthat you love that you've somehow got to find time and balance and joy around because they
(34:01):
are all joyous and yet they all require this push and pull.
And then the other thing I'm thinking about is like them coming to that idea of acceptanceof, okay, this is the season I am in, recognizing one it's a season.
and two, recognising well what can I do right now.
(34:21):
So you know I volunteered to do a session in our team meeting at work where I could givesome coaching skills to the rest of my team and get them to experience some of it.
I choose to do my one-to-ones as coaching sessions, one because that allows me to add thehours and two because it's better for them and it's better for me if I choose to do it
(34:44):
that way.
nice.
And so, and then three is just where are the opportunities?
So I've taken some annual leave because my son's graduated from preschool this afternoonand this happened to be this morning.
yeah, like find where the opportunities are that work with your timing.
Thank you, Mayuri.
(35:04):
I was actually just going to say something really practical that was for me when I had ablock of coaching sessions booked in after my daughter was born in London.
And I'd done them prior to having her and I was ready to do them after she was born.
And it got to, she was about five months, I think, after she was born, they were due tohappen.
(35:27):
And it was a couple of months before it.
And I just thought,
I cannot, I cannot see her leaving me for more than an hour or two at all.
I cannot conceive of getting out of bed and her being okay and getting on a train andgoing into London.
It was like, it was just impossible.
And I think at that point, I just thought I'm going to have to let go of this whole griefbooking that I've got.
(35:53):
But there was that kind of, again, you what is possible, Murray, like you were saying,what is possible?
And luckily, obviously, there is the internet.
So I kind of proposed to them and said, look, is there any way of breaking it up over amuch longer period of time instead of over like a week, doing it over a few months and
having like chunks a couple of hours a day over several months?
(36:13):
And then I managed to get my parents to look after my daughter twice a week for two hoursa time to do it.
And I was expressing and it was...
It was a really, really big piece of work to do to achieve, I think it was 20 hours orsomething of coaching that had been booked.
But I think there was two things for me in that.
(36:35):
One is how much work is required to do the thing that you want to do, like the logisticsof making something happen that women experience with small children.
I think the other was I felt incredibly proud of myself for coming up with somethingcreative and the support that
got enrolled and having that and finding that it was possible.
(36:56):
But I think I also realized it was more than I had capacity for sustainably at that point.
And so in my situation and the dynamic that we had, I had to acknowledge that, like youwere saying, Murray, there was a sacrifice that I needed to make for a period of time.
so for the next, it was about three years, I didn't coach and I was...
(37:19):
fully entirely with my daughter and we tried to send it to nursery and she wouldn't go.
So I, you know, she was home with me longer than I had intended, first of all, but it wasthe right time for her.
and it was, it was hard being able to lay that down because it was the thing that I lovedthe most and I knew I wanted.
But also that thing you were speaking about, about a season and that was that season.
(37:42):
And over the last few years, there's been a, like a fanning back of the dreams andpassions and
skills and the things that have been part of me that they remain like Alice you werespeaking that it's still there and there is immense satisfaction in being able to start
emerging back into the world that I held that was mine to inhabit and I feel like now is aI'm inhabiting in a different way and maybe a fuller way because of the journey that I've
(38:10):
had to do.
Thank you, Rachel.
Yeah, I I forgot what I was going to say because it's just, it's so, oh it's just lovely,isn't it?
Being around, having this conversation and recognising that there's everything everybodyhas said, I've just nodded along and gone, yeah, I recognise that.
(38:33):
And it kind of makes me wish, like looking back that I had, I think when I started tobuild my business,
I really had a sense of being alone, of like being alone in motherhood and being alone inbuilding a business.
And at the time that I was starting what I was doing, didn't really exist.
(38:54):
calling myself a maternity return coach wasn't even a thing.
And just this sort of feeling of, um yeah, like real aloneness of, don't know, just reallyenjoying the solidarity today and really enjoying m the conversation and recognizing that.
there are these experiences that run through all of us.
(39:15):
uh
And I think for some of us, we have to pretend that we're not parents in part of our work,because that's not a place that we take that bit.
So it's not that we're pretending we're not parents, but it's just something we don'tacknowledge that part of our identity.
So this is a place to acknowledge.
(39:35):
And also, I just want to say this is a shout out to several coaches who wanted to be heretoday and are probably in labour.
uh We stand with you.
Yeah, we stand with you.
And by the time you listen to this episode, your baby will hopefully be sleeping a littlebit sometimes.
(39:58):
Yeah, I'm really appreciating the insights and tips.
It's taken me back to those first few years and like you said, balancing childcare andbreastfeeding and everything.
So my son's three now, he's in nursery.
He's been in nursery since he was about one and we kind of extended the times from liketwo to three to five days.
And so what I practically try to do is when I'm working with my corporate clients is...
(40:21):
is shortening the day.
So it's like nine 30, 10 o'clock start finishing at four 30.
So I just give myself that buffer time to travel, to do the nursery pickup andprioritization and time blocking.
It's really hard to finish a gig and then go straight to pick up, which you haven't had asmuch time to reflect, to make notes.
So it's like the next morning blocking that hour review what happened.
(40:42):
So I have to really manage my time so much better and
My business coach about a year ago was like, the best you can do is hire a VA or an EA tosupport you so that you can delegate, you know, the parts of the business that you don't
need to do.
So I've been working with an executive assistant for a few months now.
It's brilliant.
So great to hand off things that aren't my strengths and also aren't growing the businessor bringing me life in order to focus.
(41:06):
But it is hard at that early stage in terms of investment costs and delegating, but I'mreally excited to see.
how much more I can grow and the business can grow with getting that extra support.
So that was recommended to me.
The first hire is an assistant.
Absolutely.
That was my first hire.
My first hire because I didn't have a mobile phone and because I wanted the phone to beanswered, I hired an answering service and they were, they still exist.
(41:34):
They're called Moneypenny and they used to pick up the phone and as though they were meand somebody rang up one day and said, um and she said, I'm sorry, Claire's in a meeting.
Well, actually I was watching children's TV and she said, I know she's there.
Well, I was present in my house.
(41:54):
The person who was answering the phone was present somewhere else in the United Kingdom.
And I was watching children's TV.
But the face of the business was clearly that there was somebody present at all times, butI wasn't there.
I didn't have to pick up the phone.
That was a great thing.
mean, now with people don't make phone calls anymore, do they?
(42:14):
So it doesn't matter.
You don't need that.
So what an absolute delight.
to speak to you all today.
And this is kind of the beginning, I imagine, of some kind of other conversation becausethere's something about tribe, isn't there?
We need to find our tribe and it feels as though there's a connection between you lovelypeople.
I'm gonna pop your details in the show notes so that you can grow your tribe.
(42:38):
uh Other people can connect with you.
But as we finish, I just want to ask each of you.
What's one thing that you're taking from this call?
For yourself.
Laura.
This has been a lovely conversation.
(42:58):
I'm so pleased to have been part of it.
So thank you so much for the invite, Claire.
em And I think I'm taking with me a reminder.
I think it was something that you said, Katie, about em perspective, about like someoneelse.
think everybody said it in their own way, actually, about season, about perspective, aboutjust doing what you can do, both as a parent and as a business owner and as a coach and,
(43:21):
you know, just in any point.
m Yeah, perspective is my takeaway.
Yeah, I think for me, it's just a reminder of how important it is for women and formothers to connect with one another and be seen and be heard and just have those spaces to
(43:44):
just be honest.
It's such a human need and as women, it's a really, for me, it's a very fundamental kindof need to be connected.
I like the word tribe as well.
Great,
I think as I'm leaving, there's a couple of things that are weaving around.
So one, as everyone else said, thank you so much for the invite to the conversationbecause it's been um quite cathartic actually to hear several others' experience of what
(44:15):
this looks like and that it isn't always a linear line.
And I think the second thing I'm thinking about is intersectionality.
So that idea of
us being a mum, I've got some other stuff going on in my life so how does that inform howI show up, what do my kids need to mean that I can or can't show up in different ways and
(44:41):
the idea of acceptance and friendship and solidarity and all of that.
Thank you.
Well, thank you all for saying yes.
Beth, what are you taking away?
I think similar, just that reminder of acceptance and with the go-go-go of running abusiness and raising kids.
(45:01):
And especially if you've got big dreams, you know, it can be really challenging to belike, okay, what's possible?
What support do I need?
What help do I need?
And knowing that, you know, we don't have to be super moms, super heroes.
Just figuring out, you know, what's, what's the season I'm in, what's possible, where canI stretch, but also where can I get that support and being really confident in that.
(45:23):
Because when we.
lead and coach from that place of peace and confidence and competence and yeahcontentment.
We really release something in the women that we're working with.
I love that.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Katie!
oh Just a reflection for me of the journey that I've been on and being privileged enoughto be on and still be on.
(45:46):
um And also excitement about where it can go.
feel bit uplifted actually would be the word.
A bit reassured, bit uplifted, a sense that there's so much more to come.
And all these different facets of who we are actually can, rather than seeing them ascompeting, they can also combine to make something really beautiful.
(46:09):
And I think that I heard something the other day that said, I'm exactly where I'm supposedto be.
It's like a little mantra of wherever we think we should be, actually we're always exactlywhere we're supposed to be.
yeah, just hearing everyone's stories has just been really powerful and just thank you somuch for creating this space for us to all share them.
(46:31):
Pleasure.
Alice.
think the fact that listening to everyone confirms for me that coaching can make you abetter mum and being a mum can make you a better coach.
And so just being excited that my son's early too.
listening to you all and seeing how different stages, you know, he can hardly talk.
(46:53):
When he starts to talk, there'll be new things I'll be learning.
So just that excitement of going forward with that.
But I also have a question and I wonder if there's a future podcast, Claire.
of dads reflecting on how being a dad makes them um a different coach, being a parent, Ireally like that movement called Parenting Out Loud, which is for men to be more vocal
(47:16):
about how parenting impacts them at work.
And I just loved it here, a similar conversation, see what were the same things and whatwas different maybe of their experience.
So that's the question that I'm taking away.
So dads who are listening, if you'd like to be on a podcast about dads and coaching, uhping us an email info@3dcoaching.com and we will set something up to have another great
(47:44):
conversation and do connect with these lovely people.
uh If you uh if you would like to details are in the show notes.
uh
I just wanted to end with a postcard that my mum gave me 30 years ago and it says, Iwanted to go and change the world, but I couldn't find a babysitter.
And my mum could see something in me that I couldn't see in myself because actually peoplenow say that I am changing a little bit of the world.
(48:12):
But there was a lot of time when I was just doing a little bit or a little bit more and alittle bit more and over time, you know, because these are children of matter.
And, you know, there's a time for everything, isn't there?
And yeah, I just want to encourage people with that.
So thank you all for listening.
Thank you for coming, Mayuri, Alice, Katie, Laura, Beth and Rachel.
(48:37):
And we'll be back next week with another episode.
Bye bye.
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