115. Should You Coach Friends and Family? The Truth About Mixing Business with Personal Relationships

When you're starting your coaching business, your friends and family feel like the obvious first clients. They already trust you, they want to support your new venture, and honestly, it feels way less scary than reaching out to complete strangers.

But what happens when your sister stops sharing her real spending habits because she doesn't want you judging her credit card debt at Thanksgiving dinner? Or when your best friend expects free advice every time you grab coffee together?

The thing is, financial coaching requires complete honesty and vulnerability. With strangers, there's less at stake emotionally. But when it's your college roommate or your cousin, suddenly they're holding back information because they don't want to change how you see them at family gatherings.

And then there's the flip side: you might find yourself going easier on them because you don't want to create tension in your friendship. You avoid the hard conversations about their shopping habits because you're worried about protecting the relationship, which impacts your ability to be an effective coach.

In this episode, I'm sharing the real pros and cons of coaching friends and family, including practical strategies if you do decide to work with your inner circle. But the bigger question is this: Is this actually sustainable for building the business you really want?

If you've been wondering whether you should coach the people closest to you, or if you're already doing it and feeling stuck, this episode will help you make intentional decisions about your business that honor both your relationships and your professional goals.

Links & Resources:

• Ultimate Growth Guide
• Join the Facebook group

Key Takeaways:

• Your inner circle might trust you, but that doesn't mean they'll tell you the whole truth about their finances.
• The problem with coaching friends: You may go easier on them to protect the relationship, which means they don't get the coaching they actually need.
• Question to ask yourself: Am I building a business or just helping people I already know?
• If you coach friends and family, treat them more professionally than your regular clients, not less.
• Your personal network has an expiration date as a client source—eventually you'll need to look beyond people who already know you.
• The most successful coaches use friends and family as practice, not as their business model.
• Here's how to keep the relationship with friends and family: Let them refer people to you instead of becoming clients themselves.