LCAN advocates coaching model that will resonate with African narrative
By Felicia Nwosu
The Life Coaches Association of Nigeria (LCAN) has held the fifth edition of African Coaching Week. Addressing the need for coaches to understand the uniqueness and peculiarities of African people’s problems so as to enable them create customised solutions, they specifically advocated for a coaching model that will resonate with the continent’s narrative.
The 3-day groundbreaking event with the theme: ‘Coaching: The Key to Unlocking Africa’s True Potential’, which kicked off on the 27th of November, came to a memorable end with an inspiring flagship conference on November 30 at EbonyLife Place in Victoria Island, Lagos.
President of LCAN, Omawumi Ogbe, explained that the choice for a line up of such high calibre and cerebral speakers points to the importance and value placed on the event.
“This month makes 5 years of our journey. It does not only mark five years of excellence, it also symbolizes the joint power of life-long association of Nigeria shaping our continent. And that is rooted in its operation. The theme is very timely and very crucial. We said Africa must unlock its potentials.
“This is what we want to do on a larger scale for every coach, for every member, for every participant of the Africa Coaching Week. We want you to feel the impact live. We don’t want you to just hear about this. We don’t want to excite you and go back home. We want to see very valuable results and we want to come back next year with changes that are very remarkable and easy to spot,” she said.
The notable discussants at the Fireside Chat shared their unique journeys on coaching chronicles and their stories of impact and growth as well as how they found themselves with the noble and notable career and how impactful and rewarding their choices have been so far.
Sharing her success story, Yvonne Ofodile, founder, Zetile Group, revealed how she moved from just having a skill in coaching for personal knowledge and development to having it as a tool for business of coaching, as well as got immersed in it as a powerful tool that could transform lives positively.
The Clarity & Business Coach called on professional coaches to reinvent their models. She said the future of African coaching is collaboration. The passionate entrepreneur challenged them to change the narrative on Africa through collaboration and engagement to amplify the import of coaching to yield impactful results and also to reposition them for relevance.
“A lot of us get stuck. We all have started and we refuse to innovate and reinvent. We refuse to be flexible. We refuse to just move ourselves to get the results that we want. It is important that we embrace collaboration with people. Internal collaboration will help drive its growth. If you want to put in a good voice, that might be through good collaboration,” she said.
Another industry thought leader, Enahoro Okhae, the CEO of GIG Mobility/ MD Pause Factory, also shared the story of how he moved from being a church drummer, earning the sum of N2500,000 as salary to becoming the CEO of GIG as a result of the strategic step he took by going into life coaching.
He spoke on the power of believing in oneself, and marching it up with vision and focus guided with undiluted self confidence. He pointed out that they must fully express themselves in all spheres of life as coaches without losing the personality of whom they are.
“You need to realize that you are bigger than your present expression. The whole of you cannot be the thing that you are being now, it is not possible. In two years’ time, you should be doing more than you are doing now. Before the law of diminishing returns sets in. Whatever coach that you are, ensure that you get to the highest level of expression. What’s going to help us is that everybody that is here, be your own coach. I coach myself. I don’t know how else to say it, but the expression you have now is intended, there’s more about you. Believe in yourself and keep on learning,” he said.
Sam Obafemi, founder/CEO, Cerca Africa, while narrating his journey into coaching, noted that he was inspired by the zeal to understand the reason behind his daughter’s tantrums, which has today become a strong transformative tool to various business opportunities.
He urged coaches to redefine the profession by honing their skills and updating their knowledge base so as to be at par with their global contemporaries and also to wade against quackery.
“The first thing is those who are coaches need to improve on their PR, marketing, communication skills. We need to collectively know that the more people know we are doing coaching, the more curious they become. And from that curiosity they can become players.”
The renowned coaching body also bestowed some special award recognition on some of its executive members. The high point of the event was the unveiling of its ACWDigest magazine, launched in commemoration of its 5th anniversary.
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