Group coaching program: when it works and how to build one

A group coaching program works when everyone in it wants the same result and is at roughly the same stage, and it goes wrong when people need very different things or one person takes over. To create one, decide the outcome, the length, the group size, what each session looks like, what support there is between sessions, and the price, in that order.

I've sold and run masterminds, and I sold international retreats in the life coaching world, so I've seen the good side of groups and the messy side. I'll start with the messy side, because it's the bit nobody puts in the brochure.

The woman who took over my mastermind

I ran a mastermind where one woman took over. Every session, she'd bring something up, go off the subject, and keep talking. Other people in the group were there for their own business, and she was running them out of time.

I had private chats with her about it. I was polite, but I was clear that the time belonged to the whole group and she needed to respect that. It was not talk therapy. People had paid to work on their businesses, not to listen to one person work through everything going on in her life.

I'm telling you this because it's the thing that goes wrong in groups, and it isn't your fault when it happens. But you are responsible for sorting it out, because everyone else paid too. A group program has to be built so that can't run on for weeks before you deal with it.

When does group coaching work?

It works when the people in it have a lot in common. Same result wanted, same stage, similar sort of problem. Then one person's question helps three others, people learn from each other, and they push each other along. A group of newly self-employed people all trying to win their first ten clients is a good example.

It also works when people want company. Some people do better knowing others are in the same boat, and they'd find one-to-one coaching a bit intense.

And it works for the coach's diary. You can help more people in the same hours, and you can charge each person less than one-to-one while earning more for the time.

When doesn't it work?

When the people are too different. Put a complete beginner next to someone who's been at it ten years and one of them will be bored and the other lost.

When the problem is private or raw. Somebody in the middle of a divorce or grieving might not want to talk in front of strangers, and they shouldn't have to.

When people need a lot of individual attention. If every person's situation is genuinely different, you'll end up doing eight bits of one-to-one coaching in one room, badly.

And when you haven't coached one-to-one enough yet. You need to know what your clients usually struggle with before you can build a group around it. If you're still getting your first few clients, how to get your first life coaching client comes first.

How to create a coaching program, step by step

I'll use a made-up coach to show it. Amira helps people who've just gone self-employed as bookkeepers get their first ten clients. She's done it one-to-one for a while, and she keeps having the same conversations, so she wants to turn it into a group.

Step 1: decide the outcome

Write down what someone will have at the end that they don't have now, in words they'd use. Not "confidence" or "clarity". Something they could point to.

Amira's outcome: "You'll have a list of 50 local businesses to approach, a way of talking about what you do that doesn't feel like selling, and your first paying clients signed, or at least in conversation."

If you're not sure who exactly the group is for, sort that out first. What an ideal coaching client actually is will help.

Step 2: decide the length

How long does that change actually take? Amira's one-to-one clients usually get there in about two months, so she picks eight weeks. It's long enough to get results and short enough that people don't lose interest halfway.

Step 3: decide the group size

Smaller is easier. Amira goes for a maximum of eight. With a 90-minute session, that gives everyone a real chance to speak each week, and she can keep track of where each person is.

Nobody's done proper research on the perfect group size for coaching, and I'm not going to pretend there's a magic number. But think about a dinner party. Six or eight people can all join in one conversation. Twenty people end up as four separate conversations and a couple of people at the end not saying a word.

Step 4: decide what a session looks like

Give every session the same shape, so people know what to expect. Amira's 90 minutes go like this:

• 10 minutes: everyone says what they did since last week, one sentence each.
• 20 minutes: Amira covers one subject, like how to write to a local business.
• 50 minutes: hot seats. Two or three people each get about 15 minutes of coaching on their own situation while the others listen and chip in. It rotates, so everyone gets a turn over the eight weeks.
• 10 minutes: everyone says what they'll do before next week.

The fixed timings are what stop one person taking over. When the 15 minutes is up, it's up, and it's not personal because it's the same for everyone.

Step 5: decide the support between sessions

Say exactly what people get, not "ongoing support". Amira offers a group chat she checks once a day on weekdays, and one 20-minute one-to-one call per person halfway through.

That halfway call is a good idea in any group. It's where you find out what someone wasn't willing to say in front of everyone else.

Step 6: decide the price

Group coaching should cost each person less than your one-to-one work, but don't price it like a cheap course. Amira's made-up one-to-one package is £1,200, so she prices the group at £600 per person, or two payments of £300. Eight people at £600 is £4,800 for eight weeks of group sessions, which is more than she'd earn doing the same hours one-to-one.

Be careful with special offers. I spent years doing marketing for driving schools, and special offers on the side of the car hurt them, because pupils couldn't tell one school from another and just picked the cheapest. The voucher-site deals were worse, and ran schools at a loss. If people can't see why your program is worth it, a discount just teaches them to wait for the next one. For more on setting and showing a price, read whether to show your coaching prices.

Step 7: decide who gets in

Don't take everyone who's willing to pay. One wrong person can spoil it for seven. Amira uses a short coaching application form asking how long they've been self-employed and how many clients they've got now, so she knows everyone's at the same stage before she says yes.

Then she has a real conversation with each person. My best clients have always come from taking people offline for a proper chat, and I don't want anyone feeling like they're being put through a process.

Step 8: write down the group rules

Before the first session, everyone agrees to a few plain rules. Amira's are:

• What people share in the group stays in the group.
• Turn up on time, and if you can't make it, tell me before the session.
• Respect everyone's time. The timings are there so everybody gets a turn.
• This is coaching about your business. It isn't therapy.

Put those rules in your paperwork too. What to put in a coaching contract has a section on what changes for groups. If I'd had rules like these written down from day one with my mastermind, those private chats would have been a lot easier.

What's a signature coaching program?

It's your main program, the one you're known for, with a name and a fixed shape that you run again and again. That's all. It sounds grander than it is.

Amira's eight-week group could become her signature program: "First Ten Clients, for new self-employed bookkeepers". Same eight weeks, same session shape, same price, run three or four times a year.

I saw this work with driving schools. Instead of selling lessons by the hour, the schools that did well turned them into products for each type of pupil, so one for complete beginners and one for people who were part-trained and needed to get test-ready. People could see straight away which one was for them. A signature coaching program does the same job. It turns "book some sessions with me" into something a stranger can understand and buy.

Two warnings. First, the name should say the result, not be clever. Second, don't call it your signature program until you've run it at least once and know it works. Run it, fix what went wrong, then give it a name.

What do you do now?

Take the eight steps above and write down your answer to each one, the way Amira did. If you can't answer step 1 in words a client would use, stop there and work on that first. Once you've got all eight, you've got a group program you can explain to someone in two minutes, and that's when you start telling people about it.

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Read next

• How to get your first life coaching client with no proof
• What an ideal coaching client actually is
• Life coach rates: should you show your prices?