How often do we ask ourselves that question? Personally I feel like that it sits at the back of my mind pretty constantly. Is it there to keep me in check? Give me direction? Contemplate my sanity? Anyway….for the purpose of this lets say that it relates more specifically to my career/direction in life.
Does anyone else ever think back to their childhood and remember looking at the ‘adults’ and thinking; they really have it together and I can’t wait to be old enough to do that? As a youngster I would always do this and get lost in thought about how one day I would be confident in all my decisions and know exactly what I was doing. Well; it’s a trap. I’ve had this conversation with many of my friends as an adult and can confirm that for the most part we are still ‘winging it’ and don’t actually know what we are doing.
Anyway; I digress. Let me take you back to when I finished school and started university at the age of 17. I was always the good kid in school; shy, unsure, socially awkward and set on getting results. I wasn’t one of those naturally smart kids, I had to put in effort to get decent grades.
I scored myself my first job, at a DIY store in a big green warehouse down the main street of Warwick, and for the next 4 years while completing university; this was my weekend home. I credit this job and the people in the early years of my career for my confidence and extroversion that I now have as a staple in my life. This is where I first met my now business partner Debb and where Peak Potential Coaching Co was born. But…we aren’t up to that yet.
Debb was an over the top, eccentric, confident young girl who owned the room and had people gravitate towards her. She didn’t flaunt it, because I don’t think she actually knew (or cared) what people thought about her. She took me under her wing and for the time we were both in that shop together, helped crack open my shell and between her, the rest of the team and my uni friends, made me comfortable with the uncomfortable.
For the next 15 years, the big green shed would be my home and my one and only Job. I had a dual degree under my belt of Business/Commerce with majors in Marketing, Human Resource Management and Finance - and a boss who told me all those years ago - why are you wasting your time doing that degree when you can just work here…..probably right 😉
Debb and I moved pretty quickly internally through roles and over the span of those 15 years; I opened 2 new stores, lived in Toowoomba and commuted back to Warwick each day as part of ‘saying yes to grow my career’; and during that time Debb and I were also 1st and 2nd in charge of a Toowoomba store - lord help everyone.
I met my husband Chris, bought a house, had the pets and the white picket fence (it was actually chicken wire and dad and I built it so; the budget version). Life was good and travel and adventure became at the heart of my life. Chris and I would work hard to play hard, aiming to travel overseas whenever our back pockets could afford it.
TImes change though, right? Business and the direction it takes changes, we change as people and maybe we become acutely more aware of what we want out of life (I am at this moment realising that in reference to becoming an adult above - maybe I actually sometimes do know what I am doing). For the last 3-5 years, in hindsight; I would say that I didn’t love what I did, not the way I used to.
People are my thing. Inspiring, coaching, developing, unlocking potential in people and seeing them succeed; or even just get better at what they do with more confidence - this filled my cup. Debb said to me once during an appraisal (somehow she became my boss at one point during these 15 years), instead of thinking of the job you want, write down the things you love and the parts of the role that light you up. I did that, but couldn’t match it in my head with a career; I mean I'd only had one job my whole life and I didn’t know what to do.
This led to our 2023 gap year. Chris is originally from the UK and has lots of family and friends back home - and during the midst of the pandemic and all of the travel restrictions and a shotgun wedding during the travel bubble; we were itching to get out. We sold the house; packed our things and traveled the UK and in and out of Europe for the next 12 months.
Time away really puts things into perspective for you; and during that 12 months we also had lots of downtime; where I would get lost in my thoughts. I knew I had to go back and things had to be different. I didn’t know what I was going to do but I knew that I needed to go home and change my path, and that scared me. What was I even doing? How would I get another job? Would anyone hire me?
Fast forward to September that year and Debb rings me one night in the UK. We chat for a bit about life and she says ‘Dan, do you want to quit your job and work with me?’. Now; we had joked for years about working together and taking over the world. It was never a realistic goal though as we both had to keep working and our lives had different priorities. Without even knowing what she was about to ask me to join her in; I knew I was in.
From September until our arrival home in January 2024; in between our travel (and sometimes during it), we would link up, plan and talk; birthing Peak Potential Coaching Co and creating a partnership that focuses on - I quote from above “ Inspiring, coaching, developing, unlocking potential in people and seeing them succeed’; who would have thought?
Our meetings consisted of an awful time difference. Sometimes I would be up at 2am having meetings with Debb, sometimes she would put the kids to bed and jump on calls late and I would get up early. We loved it though; our minds were firing and we were creating something. I remember one time specifically too; in a hotel room in Croatia we filmed a business pitch to apply for a grant - we were committed.
Our view from said room in Croatia, complete with ipad video pitch.
Through Debb’s research and exposure, we aligned ourselves with Gallup - a global analytics company that collects and processes business data and statistics from businesses all across the world. They offer the CliftonStrenghts assessment; which is a questionairre that provides a personalised, detailed report of what your natural strengths and talents are. Without you doing this yourself - it’s really hard to explain how beneficial the content is. My top strengths are a mix of empathy, focusing on the future, developing people and thinking things through strategically - it felt like me and it helped with my ownership of it.
Reading and understanding my personalised report set off lots of lightbulbs and random trailing thought patterns in my head. Not only did it help me understand me more but it also helped me understand my relationships and my interactions with the friends and family that surrounded me. I understood my husband more (he took the assessment too) and it improved our communication and reduced conflict. It helped my working relationship with Debb; she loves to grab the bull by the horns and start things; but I need time to process and understand things before jumping in - so with this we meet in the middle. I challenge her to think things through and she challenges me to be more proactive.
So now, fast forward, our business has launched and we both get to do what we love. We get to bring development opportunities locally and inspire and develop peoples natural talents to see them flourish. We offer both individual coaching and team/business coaching sessions. Both Debb and I have been exposed to a catalogue of coaching/development/personality profiling tools through our ‘big retail jobs’ and we know that not everyone gets these opportunities; so to be able to provide this to individuals and smaller businesses is really rewarding - plus the tools that we use are the best we have come across in our careers.
With our years of experience, dreams of creating a business together, coaches certification under our belt - we are here and we are ready. We’d love to help - it is our passion and strength after all. If you think we can help you or your business on your journey and share some inspiration to unlock your potential, drop us a line; we’d love to chat - and if you’ve made it to the end of this blog; GREAT WORK!
See you at the peak,
Dan
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