Working As a Business English Coach As A Digital Nomad — William Cooke
Intro:
William Cooke is a certified English teacher and coach. He is also a passionate student of human psychology, with a varied experience of cross-cultural communication and living. He uses these skills to help others improve their communication and skills and live their best lives.
You’ve got an interesting combination of a skillset. Tell us a bit about your backstory. How did you first get started teaching English?
I decided to leave the UK in 2014 and had no real plan to return, neither did I have any real idea about travelling at that point in my life. After some difficulties getting started I settled in Portugal for about 8 months, working in a hostel, where I got acquainted with Workaway.
In 2015, Angloville contacted me and I decided to do a couple of weeks volunteering and helping with English. I loved the whole experience and finally, when I was a bit more settled in France at the end of 2017, I started looking for a job teaching English.
I lived in Bordeaux, so many of the clients wanted to improve because they worked in the wine industry. Even though the school was for general English, this large but focused clientbase pointed me to the importance of having a niche.
This large but focused client base pointed me to the importance of having a niche.
After I left, I kept up with my own lessons and work until 2019 when I decided to really decide to dedicate time to building a business. I took a TEFL in the summer courtesy of Angloville and went back for a few weeks with them to volunteer.
It was there that I really started to understand the importance of more than just teaching grammar and vocabulary. I started learning about coaching and integrating it into my practice. I have always been more interested in the problems clients come to me with, their projects, their troubles, their dreams, rather than the English language itself.
I have always been more interested in the problems clients come to me with, their projects, their troubles, their dreams.
I started developing a programme around that, using my understanding and feedback from the work I’d been doing. Now I am expanding online in a more entrepreneurial context. I love my work because there is so much you can do with it. You can do it as a hobby in the evenings with a couple of clients, as a casual source of side income or you can build your own business and go as far as you want, it’s amazingly flexible.
Wow! It sounds like you’ve had an amazing past few years! Can you tell us about Angloville and what your experience has been like with them?
I’d never thought of doing anything like it and was quite skeptical when they offered me a hotel room, all my food and a great opportunity to meet people as a volunteer.
As they contacted me I thought it could be a scam. I hadn’t even registered the concept! I went with it, though, and it was completely worth it.
Basically a group of about 15 native speakers and 15 locals spend the week in a hotel and you ‘work’ about 12 hours a day speaking, mostly one-to-one, but not teaching.
There are very few teachers there. It is about being forced to communicate in English and the impact a whole week of this has on the participant’s English is amazing. The results are genuinely so impressive.
I think it is there I realised the importance of actual communication in language learning. It doesn’t mean anything if you know all the rules on paper. It’s something like trying to ride a bike by reading instructions and never getting on an actual bike.
It doesn’t mean anything if you know all the rules on paper. It’s something like trying to ride a bike by reading instructions and never getting on an actual bike.
They were offering a TEFL course to anyone who did three weeks for them. I went back and got this in 2019 but I already had a year of teaching experience by then.
The TEFL course is nowhere near the quality of a CELTA, for example and wasn’t as useful for me as I thought it might be but the time volunteering was so worth it.
It can help you to understand the needs of learners, teaching methods, creating a niche and a syllabus and everything if you are open to it. Plus you meet a load of great people and get a chance to explore a different culture in a way that is not possible for most tourists. It can be quite tiring if you aren’t a very social person but I personally found it energising.
You’ve mentioned the importance of identifying a niche a few times. You don’t exactly work as an English teacher now, but as a coach. How do you explain the difference between the two?
The ICF defines coaching as “partnering with clients in a thought-provoking and creative process that inspires them to maximize their personal and professional potential.”
When we teach we often place ourselves as the all-knowing expert and a benchmark of what the student should become. I don’t really like working that way, I’m more interested in a satisfying outcome for the client where they can communicate, use their English for what they want and keep improving long after they have left me.
I work with several non-native teachers who often know more about grammar than I do, but still, we have very worthwhile work to do on their habits, abilities, attitudes and ideas.
My main focus is on building habits for learners and getting them to feel confident when speaking even if they make mistakes. I also work with expats to maximise their lives and empower them during the transitional periods they might have.
My main focus is on building habits for learners and getting them to feel confident when speaking even if they make mistakes.
But again, my work is not ‘pure’ coaching as defined by the ICF because my programmes have a structure and set of resources on my own learning platform, these are more ‘teaching’ resources.
I like to use what works, not what I am told I should or shouldn’t. If it gets results then I will look at it further. My programmes are really multimedia-based, I’m interested in technology so I have a series of different resources and ideas of what I can integrate in the future.
That sounds really fascinating. Do you feel like you can tell us what is the most successful way that you get clients for your coaching business?
The jury’s still out on ‘most successful!’ Mostly I am getting business from building local relationships and networking but as I am now expanding online I think social media marketing is my main target right now.
Mostly I am getting business from building local relationships and networking.
I am working on content marketing and SEO but that is a longer-term solution. What really helps is not entering into a race to the bottom market on something like Preply. If you are an educated teacher living in a Western country, you just can’t compete in a space like Preply (and actually I don’t think you even should). The key is finding your niche and building up a local network, with honest, well-run and fair schools or private clients.
Having a unique take on things helps. For me that has been relatively easy to find because I like exploring boundaries and trying new things. People tend to respond to that once they see it is working. It’s hard to find early adopters but once people get comfortable with a new method it’s much easier to scale.
I am actually quite choosy with clients. I only like to work with people I know will respond to what I do. I actually think that’s important, working with people who value you. You then get a relationship built on mutual trust (maybe that’s the coach in me talking) and it’s so much easier to reach an outcome.
I actually think that’s important, working with people who value you. You then get a relationship built on mutual trust.
My programmes really aren’t designed for those who won’t put the work in and I find that many learners just want something casual and effortless but they also want to see vast improvements and they also want to pay ten euros for this life-changing opportunity.
There’s no way you can have all of those things! So I choose to work with those I know will take value from what we are doing together.
You are following my own dream of living around the world. How are you able to do this?
My coaching supports that currently. Being a digital nomad is a great way to live a very free life but having your own company that is quite difficult to build. I have done a lot of voluntary work to live in so many places and I am a very exploratory person.
It is more that it is in my nature than a particular dream of mine. When I first left the UK I was getting away from a place where I found no opportunities or future. I really had no desire to travel before this decision. Now it is just a way of life.
Although I have been blessed with these chances and with an openness to experience, I don’t really feel that it is some kind of dream, it’s just some part of my daily life, though I must say, I love my daily life!
I don’t really feel that it is some kind of dream, it’s just some part of my daily life, though I must say, I love my daily life!
I’ve lived in ten countries now, and I still feel that there is a lot of exploration to do. I was definitely beginning to feel too old to not have a more fixed career now, so having a company was a logical next step.
I have also decided to go to university again this year so I am moving to Malta. This was a decision I made in about a week. I think most people are much more hesitant than that and would have to think about it a lot but I am very spontaneous, I think that really helps.
If you could go back in time, is there anything you would change about your English teaching career?
I would have started earlier in the online market. That time between Angloville and getting a teaching job could have been filled very nicely with a few private clients on a platform for some experience, especially knowing I’d become so passionate about it.
I think fear held me back a bit, the idea of people thinking I didn’t know what I was doing as a professional. I actually got pretty bad results in English in my GCSEs (high school graduation exams) and Angloville was not focused on teaching. However, I have managed to teach myself the things I know about grammar and if I explain that sometimes I am not sure how to explain a word or something, my clients are very understanding.
It is happening less and less now though because I am familiar with most of the questions I get asked. My only regret is that I could have jumped in earlier and expanded my network and skills but I am very happy with where I am right now, just from staying curious about my job. I’d also try a bit harder building social media platforms.
My only regret is that I could have jumped in earlier and expanded my network and skills but I am very happy with where I am right now.
Is there anything else that you’d like to share about yourself?
I love networking and collaborating so I’m really happy for people to get in touch! I think that loving to build relationships with people is a huge strength when working in this field. I’m very extraverted so I find that to be a therapeutic process.
Sometimes, I think we can get really lost as independent teachers/coaches, there’s not a lot of centralised networking as it’s such a fragmented industry. I’m a dynamic person so I’m always looking for the next big thing.
And I guess if you are interested in what I do outside of work you can have a summary of my year so far, I’m currently training as a crisis line volunteer, I have published a poetry book, I conducted a research study for my expat coaching programme and decided to go back to university. I am an extremely passionate cook, perhaps obsessive is the word… (I have worked in the past as a chef, but coaching certainly suits me better!) and my current favourite place in the world is Georgia, mostly because of the amazing food!
That all sounds so interesting. I’d love to chat with you further to learn more. Okay, so if others want to connect with you online, how can they do that?
Website: https://williamcookecoaching.com
Email: william [ at ] williamcookecoaching [ dot ] com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Williamcookecoaching/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/william-cooke-5154a119b/
Originally published at https://makealeap.co/ on October 12, 2020.
