Why a personal coach could be right for you

'Coaching Palma' founder explains how personal coaching can help unlock your potential

Sabrina Sassi

Sabrina Sassi is a multilingual, professionally certified coach and founder of Coaching Palma. Since 2012, she has worked with individuals, groups and businesses, and recently opened a new office on Avenida Jaime III. “We are living in a world where people don’t listen, and it’s getting worse, she says.

“We go through our day, processing a million things, events, experiences and then go to bed with all this running through our brain. It’s rare to take a moment and sort out what is going on and to reflect on what we want, where we want to be going, or set any goals.”

Raised in a small town near Bruges, in Belgium, Sassi first came to Mallorca just out of university to work as an account rep for Thomas Cook. She was sent by the company twice and stayed on, later taking a job with the International Yoga Centre in Palma, when a chance encounter with a personal coach made her take notice. Having a natural passion for trying to understand people and a personality for wanting to help resolve conflict, she knew that this would be an ideal career for her.

When she first launched her own business 6 years ago, the first year was very difficult, she admits. It was hard to get people to understand exactly what she was doing and so held small events, breakfasts, discussions to generate interest.

Many people think personal coaching might be like a psychiatrist session but it has nothing to do with Freudian analysis or circular talks about the past. Coaching is an active, forward thinking process in which the client is eager to take the lead. “As a coach, you need to know when to push and when to stand back and let the client talk through ideas,” says Sassi, whose philosophy is very much tapping into one’s personality and being confident, an inspiration and true to yourself. “If you want to change your life, job, house, husband, the person needs to understand what needs to be changed and I am there to help motivate that change.”

Clients may include professionals wanting to make the next step in their career, managers interested in learning new communication techniques to create a better and more productive work dynamic or recruit the right people, new mothers who are looking to get back into the workplace, creative people wanting to start their own business, or someone looking for guidance before a big life change. Sassi is clear about her role as a coach, “I am not Mary Poppins. I don’t have solutions. Clients are there for themselves and together we build a strategy that works.” More and more, Sassi works with companies and small businesses, offering on-site team building techniques and helping colleagues connect and communicate to better work relationships and results. This is something she would like to develop more of in the future.

Sassi offers this advice to someone who might be thinking of seeing a coach or looking for guidance during a big change: “It’s important to remember that it is not about how good you are it’s about how good you want to be, and if you have that hunger, coaching is great for you. You’ve got to be hungry for change and willing to be the engine to make it happen.”

Photos by Sara Savage

Address details

Coaching Palma

Av. Jaume III, 17-1º, Palma