How to Run a Coaching Session (Even If You’re New)

Last updated: November 2026

To run a coaching session, have your client fill out a short pre-call form before every call, start with what they want to talk about this week, and spend most of the session asking questions that take them below the surface. Then close by agreeing on 1 to 3 assignments together, and check them on next week’s form. That’s the whole structure.

I’ve trained more than 4,000 coaches, and “what if I don’t know what to ask?” is one of the fears that keeps new coaches from ever selling their first program. Here’s how I actually run my sessions, so you can stop worrying about it.

Key takeaways

• A pre-call form does half the work: last week’s assignments, last week’s challenges, and what they want to talk about this week.
• No fixed curriculum. Every 1:1 session follows the client, inside one end goal you’re working toward over six months.
• When you’re stuck, ask “What else?”, “Tell me more about that,” or “You just said X. What do you mean by that?”
• Ask more than you tell. When it’s their idea, they follow through.
• End with 1 to 3 assignments you agree on together. Nobody wants to pay for an easy coach.

How do you run a coaching session step by step?

Every time you run a coaching session, it has three parts: a pre-call form before the call, a conversation driven by your questions during the call, and 1 to 3 agreed assignments at the end. The structure stays the same every week. What changes is what the client brings to it.

Here’s what a 45-minute weekly session looks like for me:

Part	When	What happens
Pre-call form	Before the call	The client answers four to six short questions: last week’s assignments, last week’s challenges, what they want to talk about this week.
Check-in	First few minutes	You go through the form. Did they do the assignments? What got in the way?
Go deeper	Most of the call	You ask questions about what they want to work on, and keep going below the first answer.
Assignments	Last few minutes	You agree on 1 to 3 assignments together. Not ten. One good step in the right direction.
Accountability	Next week	The assignments show up on the next pre-call form, and the cycle starts again.

There’s no “week one we cover this, week two we cover that.” Every week is a choose-your-own-journey for the client. You do have an end goal you’re working toward over the six months, and together you choose the route to it one session at a time. If you’re still building the program itself, start with how to create a coaching program.

What should happen before a coaching session?

Before you run a coaching session, your client should send you a pre-call form. Mine has about four to six questions. I keep a few of them for my clients, but here are the three that matter most:

1. What were your assignments last week?
2. What challenges did you have last week?
3. What do you want to talk about this week?

Write these down. They’re gold.

The form does two things. First, it tells you where to start, so you never open a call with “So… what’s going on?” Second, it puts the client in charge of their own progress. They have to look at what they said they’d do and whether they did it before they ever see your face.

The third question is the one new coaches underestimate. People’s lives change a lot in seven days. Say a client hires you to help her build a sales team for her growing business, and for weeks that’s all you work on. Then one week you ask what she wants to talk about, and it’s her marriage. If you were running a fixed curriculum, you’d miss the most important thing going on in her life.

What questions should you ask in a coaching session?

The best coaching questions are simple. Most of my sessions run on three of them:

1. “What else?” Most people stop at the first answer. “What else?” gets them to the second and third, which is usually where the real issue is.
2. “Tell me more about that.” Not even a question, but it works like one. Someone says they got anxiety when they went to work. “Tell me more about that.”
3. “You just said X. What do you mean by that?” This one stops you from assuming. If I asked everybody reading this what anxiety looks like for them, I’d get a different answer from each person. “Nervous,” “stuck” and “overwhelmed” mean something different to every client.

Then listen for the words people keep using. I always have a pen and paper next to me on a call. If a client says, “I feel like I’m trapped,” I write down “trapped” and put a tick mark next to it every time they say it again. The longer someone talks, the deeper they usually go, and the closer they get to the truth.

So after the third tick mark I’ll say something like: “You’ve said you feel trapped three times now on this call. What exactly do you mean by that?” They describe it. Then the next level: “Okay. Are you actually trapped, or is that something you’re telling yourself?”

That’s the pattern. Level one question, level two question, level three. Most people live at the surface. Your job as a coach is to go a little bit under it.

What if you don’t know what to ask in a coaching session?

If you don’t know what to ask, ask “What else?” It’s my favorite question for exactly this moment, because the client almost always has more to say, and while they say it, you’ll find your next question.

Honestly, you’ll rarely get lost on a coaching call. Coaching is way more natural than new coaches think. If you’re a human who has ever had a real conversation with a friend going through something hard, you’ve already done a version of this. You listened, you asked what happened, you asked how they felt about it. People have probably been calling you for years when they’re going through stuff. You were coaching for free.

The fear of freezing is usually the same fear that shows up before your first sales call, and it goes away the same way: by doing it. You’re going to be a little clunky at first. That’s fine. I went full-time as a coach at the end of 2015, and I’m a far better coach today than I was then. But if I had never started, I would have never gotten better.

Should a coach give advice or ask questions?

A coach should ask more than tell. You’ll give value and guidance, and that’s part of the job. But your main job is to help the client come to their own realizations.

I’ve been coaching long enough that most of the time I already know what the person should do. I still try to ask questions that get them to that answer, for two reasons:

• They think it’s their idea, so they follow through. Advice you hand someone is easy to ignore. A decision they made out loud is much harder to walk away from.
• They remember it. When someone has to work their way to an answer, it sticks with them far longer than something they were told.

That doesn’t mean you never say what you see. It means you lead with questions, and you share your read when the questions have done their work.

How do you end a coaching session?

End every coaching session by agreeing on 1 to 3 assignments together. Don’t give ten things. You want the client to take one good step in the right direction each week, and you want them to actually finish it.

Build the assignments with them, not for them. Ask what they think the next step is. Same reason as above: if they came up with it, they’re more likely to do it.

Those assignments then go on next week’s pre-call form under “What were your assignments last week?” That’s how accountability gets built into every session without you chasing anybody. And accountability may be the number one thing you give your clients.

How do you hold a coaching client accountable without being harsh?

You hold clients accountable by asking about their assignments every single week and asking tougher questions than they hear from anyone else in their life. Nobody wants to pay for an easy coach. They want insight, and they want somebody who’ll hold their feet to the fire.

I have great relationships with my clients, but I’m not trying to be their buddy. I think of it as tough uncle energy. I had a tough uncle, a tough cousin and a tough grandma growing up, and I think that’s where a lot of my directness comes from. The right client hears a hard question and thinks, “Oof, he’s challenging me a little bit. I think I need this.”

The same frame works on enrollment calls, where I say I’m friendly, but I’m not friends. I break that down in how to build confidence in sales as a coach.

And sometimes, even with all of that, a client won’t do the work. My second mentor, Jeff, used to say, “You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make it drink.” Your job is to help as much as you possibly can. Whether they drink is their decision.

How long should a coaching session be?

Coaching sessions usually work best at 30, 45 or 60 minutes, once a week. Pick the length that feels right for you and your clients and keep it consistent, for example every Tuesday at 10am for 45 minutes.

Do them on Zoom, not on the phone. On video you can see their face and their body language, and you can tell they’re sitting down and present with you. On a phone call, you never know what’s going on.

Can you use AI to get better at coaching sessions?

Use AI to coach you, not to coach your clients. Tools like ChatGPT tend to agree with people too much, and a coach’s job is to get someone out of where they are, not to tell them they’re right.

Where AI is useful is after the session. If you record on Zoom, take the transcript and ask something like: “This is my client. Here’s what she’s dealing with. What patterns are you noticing? What might I have missed that could help me on our next call?” It’s good at spotting patterns, and sometimes it notices things you didn’t. Think of it as a brainstorming friend.

How does running good sessions help you sign more clients?

Getting better at coaching sessions makes you better at sales, and getting better at sales makes you a better coach. They’re almost the same skill: you ask good questions, you listen for what’s really going on, and you help someone make a decision. The only difference is that on an enrollment call, you also ask them to work with you.

So if the fear of “what would I even do on the calls?” has been keeping you from selling, let it go. The structure is simple, the questions are simple, and you’ll get better every week you do it. If you’re earlier in the process, start with the full guide on how to start a coaching business, then go get your first coaching client. You don’t need a certification to do any of this, either. Here’s why.

Here’s your move: write your pre-call form today with those three questions, and put “What else?” on a sticky note next to your screen for your next call.

If you want help building your offer and a plan to fill your calendar, join my free 2-day live workshop, where I walk through the exact system 4,000+ coaches use to sign clients consistently.

Frequently Asked Questions

How do you structure a coaching session?

Have the client fill out a short pre-call form before every session, open with what they want to talk about this week, spend most of the call asking questions that take them deeper, and close by agreeing on 1 to 3 assignments together. Those assignments go on next week’s form.

What questions should a coach ask in a session?

Three simple ones carry most sessions: “What else?”, “Tell me more about that,” and “You just said X. What do you mean by that?” They get people past the surface answer and stop you from assuming you know what a word means to them.

What if I don’t know what to ask in a coaching session?

Ask “What else?” Most people don’t go as deep as they could on the first answer, so that one question usually opens the next layer. You rarely get lost on a coaching call if you keep listening and keep asking.

How long should a coaching session be?

Weekly sessions of 30, 45 or 60 minutes work well. Pick one length and keep it the same every week. Do them on Zoom so you can see the client’s face and body language.

Should a coach give advice or ask questions?

Mostly ask. You can give value and guidance, but when the client comes to the answer on their own, it feels like their idea, so they’re more likely to follow through and to remember it.