Quickcast: Coaching vs Mentorship

In this quickcast, I’ll explain the difference between coaching and mentorship, and why it matters for our approach as mentors.

**Coaching** is about helping people execute a model or strategy with precision and skill. Coaches focus on **tactics**, removing roadblocks and obstacles, and ensuring the client is doing the right thing at the right time. A good coach can execute a proven strategy or model with **virtuosity**, ensuring clients make faster progress without wasting time.

On the other hand, **mentorship** is about **strategic guidance** and **long-term planning**. Mentors help clients navigate the journey ahead, providing insights into broader concepts, building a path forward, and helping clients avoid common mistakes. While a mentor might help clients with high-level decisions, they don't get involved in every detail of execution. They focus on the **big picture**, helping clients avoid blind spots, and offering connections and resources to fill in the gaps.

In our current model, we’re not in the mentorship business, we’re in the **coaching** business. Our job is to help gym owners **apply** the model we’ve developed to grow their gyms effectively. The toolkit we provide has been tested and refined through years of work, and it’s our job to **help clients follow it precisely**.

That means, as mentors, we **don’t create new models** or **explore untested strategies**. Instead, we deliver the **proven, step-by-step actions** within our toolkit, and we help clients execute with **speed** and **precision**.

**So, when a mentor comes across a new idea or strategy (like from Tinker, other podcasts, or books), they should be very cautious about introducing it to a client without evidence that it’s been tested and refined in the field.** For example, the “Bring a Friend Day” is a proven strategy that works. We don’t need to reinvent it—introducing a “Bring a Friend Week” may sound interesting, but there’s no evidence that it’s more effective. Instead, it just adds complexity.

This is where we need to shift the focus: it’s not about introducing new ideas, it’s about helping clients execute **what already works** in a way that delivers consistent and predictable outcomes.

Ultimately, the most important thing we can do as mentors is to **stop reinventing the wheel** and focus on refining and applying the model we’ve already established.

Remember, **we are coaches, not mentors.** Our job is to help clients apply a proven model, **not invent new ones**. Stick to the toolkit, deliver it with precision, and get clients the results they’ve invested in.