Entrepreneur Gisela Kolodziej does not want to accept this – and with coaching and vision workshops contribute the decisive step that everyone achieves their goals. She herself is the best example of this.
The 180-degree turnaround in Gisela Kolodziej’s life began with a striking advertising slogan that she yelled at from a magazine while she was reading it at the airport: “Are you the person you would like to meet yourself?” The question triggered her from the very first moment – and didn’t let go of her in the coming days, weeks and months. Sure, at first glance her answer was: “Absolutely”. At the time, Gisela was a successful young woman, pretty, athletic and slim. She had made a career as the right and left hand of numerous top managers and board members at Audi AG – one of the best addresses for premium vehicles in the world. You can hardly get any higher in Germany.
Dancing as an expression of personal freedom
Gisela felt a deep change in herself. She realized that something crucial was missing in her life and that new goals were waiting for her. Perhaps at that moment a circle was even closed that had opened up in her youth: Gisela has been passionate about sports since childhood, especially the high-performance sport of dancing, which appeals to her as an opportunity to live out her personal freedom. Now a new “high-performance sport” has been added: coaching. Surprising at first glance, at second glance sport and coaching have a lot in common. On the one hand, coaching originally comes from top-class sport. On the other hand, coaching, like sports, is about honing your own strengths and getting the most out of your abilities
During this period of mental upheaval, Gisela’s entrepreneurial spirit came to the fore. She did not want to stagnate at a high level, she strove for a new task.
A “new Gisela” appeared in her. One who wanted to imitate her childhood idol Walt Disney. The ingenious animator once said: “All dreams can come true if we have the courage to follow them.” Taking courage, working out a vision clearly and then doing everything every day to make the vision a reality – that’s the one thing Life story of Gisela. And on the other hand the core of her business model as an entrepreneur. “Gisela.Berlin” is the name of the company – which in the branding connects the first name of the entrepreneur with one of the most dynamic economic metropolises in Europe. In the German capital, new ideas are born every day, the start-up culture here is unparalleled anywhere in Germany, a hotbed of creativity.
She wants to help turn dreams into action
If Executive Vision Coach Gisela wants to make her contribution today so that as many of these dreams as possible come true. In Berlin and elsewhere in Germany. She says about herself: “I am the person who believes that everyone has dreams in life. I would like to activate and define them again – and thus help people, but also teams and companies to turn their dreams into action.
She deliberately raises the bar for goals for herself and her participants in workshops or particularly intensive one-on-one coaching. Gisela: “I love setting particularly ambitious goals and constantly challenging myself and clearly pursuing my vision – every single day. What you can imagine can also really come true.”
A simple tool helps her and her clients: the vision board. In short, it is about recording your own wishes, goals and visions and, above all, visualizing them in the form of pictures and collages. So that the ideas and visions don’t fizzle out like in many brainstorming sessions, but are recorded and visualized. And so that you can use it as a guide when making progress, always as a motivation to go the next extra mile in implementation.
Visualizing visions helps to achieve them
Gisela is familiar with the advantages of the vision board from her time at Audi: “I myself worked in a highly efficient high-performance team and was able to experience the great power the vision board can have if you as a team dedicate a few hours to the Reflection as well as manifestation decreases.” For a team it is central that everyone in the team pursues the same vision. Open-ended questions are asked to define the goal. Questions such as: “What has to happen that the year is just awesome at the end of the year?” Or: “What
is it still necessary?” And: “Which model customers would I like to work with in the future?” and “What cash flow do we want to generate?”
The decisive advantage of a vision board is manifesting. Practically the “burning” of visions into one’s own way of acting and one’s own thinking. Gisela sees three important stages here: first, the thoughts. She always has a “journal” with her to record every important thought. In her opinion, heart and hand are closely related. Secondly, according to her, no one should underestimate the power of words: The right keywords trigger something, create vibrations and, formulated as goals, are anchors for personal and professional advancement. This is followed by the third, probably the most important step: the plot. Gisela keeps observing: “Unfortunately, this is exactly where a lot of people stop and get stuck. It is so important to define concrete to-do’s with a concrete timeline at the end of the day, so that goals don’t just remain dreams, but are translated into action.”
Creativity only emerges in the right context
Especially when a team lacks the creativity and motivation to push a project forward, a tool like the vision board can be an additional source of inspiration. Many teams are currently groaning under the ongoing crises, under the stressful day-to-day business, ever tighter deadlines and stricter requirements from the C-Level. In this environment, being creative and visionary at the push of a button is understandably not easy for many. This is exactly where the Vision Board and coach Gisela can work wonders.
The positive “mentality monster” is convinced: “You can only make real progress if you set goals outside of your own comfort zone. These goals are particularly demanding and are therefore referred to as stretch goals.” Gisela also had to stretch, find and reinvent herself after leaving her comfort zone – but she has not regretted the step to this day.