My name is Viv and I’ve been in the music industry for more than 25 years in various capacities. I’ve been a touring publicist, worked at a label, worked on awards events and worked in music television. In 2005, after years of flogging myself as a festival and touring publicist, I realised I was totally burnt out. My physical and emotional resources were so limited that I had to completely re-thin
k the way I was working. After some recovery time, I thought of ways to diversify my offerings. One was to become a comms coach, to help music artists communicate their story. Being in a ‘helping’ profession had always appealed to me too, so I decided to re-train and went back to study to become a personal coach. I chose to focus my coaching practice on the industry I know and love, and set up Next Act Coaching to work with people on all sides of our music community, artists and the people that work with artists – managers, agents, publicists, publishers, agents and so on. I’ve seen both the upside and the pitfalls of work in this industry and have experienced many of them myself. As a coach, I aim to help people ditch their limiting beliefs and patterns and help clarify and prioritise what’s important to you. I don’t need to tell you there are a lot of unique challenges in the music industry. They include:
*Legacy fears around charging what we are worth.
*The belief that we’re lucky to have our place in the music business and should settle for that.
*The personal things that can negatively impact the way we work professionally like:
Not being able to disarm the voice of the inner critic. Endless comparing and worrying about what others think. Perfectionism and procrastination. Feeling like an imposter in the music industry. Poor time-management. Poor resilience (will be more important than ever during and post CoVid19)
Lack of clarity on personal values and strengths. Lack of self care, exhaustion and so on. Anyone who is ready to make positive changes in their life and is open to the discomfort that can come with self-reflection, will benefit from coaching. It’s both future and goal focused. With me you won’t spend too much time dwelling on the past, as coaching is about moving forward. It’s a positive process but one you definitely have to commit to and be ready for.
