This is the second of a three-part series on winners of the 2014 Bluffton Center for Entrepreneurs Ropp Triplett Business Plan Competition. Kathy Burrus is the second place winner. She receives $1,000 in business start up costs from BCE. For more information about the annual competition contact: [email protected].

Kathy Burrus of rural Pandora is a professional life and relationship coach.

She didn’t plan her career that way, when she grew up in the Texas Panhandle. Instead, she attended college with aspirations of directing choirs.

In 1992 she and her husband and their family moved to Pandora, where she became a pastor’s wife.

“I’ve always loved to talk with people and hear their stories,” she said. “In 2004, I started to research personal coaching. Then in 2010 I started course work.”

In 2011 she founded her private practice, Green Hope Coaching, after receiving certification from World Coach Institute. “Green Hope Coaching exists to influence people to intentionally design hope,” she says.

Today she is certified as a:
• professional coach,
• professional life coach,
• professional relationship coach, and
• professional bereavement coach.

Coaching takes place in her home at 6442 Putnam Road R, Pandora, or in a neutral setting, like a coffee shop or library.

She describes life coaching as someone who takes you from where you are now and helps you go forward. Counseling, on the other hand, according to Burrus, looks back at the past to find healing.

Her primary clients are “women in transition,” as her explains it, saying clients may approach her with this statement: “I need someone to help me think this through.”

While most often a woman initiates the call for direction, that call often results in couples coaching, says Burrus.

“We usually take one or two sessions to identify what might be the next step. After three to six sessions we usually come to a good formation on what the person being coached needs to deal with,” she said.

Information shared is confidential. It sometimes involves e-mailing back and forth from coach to client. Burrus says she has also accomplished coaching via Skype and by talking on the phone. Her clients are primarily in the four-county area of Putnam, Allen, Hardin and Hancock. However, she has coached persons in Spain, Japan and South America.

As she moves forward in her career she plans to write books on coaching. She is currently available to speak on a variety of topics related to life, love and loss.

For more information:
Kathy Burrus
Green Hope Coaching
6442 Putnam Road R
Columbus Grove, OH 45830
Phone: 419-306-8311
E-mail: [email protected]
Web: www.greenhopcoaching.com