Ask a business owner why they pay for a coach and most will say some version of "accountability" or "an outside perspective." Ask them how many times that coach has actually disagreed with them in the last six months, and the honest answer is often none. A widely cited meta-analysis of feedback research found that a large share of feedback given in professional settings - roughly a third by some estimates - is vague, comfortable, and does nothing to change behaviour, or actively makes performance worse. Coaching is not exempt from that pattern. A coach who agrees with everything you say is not building your confidence. They are billing you for company.

If you have searched "is a business coach worth it" or "what does a business coach do" to land here, this is the test that actually answers the question: not their qualifications, not their client list, but whether they have ever told you something you did not want to hear.

Most coaching relationships drift toward agreement, not because coaches are dishonest, but because disagreement is uncomfortable for both sides and validation is easier to sell. A coach who challenges a client risks the relationship; a coach who nods along keeps the retainer. Over time, that incentive quietly reshapes the entire engagement into something closer to expensive company than genuine coaching.

The named enemy here is not a bad coach in the obvious sense - most are well-intentioned. It is a coaching dynamic that has slid, session by session, from "tell me the truth" to "tell me I'm doing fine," without either party noticing the moment it happened. By the time an owner notices, they have often been paying for reassurance for a year or more, mistaking a pleasant hour for a productive one.

There is a simple way to find out whether this has happened to you. It is called the Pushback Test, and it takes about five minutes to run honestly.

1. Recall your last three sessions. Write down one thing your coach disagreed with you about, or told you plainly you were wrong about, in each.

2. Notice whether the disagreement was strategic or cosmetic. Pushback on a font choice does not count. Pushback on a decision that actually mattered to your business does.

3. Ask your coach directly. "What is something I am doing right now that you think is a mistake?" Their answer, and how fast it comes, tells you more than a year of testimonials.

4. If the answer is nothing, treat that as the finding, not the reassurance. No genuine coaching relationship produces zero disagreement over months of real decisions.

"Kevin has been a game changer for us. I had tried a couple of high-profile US entrepreneur programs but found these just talked about 'mindset', whereas Kevin gives practical advice to grow your business that you can implement immediately."

- Brett Abeille

Most owners who sense their coach has become a yes-man do not switch, because switching feels like admitting the last engagement failed, and because a coach who agrees with you is, in the short term, a genuinely pleasant experience. The real obstacle is that comfort and growth pull in opposite directions, and only one of them feels good in the room.

This is precisely the standard I hold myself to with every client, because it is the standard I was held to across forty years and nine companies: the advice that made money was rarely the advice that felt comfortable to hear first. Every one of those companies had at least one moment where the right call felt wrong in the room, and the coaches or partners who said nothing were no help at all in that moment.

If the last time your coach told you something you didn't want to hear is too long ago to remember, that's worth a conversation.