This episode of Becoming a Health Coach features a discussion between host Megan McCrory and guest Danna Levy Hoffmann. They discuss the reasons behind Danna's choice to become a health coach and her journey through the Institute for Integrative Nutrition's certification programs. Danna shares her insights on how the program provided a foundation in coaching and business skills alongside her pre-existing knowledge of holistic health. Both Megan and Danna also reflect on the changing structure of the courses and the importance of picking more specific topics for further education. They conclude the discussion with some advice for prospective students, highlighting affordability, flexibility, and focused learning depending on an individual's background and expertise.
Guest: Danna Levy Hoffmann
0:00 What standout features or aspects of the certification program did you find particularly beneficial?
00:00 Introduction and Background
00:39 Standout features you found beneficial
02:14 Reflections on the Coaching Journey and Future Directions
Mentioned in this episode:
Are you So Frickin' Healthy?
Check out the other podcast I co-host with Danna Levy Hoffmann from Organilicious.ch. We are both IIN Health Coaching graduates who got together for our love to talk about all things health related.
We have some serious guest experts but we always make them laugh while we learn something new.
Click the link to listen to the latest episode.
Megan J. McCrory: Hello, and welcome to a series of short bonus episodes of Becoming a Health Coach.
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I'm your host, Megan McCrory and in these bonus episodes, I'm talking with fellow health coach and my friend, Danna Levy Hoffmann.
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Oh,
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this is why along so well.
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Okay, so before we move on, uh, the last thing I wanna talk about in the certification program is more specifically, what were kind of the standout features for you or the aspects of the program you took from IIN, um, that you found particularly beneficial?
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Now, looking back.
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Danna Levy Hoffmann: Yeah, so look, so I did the IIN and, and you did something similar.
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So I did the, um, the basic
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IIN
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Megan J. McCrory: called the Health Training Program is what they call it.
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Danna Levy Hoffmann: There you go.
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That's the one.
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And then I continued on
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to gut health.
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So that was to me a lot more, educational, I could say.
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I mean, again, because I came with a lot of knowledge and I've already, you know, I used to, for fun research, I have a huge book, huge, huge, huge book that I probably know by heart where I would just look through like, you know, natural remedies and acupuncture and acupressure and like, everything kind of more holistic health.
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So coming into the, IIN coaching program I came with a lot of knowledge.
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I didn't have to even put too much time or effort into it.
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I felt, I was like, okay, cool.
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This is, this is more for me to learn the art of coaching
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rather than like the education and, and delivery is rather like, okay, how do I, how do I pass this down to people?
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How do I make sure that I have a business running and stuff like that?
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Um, I then had the option, the opportunity to continue my education with IIN and, uh, chose the gut health.
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And the reason I chose gut health was because my own gut health, and my
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family's gut health was shite.
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So that was really, again, uh, not a very educated, uh, reason, but that was a big reason for me.
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I'm still very much in that world.
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It's still very, very important
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to me.
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And so I think that was the, the reason why I went In that direction.
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Um, during the first initial year of IIN did realize, which, which I had a love-hate relationship with, to be honest.
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I realized that their courses, It was like one week we're talking about a vegan diet and the next week we're talking about the ketogenic diet.
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Right?
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And the next week we're talking about, I don't know, another, something, right?
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And I felt like, ugh, if, if someone hasn't gone through the this process before, I.
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Trying out different diets, educating a little bit more about the diets, like having a little bit more knowledge.
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I felt like these people could, are probably like every single week that we're covering a different topic, they're doing a different diet, you know, so I felt like it might be a little bit overwhelming for others who are not really still in that realm.
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They're just like, oh, health, that sounds good, you know, it's affordable.
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Let's, let's just do this.
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but I don't know if that's true.
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Megan J. McCrory: Well.
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Danna Levy Hoffmann: that was just my, my initial feeling.
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Megan J. McCrory: interesting that you say that because since we've left, uh, shortly after our 2018 course, they actually introduced a, a a half year course.
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So they shoved the whole year content into a half year.
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And so people could do this accelerated, like the very first person who was uh, that took a course based off my referral link 'cause we chatted.
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'cause I like to chat to people 'cause they often, they
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email me and ask me like, really?
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Is it really good?
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And I, you know, and give them an opportunity to talk about it.
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But this guy
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took the course and he's like, yeah, I'm gonna take the accelerated course.
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I'm just like, holy yeah, holy crap.
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Because I'm with you.
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I felt like I did learn a lot.
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I think I probably wasn't as into a lot of the natural remedies as much as you had already been.
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Um, but I feel like that's
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an important point because a lot of the pushback that I see about IIN online is that it doesn't really provide you with a solid.
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Um, health background and
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Danna Levy Hoffmann: Yeah.
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Megan J. McCrory: and I feel like it depends, it always depends on the person's background that's coming into it.
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Right?
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So for me,
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and like for you, I felt the biggest part that I got out of that was the aspect of how to coach someone.
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And
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even that is very nuanced.
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And when they do it in the
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program, it is like, Hey, these are the questions.
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This is how you should
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let people have space and listen.
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And you know, I think, I think the basics of coaching are there.
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And when you get out, then I feel then you, you have the knowledge of what you don't know and all the other coaching styles.
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And like co-active coaching was really interesting for me afterwards,
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and I bought a book on this and met people who have done just co-active coaching.
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So I think when someone is thinking about becoming any kind of coach, it's really like, okay.
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Do you, are you a subject matter expert already and you just need to know how to coach?
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Then maybe you just need a platform that's just teaching you how to coach and the content that
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which your background, you don't need to know.
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But I feel like IIN tried to do both, you know?
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And for some people,
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for some people they didn't do it well enough for what they expected.
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So I feel like it's
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you wanna be a nutritionist then you, maybe you should go to university and be a nutritionist if that's what you really want to do,
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right?
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Danna Levy Hoffmann: Yes.
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Megan J. McCrory: And or a
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dietician.
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And if you wanna be a coach and you know, but I feel like IIN is somewhere in between there, giving you a big overall view of, of alternative and natural health and also other, you know, everything.
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And also
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helping you learn how to coach.
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And also this is how you start coaching, like the business side, you know, forms
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things that you need.
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Danna Levy Hoffmann: right.
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And they're also relatively affordable.
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I mean, like of course no one wants to spend a good 3000 bucks on anything in one chunk, but most of the coaching programs out there are much more expensive.
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So I think, you know, and, and just like you, a lot of people come up to me and they're like, you know, we're interested in this and we're interested in that.
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We saw that you did this program and that program.
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And they, and, and I always insist also on going on a call with them because I think that I do need to clarify this.
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Yes, IIN is a great jumping board, but you know, you want to make sure that that's not At the beginning and the end, but rather like, this is my introduction and now I need to really focus down on
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Right
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what, what did I collect from this program and how do I wanna proceed?
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Because I don't think that from just doing IIN um, just the initial program, let's say.
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I don't think that I, I, I I really, truly, honestly believe that it might confuse you more than than, you know, like ground you.
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So it's, it's just something that is a great beginning kind of, and I think that's probably their, their, um, hope and their you know, way of selling is also like, okay, great.
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We gave you all the basics.
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Now what was, what, what, you know, tickled you, what did you want to hear more about?
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We have these
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programs.
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Did you wanna know about more about hormones?
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Here's a whole six months.
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And those programs are a lot more.
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Full on
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than the initial program.
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So you have to understand also that if you go through the IIN, um, initial program and then you jump into another kind of more, you know, full on one, you're gonna spend a lot more time, you're gonna, you know, learn a lot more.
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So I think those have a lot more
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value to them.
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And in terms of the coaching, and I, I agree.
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They give, they give you like a, I don't know if they still do it, they even give, give you a chance to like use their platform to have a free website for
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the first
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I don't know if they still do that
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or
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Danna Levy Hoffmann: months or a year.
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Yeah,
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I wonder.
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But uh, but that was really not, I mean, I didn't need it, but that was, I thought was really nice to give people this chance of like, look, you don't have to invest in a website
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at the beginning, just here.
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Here's what we can provide for you.
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Give it a try, see how you're doing, and then move forward if you feel that this was the right step for you.
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So I did appreciate that as well.
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I think that is a very, um, So it's a really nice, kind of a, a bonus to get through
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the school.
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So Yeah.
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with the IIN think it was very kind of specific for me it was more finances.
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It was more like, let's just get, um, you know, a plaque on my wall that says I, I finish this program and, and then I, I do have certain knowledge that I anyways had and then, you know, let me just get more education with the, with the gut health course, which I really enjoyed.
