Just before Thanksgiving, my husband, best friend, and business partner Byron Van Arsdale passed away from mantle cell lymphoma, a rare and aggressive blood cancer. You’re reading this column today because in 1997 Byron taught me how to conduct virtual meetings over the phone (teleclass).
Under his guidance, I transitioned from Dr. Ross, a university professor and expert, to a coach, columnist, and professional speaker. In 2001, Mark Davison hired me to write for Inman because “you write like a coach.”
I first met Byron when Lou Piatt, president of the John Douglas Company, where I was executive director of training, said to me, “We need to figure out a way to provide training to 60 offices, but we don’t have the budget.”
“I’m dreaming, Lou,” I thought, when Piatt said, “Coach University is broadcasting training over the phone. Go check it out.”
When I learned more about the Coach U model in late 1996, I was excited to enroll in its coach training program. My first experience with Byron was the Coach U teleclass “Challenging” that he was leading.
I was impressed with the level of intimacy, support, and results I saw in his classes. It was far more effective than any face-to-face meeting I’ve ever experienced.
Piatt decided to implement a teleclass/coaching model for agents, so I enrolled in the Teleclass Leader program. It turned out that Byron was the program’s leader and also a former broker owner. We clicked naturally.
What makes Byron’s coaching approach different?
Byron was an Eagle Scout who lived by the principles of Scouting. “Give more than you receive, remain ethical and honest, fully embrace life and enjoy every day.” He not only wrote and trained on these ideas, he practiced them every day.
If anyone needed groceries or needed help around the house, he was happy to help. To our friends, neighbors, and golf buddies, he was “Byron the Baker,” always baking cakes, cookies, and pies to share with everyone.
It’s no surprise that he was a natural coach and mentor. He rejected the experts, gurus, and sports coaching models. Instead, he had a talent for asking insightful questions, listening carefully to his clients, and inspiring others to understand and act on what was possible.
He assumed that his clients were competent, resourceful, and functional, even if the clients themselves did not yet understand it.
These principles shaped both his life and work. His influence extended to senior executives in numerous industries, organizations and continents, both in the private and public sectors. Byron has trained over 2,000 business and professional coaches around the world.
For more than 30 years, his six-principle model for effective leadership in virtual and in-person environments has shaped leadership conversations around the world.
Personally, Byron taught me that happiness comes not from a custom home in Beverly Hills with a new Jag in the garage and designer clothes in the closet, but in serving others, listening to their stories, and giving back for the pure joy of making someone smile.
Byron’s approach to real estate coaching
The two articles and videos below demonstrate how Byron has coached both real estate professionals and senior executives in multiple industries around the world.
In “Are you new to real estate? Focus on these two things,” Byron summarizes the most important things in the coaching process, especially for new agents.
“Training teaches you what to do and how to do it, but coaching focuses on producing high performance. Coaching is about 6 inches between your ears. To be successful, you start by taking small daily action steps so you can talk to people about real estate.”
“Second, ask lots of questions. When you listen carefully to what the other person has to say, you build trust. You begin to understand what’s important to them. This builds trust and allows you to do business with all price ranges and all experience levels.”
After over 25 years of coaching and mentoring, Byron has learned two powerful lessons that almost all coaching clients share and how to remove one of the most common blocks that prevent most people from achieving success.
In 10 Powerful Coaching Strategies to Improve Your Performance in 2023, he says:
“People who seek coaching often end up trying to solve the wrong problem because they focus on the symptoms rather than the cause,” Byron said, likening the situation to whack-a-mole. “The idea here is that if you really understand what the real cause of the challenge is, it’s usually very easy to solve.
“Another common pattern he observed was how often people stop at old stories about who they are and what happened to them. Before clients get too deep into that story, he would often ask, ‘How long have you been working on this challenge?’
If it’s been more than a few years, he’ll tell them: “Okay, your statute of limitations is over. You’ve had enough time to work on this story. It’s time to let it go. Just let it go and don’t worry about it anymore.”
He explained:
“The goal of coaching is to get the client to experience performance. Sometimes you have to be really honest and get to the point. I don’t care why, I don’t care if the client understands what actually happened. What matters is whether you can perform today, in this real estate market, and that’s the bottom line.”
“Byron effect”
One of the most powerful moments at Byron’s Celebration of Life came from our dear friend Yutaka Saito. Mr. Saito served as Japan’s first business coach at Fujitsu. In 2001, Saito spent two months coaching with Byron here in Austin. Currently, Saito’s company has 50 coaches who provide services to large Japanese companies, including Honda.
In the following video, Mr. Saito talked about how Byron changed his life and coined the term “Byron effect.” Mr. Saito then talked about Byron, a life-changing conversation he had with a former client, and the best advice Byron gave him about having a happy marriage.
Until Saito dubbed it “The Byron Effect,” I had never thought about how much influence Byron really had, not only because of his coaching, his training, and the book we wrote together, but also because I was hired by Inman because I wrote like a coach.
The “Byron Effect” for you and your business
The true impact of your work is rarely seen at the closing table. Instead, it reverberates through the years as clients live their lives and create cherished memories. Your work matters, and its impact will matter longer and longer than you think.
Disentangling “we” into “me”
Byron taught me what it means to “hold space” for others, not only in coaching and business, but most importantly, in our marriage. I never would have been able to do what I do without him quietly handling many of the logistics of our daily life. Every day he told me how much he loved me, tried to make me laugh, and always reminded me that we were better together.
There is no cure for mantle cell lymphoma, only the possibility of remission. Byron last walked on September 2, 2025. I heard that if Byron spends every day in bed, he will need five days of rehabilitation to regain his strength. It will take more than 400 days and we don’t know if he will ever be able to walk again. It wasn’t the life either of us wanted.
Disentangling “we” into “me” is the hardest thing I’ve ever experienced in my life. With his death, I lost the love of my life, my best friend and life partner, but he also gave me the rest of my life back and the responsibility to live it as fully and happily as possible.
