To Coach or Not to Coach – chris lonsdale

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January 2005

To Coach or Not to Coach

To Coach or Not to Coach A What’s it all about? few months back I was speaking with the Asia Area managing director of a pretty serious engineering multi-national. Executive or Life Coaching, put in its simplest He had just come back from a conference, form, is a relationship between you and another and was somewhat amazed by the fact that person, focused on helping you to get better many of the senior leaders he talked to all had in some way. That’s it. Who you work with, executive or life coaches. It came as quite a and what you work on, depend on the goals surprise to him. that you have for yourself, and the skill set of the person who is supporting you. Ten years ago, especially in Asia, nobody had even heard of “Executive coaching” or “life Some coaches, for instance, will support you coaching”. Today it is all the rage. Apparently, in a very narrow area of your life. They may many of the senior executives at this particular have expertise in image, or fitness, or some conference were comparing notes about their other specific domain. You work with this sort coaches, just as they might have done about of coach when you are focused on just one their cars a few years back. area. You are really clear about where your gaps are, and want detailed input for filling Given the growing awareness, popularity even, those gaps. You want to hit golf balls better, of having a coach you may well have so you get a golf coach. You want to project considered getting one yourself. It’s quite likely your voice better, so you get a voice coach. that someone – a colleague or a friend perhaps – has suggested you should get a coach. Or, Of course, it’s not always that simple. As an you may have taken the jump already. example, if you want to project your voice better you may need to work on a number of If you’re thinking about getting a coach, but things – releasing tension in your body, learning haven’t yet decided what you’re doing about to articulate words better, increasing your level it, there will be questions you are asking yourself of confidence, learning to look people in the about the whole coaching process. Why do eye. That’s where you need a more multi- you even need a coach in the first place? What, dimensional coach; someone who can address exactly, does a coach do? What can you a range of issues and topics. I call these people expect from the relationship? multi-dimensional specialists.

To Coach or Not to Coach

Coaches who are truly multi-dimensional Generative specialists will have spent many years going very deep into a range of different knowledge You don’t need to be in trouble in your life in areas. They will almost certainly have expertise order to get a coach. Being strong, effective, in communication and relationships, because and on top of the world is a great place from without this you really can’t be a life coach or which to launch yourself on the next phase executive coach. A committed life coach will of your own development. It’s much better to also have personal experience working with do it from there than waiting until you are in a range of tools and techniques for self- the depths of depression. advancement. They will understand self management, thinking styles, learning styles, You take on a generative coaching process health, and fitness, among other things. They when you sense you are coming to an inflection will also have skills for creating change, on a point in your life. This is a point where you personal level and frequently on a group level. have the opportunity to move to a whole new Training in various psychological disciplines level, or the choice to stay on a plateau upon is an added bonus. which you may rest for years. If you decide to explore the possibilities beyond where you In addition you would expect a range of more are now, then generative coaching can help technical skills and experience, all of which you on that journey. can be brought to bear in helping you achieve your goals. Some, for instance, will have deep When you want a generative approach to experience in business or organizational coaching, you know that it’s time to refocus dynamics; others will be great at marketing, your life. You have gone as far as you can others will have a sporting background; while with your old approach. You want to try others will have backgrounds in different something new; something different. You enter industry areas such as banking, or the coaching process with a powerful intent. manufacturing, or distribution, or government, Quite simply, you desire to restructure things or the arts, etc. in a way that will open up new possibilities in your life.

Why Coaching? In the generative coaching process you need to reconnect with your core aspirations – your Before you start thinking about what sort of reason for being alive – and then align yourself coach you want, maybe it’s useful to think with that. This requires deep introspection, through the case for coaching. Why on earth and frequently a “skill reset”. By skill reset, I do you need a coach in the first place? mean that you will need to evaluate the skills Fundamentally, there are two major reasons. that have helped you get to where you are There’s the remedial reason, and there’s the now. Often they are not the skills that will take generative reason. you to the next stage. Often, you will need to master an entirely new body of knowledge,

To Coach or Not to Coach

and skills that are quite different to those you The company he worked for had a very strong have been using. You go back to the bottom “up or out” culture, which was putting him of the hill, and start all over again. under increasing pressure to do things that he neither liked, nor was good at. He knew What it means in practice that the longer he stayed the unhappier he would become. Rather than waiting to be Alfred is in his early forties, and is successful pushed, he decided to take control of his life. in his career. From feedback that I’ve received It was time for him to decide his own future. from people close to him, he’s actually one of the best in his particular field in Asia. He The work with Carter evolved on a wide front, came to me some time ago to explore how moving from intense exploration of his goals I might become his personal coach – for life, and aspirations for life, through exploration career, and business. Alfred wanted to engage of health and fitness, to some of the more in a coaching relationship because he practical aspects required to engineer a perceived, quite strongly, that he was not yet change in career. A key was to understand being all that he could be in life. He was his true gifts and strengths, as well as some successful by other people’s standards, but weaknesses that blocked him just short of not his own. For one thing, he wanted to success. change what he was doing, and move into a different but related field. For another, he Early on it became clear that Carter had a has goals for living the second phase of his unique and powerful mind. He was able to life in a very different, much more enriching visualize problems, and their solutions, in way. exquisite detail. This gave him a great advantage, and the ability to solve problems The work with Alfred has involved a number that were beyond the capacity of most people. of critical elements, ranging from the setting Despite this great strength, however, he was of compelling outcomes, through to re- almost totally unaware of it. He was certainly patterning of automatic behaviours and unaware that he was quite different to other reactions. It has been a transformative people, or that this particular skill had any process, helping him maintain the essence real value. To him it was just normal. And it of who he is as a person, while giving him bordered on genius, especially in his area of the tools he needs to achieve the next step technical expertise. in his life’s evolution. He was also a deeply compassionate human Carter’s case was very different. He was in being, who cared deeply for the people around his mid-thirties, and working for a major multi- him. This, too, was something he didn’t fully national corporation based in Hong Kong. appreciate, and from which he benefited little. We began working together when he started His quiet, un-expressive communication style to discover that he just didn’t “fit” any longer. alienated him from most of the people around

To Coach or Not to Coach

him. This was not helping him in his current While some problems in life are not of your career, and it would obviously block him from making, many are. And, whether or not you doing most things effectively. created the current situation in which you find yourself, no-one but you will can really get We began by asking the question, “what do you out of it. It’s your responsibility to fix the you REALLY WANT in life?” The initial answer problem, and external support can help. That’s turned out to be a fantasy which, once where the coaching comes in. explored, created more problems than solutions. It turned out that Carter didn’t really In a remedial situation the coach plays a range want what the fantasy had to offer. But he did of roles. Initially, it is to help you stabilize have to test the idea to find out. Once he yourself. If you have gotten yourself into a learned that lesson, he was able to set goals mess, you may not be in a position to make that he really did want. the best of decisions. A good coach will strongly encourage you to take steps that, as From there we moved to exploring Carter’s quickly as possible, ensure you regain the internal value structure, and discovered sets focus and mindset needed to make sensible of competing priorities. These held him in decisions. place and he needed to free himself. They also accounted for the problems that he had Beyond that, the role of the coach is to help with relationships and communication, and you break old patterns. Why? Frequently, your were worthy of intense focus. Once his internal own patterns have contributed to creating the priorities had been aligned, we could move situation in which you now find yourself. You’ve into a phase of creating a developmental done it to yourself. Not deliberately, for sure. journey that would, over time, lead Carter to And, in many cases where you find yourself fulfil his aspirations and more. in trouble of some sort (money, job, relationships, etc.) you can trace back to a Today, he is moving through a new job while series of similar situations in the past. putting in place the stepping stones that will Somehow, history seems to repeat itself. So, allow him to live the life that he truly chooses while it’s uncomfortable to hold that thought, for himself. when you look back and identify the common factors, you find yourself at the centre. You Remedial are the common factor. The situation that has been created is, in large part, caused by your When your life has suddenly turned to mush, own patterns. you are at a dead end, you are about to crash and burn, or you find yourself in a hole, then The problem with these patterns is that you you need to think about getting some remedial live through them, in the same way that a fish coaching. You use remedial coaching to stop swims through water. They are so close to the fall, and get back onto a healthful path. you that you are not even aware that they are

To Coach or Not to Coach

there. This is where the coach can help, first I had no choice. I had to stop him in his tracks, by supporting you to become aware of those pointing out that I had heard it all before. I told patterns, and then by working with you to him my prediction that he would last 6 weeks change them. Only when you truly change with the new woman, and probably about the those patterns do you have the opportunity same amount of time in the new job. He to create a new trajectory in life. looked at me shocked. And I explained to him that, since we had known each other, I had What it means in practice seen him repeat the same cycle a number of times. The patterns of his life were clearly Simon was having dinner with me complaining, driven by him, and he was totally unconscious once again, about how bad things were for of them.

At that instant he knew. He understood that if he was ever to get what he really wanted in life he must look inward, and address the very fundamental patterns that were driving him. He decided to enter into a coaching relationship, focused on restructuring himself at a fundamental level. And so we began.

Initially, the focus was tactical. Simon needed to negotiate a new business deal and get himself stabilized economically. My role as a coach in that situation was to provide tactical support and guidance for the negotiation process. Some of this work focused on the him, Just three weeks previously the communication and negotiation patterns that conversation had been about his new girlfriend, Simon was using. Of necessity, the approach and about how he now was in the relationship was directive. Simon had to do things as of his life. This was the one. And the job he instructed, and experience the results. We was in was the perfect job for him. This was had time to discuss the reasons why it worked how he was going to make his fortune. Now, later. just a few dozen hours later, everything had changed. He had a new girlfriend (who Knowing that his old approaches didn’t work, happened to be just perfect, and finally, the Simon followed the tactical guidance and was real one). And, he had given up his perfect able to successfully land a workable business job and was going to an even more perfect deal. Now, stabilized, it was time for us to one. Just like the last time. focus on some of the core drivers. While I continued to provide tactical input, we began

To Coach or Not to Coach

to explore the fundamental value structure roles, and they are all equally important. In that had driven Simon into his predicament. any coaching relationship, most if not all of And that is where things began to get very the roles should be operating at the same interesting. Step by step we discovered the time. edifice of beliefs that Simon had cobbled together over the years, and he began to see The Feedback Loop how this prevented him from achieving what he really wished for in life. At a very basic level, the coach acts as a feedback loop. If you’ve ever listened to Anthony was an entirely different situation. yourself on tape, or seen yourself on video, His habit was to try to rush his success, and you’ll understand why this is so important. take on far more than he could ever handle Very often we are unaware of what we are effectively. He would then start to panic, and doing, and certainly unaware of how we impact this would result in a state of total paralysis. on those around us. A coach can reflect back His workload would build, along with a pile a relatively objective view of what is happening, of broken commitments, and the worse he so you then have the choice to modify your felt about himself the worse it would get. behaviour in order to be more effective. Ultimately, he would find himself in a position where he was unable to fulfil even his most External “Energy” Source basic commitments. Around the same time his marriage would begin to falter. This cycle I use the term energy very broadly. If you’ve would repeat itself every three or four years. ever observed a stream feeding into a river, you’ll have a sense of what I’m talking about In Anthony’s case, the initial stage in the here. The smaller flow comes into the larger coaching process involved giving him very flow, creating whirlpools and disturbances. direct instructions as to how he should reduce These disturbances, which are literally his commitments. Once he had stabilized, we injections of energy, influence the direction of moved to dealing with the more fundamental the larger flow. A coach does something drivers that had helped to create the patterns similar. New ideas and information affect you in the first place. These were core beliefs like new bursts of energy. These new ideas which, once addressed, freed him up to act and new energy create the possibility for you in a more rational and effective way. to take new directions and make new decisions. Without the new ideas or energy, this would have been more difficult; maybe The Role of a Coach impossible.

To understand why coaching can be useful, The external energy source can be absolutely it’s important to understand the roles that a critical in the coaching role, especially when coach can play. There are a variety of different you are dealing with difficult issues. There are

To Coach or Not to Coach

times when you will face issues that are Pattern Connector uncomfortable at best. If you are on your own, it’s so easy to come up with excuses for NOT Another very important role of the coach is addressing these issues. At such a time, the what I call the “pattern connector”. Whether or coach provides energy and motivation, insisting not you realize it, when you communicate with that you face your problems and work through someone else you will often make distinctions them. The presence of the coach, and the about things without realizing that you are doing energy that he or she brings, helps push you so. You might sense very strongly the difference through where, on your own, your preference between management and leadership, for to back down would probably win. instance, but not be aware of that at a conscious level. You might know, in your gut, what your The Sounding Board mission is but maybe have never been able to connect words to that mission. As you speak Have you ever noticed that you have some of to someone, your passion shows through, even the best ideas when you are talking out loud? if you don’t know that this is happening. And, Often, thinking quietly to yourself just doesn’t you express ideas that are important to you, help you make the connections that you need using certain words and certain intonation, to make. But, talking out loud, especially when even though you may not be aware of the someone else is listening, can be a very essence of what you are saying. enlightening experience. Somehow you find yourself articulating thoughts in ways that you A good coach should be able to notice the didn’t expect. It’s almost as if one part of you patterns that you wear for the world, but of is talking to another part of you, and the mouth which you are unaware. And, as you express has to be involved. those patterns the coach will connect the pieces together to make it all visible to you as well. Having a committed listener as part of the When that is done well you know that it comes picture, especially one who asks penetrating from you, even though the coach helped to questions, simply makes the process even make it visible. This process creates powerful more powerful. You find yourself thinking very insights that help you to make important shifts deeply, and making connections that you in your own thinking. otherwise might not make. The Guide A good coach will listen to you probably more deeply than anyone ever has in your life. This Another very important role of the coach is the alone can draw out of you thinking and insights guide. A good coach will have, over the years, that you did not know you had. And, these been challenged by situations similar to that insights can help you make important changes which you are now facing. Having gone through in your life. these challenges and survived, the coach is in an ideal place to help you navigate. Knowing

To Coach or Not to Coach

that you are exploring difficult territory with Too Critical someone who has been there makes the process that much safer for you. In the same The opposite problem with friends is that they way that you would prefer to climb a mountain are too critical at times. There are phases in with someone who has climbed many your development when you need a guide to mountains before, you will gain so much more be patient with you. Certain skills and attitudes when you work with a coach who has been take time to master, and you need to have challenged by life and who will share that a guide who will accept the clumsy attempts learning with you openly whenever you need that you make as you try to master those it. new areas.

Often, friends will say “you’ve already been Why Not a Friend? told what you need to do, so why aren’t you perfect already?” That simply doesn’t work, Many people will think that asking a friend for and will tend to demotivate you rather than advice is the same as having a coach. give you the support and encouragement However, when you examine this more closely that you need to succeed. you discover that it is not true. There are a number of reasons why, in most cases, a Part of the Problem friend should not take on the role of coach. If, as is frequently the case, relationships are Too Nice part of the issue that you need to address friends are probably not appropriate as coach. Friends, in most cases, can’t coach you Your friends are part of your relationship because they are too nice. Often, in order to network, and as such they are a part of the get your attention so you will change, you problem that you have. How you interact with need to hear unpleasant things. These are your friends, and how they interact with you, things about you that you really don’t want all need to be examined if this is your focus. to acknowledge. To talk about such things You will find it very difficult to tell your friend is very risky. For sure, when you hear them, that you have a problem in the relationship you are going to be upset. A friend, under if that friend is also your coach. most circumstances, will avoid saying something to upset you in that way because Training they are concerned it could break the friendship. So, at the most important moment, Training is also another critical factor. Some a friend is likely to cut you some slack – just coaching simply involves looking at superficial, when you should be held in place, and made tactical type issues. However, once you get to squarely face the issue that you have been into dealing with deeper, ongoing patterns it avoiding. isn’t that simple. While there are techniques

To Coach or Not to Coach

to help you deal effectively with patterns that no longer serve you, few of your friends will have the necessary training.

Is Coaching For You?

In this short article we’ve explored a little what coaching is about, and some of the issues that you need to be aware of. Today, in a rapidly changing world, more and more people are discovering the value that they can get from having a professional committed to supporting their growth and development.

Of course, whether or not life coaching is for you is an entirely personal decision. However, if you’re committed to excellence in your life, getting support from people who have the passion and the skills to help you make a difference can be profoundly important.

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