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James Flaherty (Oxford, UK: Butterworth-Heinemann (third edition) 2010)
Understanding of life is like light. It can only be seen when it is reflected off something else. This book can be such an object. You can see your own thinking reflected, if you are open and looking for it.
You can take the notions presented here and apply them to your own life, (perhaps) resulting in a new awareness.
This awareness is a chance to see what is happening in a new way – a chance to form a new relationship with the situation, and to take new action that may bring you closer to your goals.
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Every time I sit across from a client is a fresh moment to discover what is possible and to let go of what has worked before.
The beginner way of knowing about management won’t work for all people and won’t even work for the same person over a period of time.
Sooner or later we begin to understand the importance of context and tuning into an individual’s situation.
When our experience is broad and deep, our response will never be rote; but it is not just a matter of doing something over and over again.
We must engage in the activity with a clear intention to improve our competence and continuously correct ourselves as we go.
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“Practice” as presented in the book has a structure and standards and requires great persistence. It is the only way we can become proficient at an activity and remain freshly creative.
Central to any practice are “distinctions,” particular ways of talking, that let us operate within the given activity.
We must learn the language of brake, accelerator, steering wheel, rear-view mirror and so on before we drive.
Essentially this book is a collection of such distinctions, meant to orient you to the world of coaching so that you can become more and more competent as a practitioner.
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The only thing that coaches ever do is speak and listen. Almost all our clients do is speak and listen, as well. The quality of work that anyone does follows from her ability to listen
deeply to what is being asked, engage in conversation to clarify the intended results, and then continue to converse as the project unfolds until everyone is satisfied.
The absence of this competence is the main cause of breakdowns, waste, and loss of business.
The good news is that anyone can learn to speak in a way that moves action forward, opens up new possibilities, and builds relationships.
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“Talent neglected or misguided…investigations into the nature of things not completed…what is right understood but not acted upon…and the lack of energy to rectify what is wrong…these are the things which pain my heart, which I exist to remedy.”
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1. Human beings create themselves in language, continuously shaping and reshaping the narratives in which they make sense of their worlds.
2. Human beings are biological creatures all the way down. They invent and express how they understand the world in their bodies.
3. Human beings are paradoxical – very much creatures of habit and at the same time very much malleable.
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Do you believe that human beings (above all else) seek pleasure and to avoid pain? Is everyone is trying to get ahead himself, regardless of what happens to others? Do you think that people are just small particles in a vast, unstoppable mechanism, simply bio-computers?
Or, conversely, do you have an opposite view, that the individual: …is the captain of his or her fate, …can fully determine what happens, …can bend circumstances to his or her will, …and overcome all obstacles?
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1. How to say something distinct enough to foster change and yet familiar enough to be understood.
2. How to say something linearly (cell-by-cell or page-by-page) that can only be fully understood holistically or systemically.
3. How to show something meant to evoke a paradigm shift in a way efficient (cogent) enough to maintain interest.
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When you find yourself constrained, confused, in disagreement…ask yourself the following question: What way of “seeing this topic” am I attached to? What way of “seeing this topic” am I defending? What would happen if I saw it in this new way?
Keep working with yourself in this way as you go through this presentation and you’ll find yourself more competent by the end.
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1. The need for innovation is endless, in products and organizations.2. Organizations have to find a way to retain good people by providing
attractive compensation and a chance to continuously learn.3. Organizations are having to work in multicultural environments.4. “Command-and-control” (power and knowledge) cannot bring about the
conditions and competencies needed to meet these challenges.5. Organizations must be dedicated to allowing people to be both effective
and fulfilled.6. Coaching is a way of working with people that leaves them more
competent and more fulfilled.
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The client meets high objective standards. Objective standards can be observed by any competent person.
Well-coached clients can observe when they are performing well. The client will make necessary adjustments independent of the coach.
Well-coached people will continually find ways to improve on their own. They will practice more, they will watch others perform, and learn new
activities that will strengthen them in their competencies.
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1. As soon as the stimulus ends, the behavior ends.2. People learn to get the reward without doing the action.3. People do not learn to self-correct according to principles or values.4. The amoeba theory weakens people because it habituates reactive
behavior.5. It eliminates self-generating initiative, risk-taking, creativity, ambition
and curiosity.6. All attention is on the immediate cessation of pain or the immediate
acquisition of the reward.
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1. The relationship is the background for all coaching efforts.2. Pragmatism – What’s true is what works, what works is what’s true.3. A learning experience for both coach and client. Seriously.4. People are already, always in the middle of their lives and their ways.5. “Techniques” get in the way of openness, courage, and curiosity.
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. The Illusion of Technique.
. Being-in-the-World.
& . Understanding Computers & Cognition.
. To Have or to Be?
. Pragmatism.
. The Present Age.
and . The Tree of Knowledge.
. The Gestalt Approach and Eye Witness to Therapy.
. Consequences of Pragmatism.
. Philosophical Investigations.
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“Remember that existence consists solely in its possibility for relationships.”
Human beings are a whole, and no part is dispensable without changing the whole. Always keep the whole in mind.
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Human beings enter into relationships with everything that we encounter.
We do not have a choice about this. Any phenomenon that we meet in our world appears to us as
“something.” It is only by being raised in a human community that we become human
beings. Probably what we are most open to is being with other human beings. This way of being with other humans is our way of showing our
understanding of what a human being is.
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The relating with language, once it begins at a early age, is always with us.
Even our thoughts are part of the horizon of possibilities that language provides for us.
As a member of the language community, we also learn how to relate to other human beings, what’s important, and how to act.
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We are fulfilling what has begun in the past by taking action in the present to bring about an outcome in the future.
At any given moment, we are open in a particular way, our mood. Mood affects what we are open to, our view of the future, and the
distance we put between ourselves and the world.
Our body is the way we are in the world. Many therapeutic modalities have focused on the body as a locus of
transformation.
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Language is an essential part of coaching. The essential job of the coach is to provide a new language for the
client. Language provides what is possible to do and what is worth doing.
It is not possible to make observations outside of language. Behavior follows from the “structure of interpretation” of the client. The way we see the world at a particular moment determines our
behavior – the actions we take.
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The coach must make the client’s own “structure of observation” explicit and accessible to the client. Observe the way the client observes and be able to articulate this so that it can be observed by the client.
Always “according to someone,” it is not a universal truth.
In coaching, observations are always made within a tradition of distinctions and standards, though not a universal truth.
At this point an observation can be spoken about as assessment.
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Is it based on observations that can be made by any competent observer?
Can the coach cite particular instances? Can the coach predict future action based on the assessment? Is the assessment a paradigm shift for the client? Can the client and coach synthesize observations of the coach to
make sense of many of the actions of the client? Does the assessment free the client to take action?
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Many problems are caused when this is taken for granted. Basic ingredients are , , and
.
Occurs when routine is disturbed, something breaks down, an offer is made, or a change in circumstance requires a new skill from us.
First observe/assess the level of the client’s competency, second the client’s “structure of interpretation,” and third, the array of relationships, projects, and practices of the client.
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Making apparent the intended outcomes of the coaching relationship and the commitment of the client and the coach.
Presuming enrollment, which is common, leads to many mistakes and misunderstandings.
The task is to have the client observe something in such a way that competence improves.
The reason for having a structure is so the coach does not slip into a more familiar role of being a teacher, a therapist, or a manager.
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You don’t have to have chemistry with your client, but you must have a workable relationship in order to fulfill your coaching work.
Sometimes people hide behind roles – executive, parent, boss – but it won’t work – only the relationship can provide the foundation.
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Is the person sincere? Is the person competent in their sincerity? It’s not a universal judgement, but trust in a particular domain.
We should respect clients in the domain of the coaching activity. Our malleability to tolerate can increase our capacity to respect. Note particularly other cultures, diverse practices.
Has to be constructed within each coaching relationship. Openness and honesty without argument or defense.
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Strengthen trust by doing exactly what you say you will do, and pointing back to the fact that you did what you said.
Over time your client will begin to trust you more.
Invite the client into your decision-making process. Reveal that there are different sides to questions, and no decision is perfect.
Demonstrate that we have changed our mind, or point of view, for example. Practice saying things that are not readily spoken about (Carefully!).
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In coaching, timing is everything. An opening for coaching is an occasion: an event that makes it more
likely that the potential client will be approachable for coaching. Habits are the conditions present in every human being that account for
the consistencies in their response to life. Coaches intervene in this consistency. Coaches coach the nervous system (behavior).
People generally aren’t open to being coached because they already have habitual ways of accomplishing things, both physical and mental.
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– Besides the power of habits, a person’s social identity presents an obstacle to coaching. Each of us has a certain reputation that determines the way people
interact with us. This becomes somewhat fixed, on both sides. We also have a personal narrative of the story we tell about
ourselves. This evolves, usually, as we grow, but slowly. People naturally believe that what they are doing is correct and is the
best possible action, given the circumstances and their roles in them. When coaches attempt to question someone, they may encounter
defensive routines consistent with the roles the person has taken on.
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A common opportunity for a coach is when the client is experiencing an interruption in the ability to fulfill a commitment.
Also performance reviews; the need for new skills in a new job; business requirements for higher quality or lower costs; or simply the client’s request for coaching.
On other occasions, coaching starts because the coach sees the client doing something that she doesn’t like or is uncomfortable with; but this could be simply behavior modification (possibly coercive).
Genuine coaching never happens unless there is a partnership. Long-term excellent performance cannot be foisted on someone.
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“What’s the driving force?” “What’s the bottom line?” We feel rushed, impatient, compelled to reach a conclusion. Don’t.
Practice being anti-reductionist. Instead of boiling it all down to a facile and more futile formula, keep allowing your understanding to become more complex and therefore potentially more creative.
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– What the client has on his mind at the moment. May be trivial, may be big, but no one listens well when they have immediate concerns on their minds. Once we hear the sound, we stop seeing the scenery. The coach should surface these immediate concerns (by asking). There is a borderline between coach and client: Are these your immediate concerns, or the client’s immediate
concerns? Is this your mood or the client’s mood? Put some certainty on exactly where the border is so you can be
present for the other person.
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Anyone we coach will be in the middle of dedicating his life to someone or something. What that is may not be visible or obvious.
It’s a mistake to argue back from outcomes to determine what a person must have been committed to.
Commitment in the mind may couple with incompetence in action. But the coach must understand (and honor) what the client is
committed to. This will allow the coach to keep looking for what is missing in the
client’s ability to fulfill her intention.
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We are taking action now to fulfill something initiated in the past in order to effect something in the future.
By knowing what future a person is trying to generate, a coach can begin to make sense of the actions the client is taking presently.
A problem is that we often forget what is supposed to be motivating us. After we eat the chocolate cake, we remember our diet.
The coach can remind us of what we set out to do, and work with us to keep building a way of observing and acting that is consistent with our plans, and leave us able to fulfill our intended future.
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Each of us has a different history of interactions with people and circumstances, which influences the different ways we respond.
We can never fully understand another person, or a culture different from our own experiences.
Through empathy and dialogue we do the best we can to match the different experiences to similar experiences of our own.
It is obviously important for a coach to get beyond clichés and stereotypes, and closer to an empathetic understanding.
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It is the job of the coach to understand the client in more and more ways rather than fewer ways, even if fewer ways would be simpler. Mood is the semi-permanent emotional tone of a person. The task is to understand the mood on its own terms and not
fall into dictating what it ought to be or must be.
Skepticism maintains self-esteem by disguising itself as sophistication.
Cynics are always looking for secret motivation behind even the most laudable actions.
Resignation maintains self-esteem by posing as pseudo-wisdom.
Frustrated people work hard, complain, and never give up.
Resentful people distance themselves from people and situations.
Guilt gives people a false sense of agency – could’ve, would’ve, should’ve.
Guilty people are also the most self-righteous people.
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Facts & Events
Relationships with Others
Self-Managementvision, passion, integrity, trust, curiosity, daring
self-observation, self-knowledge,self-consistency
empathy, reliability, openness, optimism, faith
listening, speaking, settingstandards, learning, innovating
rigor, objectivity, focus, persistence, creativity
analyzing, predicting, simplifying,models, organize, prioritize, release
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intellect Making distinctions Predicting future consequences of actions
Bringing people and events close to us Distancing ourselves from people and events
The capacity to make what we intend to happenactually happen
The setting and framework of a declared purpose Systems thinking, what will affect, what will be affected
Compassion and kindness Connectedness to humanity
emotion
will
soul
context
1. Observe your client in a variety of situations. Notice behavioral and speech patterns.
2. Resist the temptations to make conclusions based on memory rather than on real-time observations.
3. Ask questions to reveal more of the client’s structural interpretation, but not to verify the assessments you have made.
4. Predict future actions, providing an opening for your coaching intervention, while maintaining a dignified, respectful relationship.
5. Always keep your assessments open for reevaluation. The client’s unknowable aspects are what allow for change and transformation.
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Things move in the world when someone speaks. Our attention (and energy) become focused as we respond to things we
hear and possibilities we see. The social world of humanity is moved forward by conversations. Coaching is a blending of different types of conversations. Conversations resolve conflict, build alliances, and open up opportunities. Learning the kind of speaking that moves things forward is essential for
coaches and anyone else who lives or works with people.
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