v1.1 © clutterbuck associates 2011 1 challenges for coaches: those you see and those you don’t...

V1.1 © Clutterbuck Associates 2011 1

Challenges for coaches: those you see and those you don’t

Professor David Clutterbuck


Some emerging themes in coaching

• What’s the difference between coaching and mentoring?• How smart are SMART goals?• 7 levels of coaching conversation• How many conversations in a coaching interaction?• The line manager as coach• Powerful questions v the tyranny of the question• Coach maturity


Coaching v mentoring: 2 models of each

Performance

Influence(Directive)

Career

Influence(Non-directive)

TraditionalCoaching

Developmental Coaching

Sponsorship Mentoring

DevelopmentalMentoring

Personal Development


Phases of reflective space

External Energy

Internal Energy

Normal Working (High Activity)

Framing

Implication Analysis

Insight!

Options

Action

Re-framing

Time


Coaches’ critique of goals

• Goals over-privilege the sponsor’s agenda at the price of the coachee’s agenda

• Goal setting is an unconsidered routine• Encourage ‘do more’ in a society where ‘do less’ may be more

valuable • Goals serve the coach’s need for clarity and control• Clients may not be ready to set goals (or to have moved beyond

them)• Goals can be used as an excuse to avoid the painfully beneficial• Goals save coach from having to be fully present


How can we obtain the right balance between goals as beneficial stimulants to performance

and goals as addictive distractions?


Seven levels of dialogue

• Social• Technical• Tactical• Strategic• Self-insight• Behaviour change• Integrative


The seven conversations


Conversation one

Coach’s reflection on:

• Context • Avoidance• Attitude


Conversation two

Client’s reflection on:

• Learning• Needs• Attitudes and motivations


Conversation three

Shifting focus between being inner-directed and outer-directed


Conversation four

Allowing the dialogue to happen


Conversation five

Helping the client develop their own skills of self-observation


Conversation six

For the coach:

• How did I help?• What choices did I make?• What did I learn?• What concerns do I have?


Conversation seven

Client’s:

• Learning • Intention• Processes and Behaviours


When to use the seven conversations

• When the coach feels in some way inadequate or that they have “failed” the client

• When the client procrastinates constantly, leaving the coach frustrated• When the coach feels too close (intimate), or too distant

from the client• When the coach has a sense that there are unidentified others

in the room• When conversations are repeated, with no sense of significant progress

in the client’s thinking or behaviour• When the coach simply has the intuition that they are “missing

something important” in the conversation or the relationship• When the coach feels there is a moment (or longer) of disconnect in

the conversation but can’t pin down what was occurring


Attentiveness v reflection in action


Contextual factors in conversation

Atmosphere: Temperature, bright/dull, colourFlow: Pace, energy, direction, purposefulnessEfficacy: What changed or what foundations were laid for change?Openness: Self-honesty, instinctive responses, body languageIdentity: Self-awareness, authenticity, awareness of perceptions by othersOwnership: Coach directed, client directed, jointly owned, jointly disownedCreative thinking: Multi-perspective, constrained/unconstrainedAttentiveness: Awareness of nuance, unspoken meaning, unspoken

communication, being “with” or “holding” the clientFocus: Convex or concave (i.e. were we focusing in on a very specific

theme or widening out and more discursive; or moving backwards and forwards between these foci?)


Linguistic content

• What words or phrases captured your attention then?• With the attentiveness of recollection, what words or phrases

capture your attention now?• Do these words or phrases echo those from previous coaching

conversations with this client? (Or ‒ often even more revealing ‒ with another client?)

• What makes these significant for you?• What makes them significant for the client?• Is the client aware of this significance?


Can a line manager truly be a coach?


Five levels of listening

• Listening while waiting to speak • Listening to disagree • Listening to understand• Listening to help the mentee understand• Listening without intent


Asking powerful questions

• Personal – it is about them, or about how they connect to an issue

• Resonant – it has an emotional impact• Acute/incisive – it gets to the heart of the issue• Reverberating – it stimulates reflection both in the moment

and for some time afterwards• Innocent – the intent of the questioner is not self-interested or

derived from an agenda of their own• Explicit – clearly and explicitly expressed


Coach maturity: an emerging concept

Maturity is about mindset, not age or seniority


Evolution of coach maturity

Coaching approach Style Critical questions

Models-based Control How do I take them where I think they need to go? How do I adapt my technique or model to this circumstance?

Process-based ContainHow do I give enough control to the client and still retain a purposeful conversation? What’s the best way to apply my process in this instance?

Philosophy-based FacilitateWhat can I do to help the client do this for themselves? How do I contextualise the client’s issue within the perspective of my philosophy or discipline?

Managed eclectic Enable

Are we both relaxed enough to allow the issue and the solution to emerge in whatever way they will? Do I need to apply any techniques or processes at all? If I do, what does the client context tell me about how to select from the wide choice available to me?


What mindset do you observe in the best coach you know (who may be yourself!)?


Systemic eclectics

• Have immense calm• Use tools subtly and seamlessly within the conversation. • Steer with only the lightest of touches• Understanding a technique, model or process in terms of its

origins within an original philosophy• Use experimentation and reflexive learning• Use peers and supervisors to challenge their coaching

philosophy• Take a systemic and holistic view of the client and the client’s

environment; and of the coaching relationship


What do mature coaches take into consideration in working with clients?


Mature coaches reflect deeply on:

• Personal philosophy of coaching• Understanding of the business context• Freedom from the tyranny of the question• How they use supervision• How they maintain professional development – and can

demonstrate how y our have applied learning• How they identify and manage boundaries• Their personal journey as a coach• What kind of clients and situations they work best with• What makes a fully functioning individual• What makes an effective organisation

v1.1 © clutterbuck associates 2011 1 challenges for coaches: those you see and those you don’t...

Documents

clutterbuck associates

coach frustratedwhen

conversation sevenclients

conversation fourallowing

conversation fivehelping

conversation sixfor

question coach maturity

coach powerful questions