Coaching with a difference

Once a month I relax completely as Sue pounds my back to draw out some of the tensions and contortions put there by tennis and life in general. As I relax, despite the pain, we talk freely about what we’re doing and what’s going on in the world. At a recent session, I commented that a lot of what I do involves helping people deal with the impact of difference. “’The impact of difference’ - that’s a powerful idea” she said. 

We all know that people are different. We don’t all think, feel or behave the same. But so much of the time, as we try to make sense of what others do, we assume that they are the same as us. So if we don’t understand their behaviour, we dismiss them as bad or mad, as malevolent or stupid.

One of the most shocking and profound things I read when I first started coaching was Myles Downey’s contention that people have a unique map of reality, they have good intentions and “are achieving their own objectives – perfectly – at all times”. In other words, in their world, what they do – no matter how bizarre it might appear to us – makes perfect sense to them. And so much of what I do, whether coaching, facilitating or speaking involves working with the implications of that for how clients might deal with the challenges they meet at work.

The top two implications are: I am not the same as them (so my job is to help them find their own way forward); and they are not the same as the others in their life (so their challenge is to understand in what ways those others are different).

In a previous post I argued that there is only one coaching question: who are you? As a coach, I explore each client’s needs, drivers, frailties, triggers, preferences and beliefs about the world in order to raise their self-awareness and discover how to work with them. As I do this, I show empathy and understanding but I must remember that I am framing a hypothesis, a best approximation, a guess borne of experience and shared humanity. 

As a facilitator working with groups on leadership skills, I combine outside-in and inside-out techniques. I help others to learn from best practice, showing them models, skills and techniques that help them raise their game. But I know that they will hit their top game when they express who they are, using the best practice that ‘fits’ them.

At the core of the leadership programmes that I deliver is the belief that to lead others you need to understand yourself and have a grasp of the ways in which others might be different. That’s why I use psychometrics like MBTI, various models of leadership style and preference, and research on drivers and needs at work. It’s all to enable leaders to manage themselves well and lead diverse others.

And within many of the most powerful models, is the belief that others’ behaviour makes sense to them. The challenge is to find that sense. So in workshops on managing conflict, we look beneath the opposing, irreconcilable positions that people take up. We look for the underlying interests and needs that those positions express. And once we understand what leads someone else to take an opposing position, the possibility of a win-win emerges.

All this is within the enclave of leadership and effectiveness at work. But it is too important to hide there. “The impact of difference” is not just a powerful idea. Understanding it is an integral part of operating in the world as it is rather than as we assume or wish it to be. Without it, collaboration and constructive disagreement are not possible. We’re condemned to blame, to stay separate and defend.

So as you instinctively come to judge others, get curious instead: who are they and what leads them to do what they do?

Coaching with Dolly

I was flicking through the sleeve notes for Dolly Parton’s latest album as a passenger on a long drive to York recently when I was reminded of a recent conversation with a new coaching client.

My client’s goal is to develop a new area of business in which to apply the skills that she has. It will take her into new arenas and require her to know and value what she brings. 

One of the hard things in moving into a new business is to know what prospective customers want. And to act on that without distorting or diminishing what you offer. Dolly’s approach is to show “all the colours of my life” in all the areas of music that she embraces. She’s proud of her repertoire and range. And as we ‘market’ ourselves, we should be similarly proud.

My client said she wanted to know what I had learnt from developing a coaching business. As a coach, this request sits uneasily with me. My way is unlikely to be her way. But can I share what I have learnt? Dolly helps with this: “I don’t like to give advice. I like to give people information because everyone’s life is different, and everyone’s journey is different.” So what information do I have about what has worked for me?

·        Show your true colours: showing yourself as you are rather than as you think your clients will want you to be. That way you get the right clients on the right basis.  

·        Be prepared to put some people off:  some people don’t like country music (in fact I’m not a big fan, but Dolly is special). This is the price of showing who you are. But it leads to a better fit.

·        Adopt the reputation you want to create: coaches and others struggle to communicate what they are about. So what would you most like your clients to say about you? What do you want to make true? Dolly says: “Find out who you are and do it on purpose”.

·        Don’t sound like everyone else: coach profiles on Linkedin or individual websites seem inter-changeable to me. They use the same words, make the same claims, have the same feel. There’s nothing wrong with them. They’re just not very interesting. I suspect this is also true for businesses other than coaching. Use fresh words. Be different, provocative.

·         Be bold in what you call yourself: this is part of not sounding like everyone else. I don’t pretend to have cracked this. But I like it when I find a “business story-teller” rather than a “communications consultant”, or a “provocative listener” rather than a coach.

Find your voice through many iterations: it is hard to be interesting, to show yourself in a compelling way, to find the reputation you want. So experiment, talk to people, notice how you explain yourself, listen to what they say to you, try drafts on clients and colleagues, imagine you’re speaking to a bright 4

·         year old who is about to become bored, repeat and revisit.

·         Network with a purpose that fits your values: I struggled with business-to-business networking events. And I felt uncomfortable schmoozing corporate gate-keepers and influential past clients. That was until I got interested in them. Once I started going with a spirit of inquiry, with the goal of discovery, then I relaxed. No hard sell, just conversation. And that meant they saw me as I coach. And that brings the right business.

·         Be clear about your business model: you can go solo, collaborate, form a partnership, be an associate, build an empire. Which do you want? That guides the work you do and what you say about yourself.

·         Decide on niche or range: few coaches make a living just from coaching. And some, like me, find synergy from teaching and facilitating on the leadership issues that many coaching clients bring. What’s your offer?

·         Do work that excites you, turn the other stuff down: this takes some courage, especially when you’re starting out or if times are hard. But your best work is your best marketing. And your best work requires you to be excited and engaged. Saying what you will and won’t do shows clarity and integrity. 

·         Invest in yourself: or as Dolly observes: “It costs a lot of money to look this cheap.”

 

In many ways, all this is the business case for authenticity. You owe it to your clients: they know what they’re getting. And you owe it to yourself. In the words of Janis Joplin: “Don’t compromise yourself honey, you’re all you’ve got.” Or in Dolly’s inimitable style: “I’m comfortable in my own skin, no matter how far it’s stretched.”

Coaching? You cannot be serious!

Yesterday I attended Carole Pemberton’s excellent coaching masterclass on resilience and, a few weeks ago, the launch of a new book curated by Liz Hall on Coaching in Times of Crisis and Transformation. On both occasions I have had fascinating conversations about the place of humour in coaching, particularly when a client is emotionally in a really difficult place.

We know about the dark humour shared by professionals who deal daily with people in trauma. A group I worked with on a leadership programme were in the front line of supporting victims of rape and sexual assault. When I respectfully asked what that was like, I was told “oh, we have a real laugh” but they implied no disrespect for the victims or their experience.

After my mother died quite suddenly, I recognised the jokes that my brothers and I shared as we cleared her house were part of the grieving process. After all, what else can you do but laugh when you discover that someone had 15 shoe-horns and a stash of plastic gifts from ancient Christmas Crackers.

It strikes me that part of resilience is over-coming the darkness of a situation, of finding some light in it. It’s a part of gaining perspective. And that is one of the things that coaches must help their clients find in all situations. It does not diminish the difficulty our clients face, but it does help the burden feel lighter. This echoes Jenny Campbell’s findings about the internal resources of resilient leaders.

Now, as Jimmy Tarbuck once said, in humour, timing is everything. Clients need their crisis or trauma to be recognised, they need to be heard. Responding with a guffaw to a heart-felt tale of woe would quickly lead to a reputation as the Frankie Boyle of the coaching world. And humour is not only antidote to darkness or negativity, it can carry some of the emotional response in being wry or wistful or acerbic. So we need to listen carefully to it, it’s not just catharsis.

As I coach, I am respectful and am often serious. I empathise with the depth of challenge that some clients experience. But like my favourite coaches, I am also playful, iconoclastic and robust. So if I am going to be fully present with my client, and help them to bring all their resources to any challenge, then that playful self also needs to turn up.

Being fully present shows that I am ok sitting with a client in crisis. That helps them find hope and move towards a mental state that is flexible and able to work with the possible. It’s the third state between rigidity and chaos that Paul Brown and Helen Leeder Barker write about in Liz Hall’s book and it’s a state which allows a focus on the future.

So, as coaches we need to hold ourselves lightly: balance our wisdom and commitment with childishness. And if someone asks what happens in coaching, talk about it as a place not only of serious endeavour and safety but also as a place of playfulness and perspective.

The Mystery of Coaching Mastery

This is something that I have been wondering about and working on for some time: what is it that makes a top level coach? If that question interests you too, please have a look at my article in the latest edition of The Listener which you can find at http://www.kensmithcoaching.co.uk/page10.htm I'd love to hear what you think.