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Andrew Parrock
Sally East
Pradip Shroff
Epimetheus
Lilian Abrams
Martin Richards
Maria Biquet
Simon Dennis
Katy Tuncer
Ian Flanders
Simon Darnton
Geoffrey Ahern
Alan Robertson
Isobel Gray
Laurent Terseur
Aubrey Rebello
Lynne Hindmarch
Doug Montgomery
Sue Young
Jeremy Ridge
Naomi Dishington
Wendela Wolters
Nicholas Wai
Charlotte Murray
Yvonne Thackray
All in Prof CC
In the coaching context, time is both a parameter and a container for reflection that spans the duration of the continuing lived experiences that is drawn to attention, a space for learning-unlearning-(re)learning, realising growth and development, and continuing developing character within a series of timed scheduled events.
These are my learnings over the last several years being a coach myself, and engaging in conversations with other coaches. In part 2 of the series on "Executive Coaching in India", I discuss the wide range and variety of coaches in the market and a simple generalisation presented here could help in directing action from coaches, buyers and users of coaching. And for aspiring coaches, early inroads towards success can be varied. Certification is just a start and to really become a paid professional coach requires a lot more than that. Many aspiring coaches feel they do not get enough return on their investment, including of their time and hard work.
All of that, without a particular order and in various proportions, adds to what the cultural background of each of us is made of... so in my view, as long as someone is not me - we can talk about cultural differences, just the extent of those will vary. If I were to arrive at my own definition of what one's culture is, it would be:
Set of unique, dynamically changing contact lenses through which each person views and interprets the world. As we go through life, the contact lenses naturally adapt but we can also replace one set for another set of lenses intentionally. Taking the contact lenses completely out could be equal to erasing someone's memory.
These are my learnings over the last several years being a coach myself, and engaging in conversations with other coaches. In part 1 of the series on "Executive Coaching in India", I discuss some broad issues regarding coaching in India. There are many other discussion points but these initial ones are some of the core ones. As well as the readiness of leaders for coaching is an issue that comes up for debate often. Apart from the coachee herself, the coach and the organisation may both be part of the solution, and the problem.
One month before my 17th birthday I read the following metaphor: “Life is a war, we are all warriors, we throw battles everyday and we can either win or lose those battles.” - I felt such a strong resistance to these words that it pushed to my awareness a whole new metaphor: ‘I am not a warrior, I am a guide. …
In some circles this is a controversial question. Coaches do not need domain knowledge to coach effectively yet many successful coaches are known for their niche.
This article builds on the ideas I examined in my ’Coaching as a manager’ where I concluded that a manager could not truly be a coach to someone they manage, regardless of the fact that they can use coaching techniques to help them. Let’s look wider than the manager/coach relationship and examine the organisational situation they work in.
The pandemic has provided an opportunity for coaches to re-evaluate and take stock of the practice and business and determine how they want to deliver coaching. Coaching is often described as the 'Wild West' because it has a perception that many who come into coaching consider that it's easy to earn money in coaching, versus those people who are coming to coaching to deliver something of value through coaching.
A few years ago, my dear colleague Yvonne Thackray asked me, “Who are your ideal clients?” I was puzzled by the question. “I can work well with any leader who wants to work with me”, I said. To me, it was a simple question of them being motivated to achieve their coaching goals, and their feeling with a comfortable fit with me. She countered by saying that she suspected that that might not be the full picture.
Feedback is especially useful to further understand how I am developing my coaching style and approach. From my clients’ feedback, there is a general acknowledgement to my depth and breadth of knowledge, understanding of coaching, and how I flexibly apply it to meet my client’s challenges.
In April 2020, our coaching team set ourselves the challenge to become “masters of the universe” at on-line facilitation. We had facilitated over video before Covid-19 hit, but back then it was unusual, and rarely first choice for high-stakes facilitated sessions.
Following the Corona Virus lock down there has been a lot written on virtual coaching. For some coaches working virtually has been a new and a steep learning curve; for others, myself included, it has just been more of what we already do. I have always had a number of my coachees who lived overseas with whom I have coached virtually.
I’ve been thinking a lot about how I and my work as a coach and a coach supervisor are being influenced by the Covid19 crisis. I keep coming back to the ubiquitous, yet often unnoticed, parallel process.
Volunteerism is a core activity of Coaching Organisations that offer pro bono coaching to communities and people in need and project teams with a (usually humanistic) purpose.
Recently I had a meeting with a company client with my business partner about a project we had delivered. We discussed several topics and at some point she told me “you have gained absolute trust from every single person in all six teams. My business partner felt proud and started praising me
From psychosynthesis psychology we understand that we operate out of different parts of ourselves. In psychosynthesis these parts are known as subpersonalities.
I’ve been thinking about loyalty, in my life as well as in coaching. To start with I explored coaching through authenticity, and the idea of how centred we are within our roles in my first piece with the good coach, and I’m now expanding that to encompass what it means with regard to how loyal we are to our employers.
After more than a decade developing and delivering management skills training, I’ve recently extended my practice to provide Executive Coaching. An early experience with a Coachee started me thinking about the potential benefits of combining both disciplines.
