Bill approached me for coaching to address the challenges that he was experiencing as he prepared to take on a more senior role within his organization. He defined the issue as: “How can I make sure that the transition is successful? The director that I will succeed is so different from who I am. The team seems to be demoralized; I am not sure that I can wait until the old director is gone before I start to make change.”
As Bill spoke of his challenges he realized that his attention was focused on a number of “problems” and that he felt overwhelmed by the challenge. As his coach, I focused my attention on him. We explored his core values (respect, collaboration, transparency) and recognized strengths (strategic leadership, a change agent) and reasons why his organization is promoting him (real change is required in this group). This exploration led to Bill paying more attention to how he defined himself as a leader and less on the “problems that he was facing.”
We contracted to find ways that “Bill the Leader” could influence the change needed in the group.
As we explored the ways that Bill could influence change, several learnings became relevant.
Bill was challenged to evaluate his assumptions:
What are the strengths of the current director?
What is his view of the role and group? How could Bill discover this view?
What can you learn from him?
Is the group ready for collaboration?
What approach to change is best?
Building on his values and strengths: respect, collaboration and transparency to explore strategies for change, he asked new questions:
What will be important to the current director as he prepares to leave the role?
What are the strengths of the team? How can I acknowledge and build on them?
What is a reasonable timeframe for real change?
What are ways that I can engage the management team now?
We explored the outcomes of using his strengths:
What were the positive outcomes? What unexpected or negative consequences resulted from his previous action?
What did he learn from these experiences?
How could he change his approach to get different results?
How could he practice a different approach?
How could he get feedback from others?
How could he integrate this feedback into behavior?
As a coach, I learned, once again, the importance of client focus and the intuitive process of following, responding from diverse perspectives and asking challenging questions to hold the client accountable for his growth.
This was a positive example of powerful questions that placed the focus on the deeper issues and led the client to connect with what was most important to him. He moved from being overwhelmed to being confident in himself. As I held the focus on this confidence, he became more confident in his ability to succeed in the transition.
It was an example of placing the accountability for change on the client and holding him to being capable of making the change. He developed tangible action steps that were based in his values and strengths, and he incrementally engaged the current director and the team to understand their concerns, values and strengths.
He clearly focused on how he defines himself and brought this clarity to his interactions with the others. He received positive feedback; this created a deeper awareness of his value to the team, compelling him to continue to be open and respectful and to build on the strengths of the team.
Several key points arise for me:
What we focus on expands; focus on the strengths and growth of the client.
Pay attention to the desired change—we are accountable to the needs of the client.
Focus on “being with” rather than “doing to.”
Practice, practice, practice.
These brief thoughts are intended to facilitate or prod deeper coaching conversations among coaches and with our clients.
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