How Do I Practice Global Listening, or the Convergence of Attention and Awareness
As we closed the Agile Coaching Circle for Europe time zones for September, this question was posted in the chat:
How do I practice global listening?
Great question, and one that we should have answered a long time ago. You see, in each of the coaching circles, we do a bit of teaching up front about some coaching basics, namely a coaching arc, powerful questions, and levels of listening. We then hold practice coaching sessions with a debrief of what happened. However, we’ve never written about practice tips or suggestions on how to work on a specific skill.
Let’s fix that, starting now.
Who's Got the Monkey? How Healthy Boundaries and Responsibility Help You Help Yourself
What do monkeys have to do with boundaries? So much, as it turns out, and now is an excellent time to identify what boundaries are and what boundaries are not. Plainly put, boundaries are the limits we set with other people that indicate what we find acceptable and unacceptable in their behavior towards us. As Henry Cloud says, “Boundaries define us. They define what is me and what is not me. A boundary shows me where I end and someone else begins, leading me to a sense of ownership. Knowing what I am to own and take responsibility for gives me a sense of freedom.” My own father says, so very wisely, I might add, “You get what you tolerate.”
The Solace of Open Spaces, or Building Relationships of Trust
I like to use questions to challenge people and organizations, but questions can also be used as intentions to guide attention. When we use questions as intentions, we all look more closely, more deeply, finding solace in those open spaces.
The Softer Side of Psychological Safety
And me? I am a product of a very different time and way of working. I’ve done (and still do) my time in a therapist’s chair, I read studies and self-help books and practice practice practice, I let my clients and teams see my emotions. I’m an open book. Part of my strength as a coach is my willingness to be soft with those I serve. My willingness to be open started us off on equal footing. Because I had also stepped into vulnerability, it made it easier for them to wade into those troubled waters.
Cleaning Up Your Questions
Clean language is worthy of a deep dive all its own, and one day, I’ll get there. But today is not that day. This is the day to focus on how Clean language can help you to clean up the questions you use in coaching and mentoring sessions, in organizational retrospectives, and in any conversation with clients. Here is the question that drives this blog post: As coaches, how do we clean up our questions?
The Ugly Truth of Self-Management
I have what is politely called “a descriptive face,” meaning that whatever is going on inside of me, my face has already told you all about it. My mouth doesn’t help much, because whatever my face is telegraphing, my mouth likely has something to say about it. For me more than most others, self-management is not just an important coaching skill, but an important life skill.
How Much Is Enough, or Navigating Coaching Training and Credentials
Like so many others, I’ve doubled-down on education in 2020. A global pandemic seemed like the perfect time to focus on my skills. Finish a co-active coaching certification? Check. Finish the ORSC training series? Check. It helped that most of the training that I wanted to do was now being offered virtually, meaning that I could bypass travel costs, and more importantly, I could continue to work as the training was oftentimes split into half-day sessions. I could do training in the morning and then see clients in the afternoon. Win win!
But this leads me to the question that I seem to be fielding quite a bit of these days is this: What training or certification do I need to be a coach? What is enough?
Bouncing Back, or Building Resiliency through Adversity
The point that I’m trying to make is this: life happens. Stuff happens. It’s not personal, it’s just the way it is. But just because life gets shitty doesn’t mean that it will always be shitty. It will pass, but hopefully, the lessons we learn will not. As humans, we’ll bounce back more quickly and with greater resilience when we ask ourselves good, hard questions and learn to respond, not react to the challenges that come our way.
Three Types of Coaching Questions to Include in Coaching Conversations
I then asked this question, “What is it like to live amongst beauty?” The response from the client was immediate and powerful: tears.
But do you see what happened in that question? I used the client’s language about beauty and their home to ask a powerful, meaningful question. I played off their words, their imagery to deepen the context of the conversation. The strength of that first question helped us to have a meaningful, productive session, culminating in a course of action that brought them immense joy. I doubt that we would have gotten there, however, without that first, great question.
Permission to Fail, or the Best Gift I Ever Gave Myself
Permission to fail is a deep breath, a confession. Permission to fail is the covenant I build with myself. By making failure something to be accepted, I learn to trust myself to overcome that failure. I trust myself to survive failure because I’ve done it before. I trust myself to learn from my experiments, from my mistakes. I trust myself to do better the next time. I trust myself to get up.
Three Types of Coaching Questions You Should Never Ever Ask During Coaching Conversations
I’ve heard that said, many a time. And up until I began coaching and fell in love with questions, I believed that statement. However, while there may not be a poor question, there is most definitely a poor type of question. I should know—I’ve tried to ask those types of questions and had my coaching sessions fall short of where they could be.
As a coach, there are three types of questions I avoid in coaching conversations. By bringing them into the open, I’m hoping to help you avoid them, too.
Listen Up, or the Difficulties of Auditory Processing
When I listen during a coaching conversation, I listen with my entire body. I listen to what is going on around us, to what is coming up in me, to what isn’t being said. I listen to the silence. I listen to everything, for everything. The most amazing questions well up inside of me when I make space for them.
Doing Versus Being, or How Do We Step Into Accountability?
At the end of the day, accountability lets you step into your own power. When you are accountable to yourself, you hold yourself to your highest standard of what is possible and of what you can create. People no longer ask about accountability because it is no longer an issue of trust.
Standing in Curiosity, or One Impossible Thing at a Time
For me, curiosity is anything but easy. I like to know the answer. I like to give answers. I like to be the smartest one in the room. I like to be right. I have to fight to get to curiosity and then fight even harder to stay in curiosity. I ask good questions, heck I even teach how to ask questions, but even I know that I’m too much head and not enough heart. Curiosity often feels insurmountable, that impossible thing for me to climb.
The Right Headspace for Coaching
Coaching is for you, not to you. It’s time to let go of thinking that there is a single, perfect time to do the work because there is no such time. The right headspace for coaching is the headspace you’re in. Let’s use that as our starting point and work from there.
Getting into Good Trouble, or the Importance of Knowing Your Own Values
The point I’m making is this: if you are clear on your values, who you are and what you stand for as a person, it is so easy to know when you need to venture into good trouble. It’s an up-or-down vote. I know what is important to me and what is not. I have a hard decision in my future, one for which I’ve already determined that I’m willing to get into good trouble. That’s okay. I’m ready. My values have helped me to set my course of action, to know what is right for me. Upholding my values is always worth good trouble to me. In closing, I am leaving you with this question: What is good trouble for you?
Three Reasons to Make Metaphors a Coaching Habit
This is all well and good, but why do I want to use metaphors when coaching, be it with organizations, teams, or individuals? Because of this: metaphor doesn’t just help us to describe, it helps us to understand.
Power Up, or Stepping Into Who You Want to Be
I loved the idea of her “power poses,” and I began doing them. The Starfish. Superman. Bodybuilder. Wonder Woman. Pride. And while I am generally considered to have little to no shame, it was a bit awkward when I got busted in the elevator or the ladies’ restroom and had to explain just what it was that I was doing. Once they heard the explanation, people got the idea and even got a laugh, but it was then that I started to wish for a way to power pose without having to explain myself. I needed a power pose for the inside.
Five Powerful Questions for Every Coaching Conversation
There is no shortcut, no formula, for good coaching conversations. Every conversation and session are unique, and as a coach, it is my job to go where the client takes me. These five questions I’ve given here are simply a starting point to help you make your own coaching conversations more impactful and less awful than my first coaching sessions.
The Radical Kindness of Good Boundaries
Boundaries are a marker, a line. On one side of the line, you feel safe, secure, but on the other side, you might feel unmoored, violated, unsafe. Boundaries exist to keep us safe, be it physically or psychologically. Brene Brown has a line that I love and repeat often: “Clear is kind. Unclear is unkind.” When we are clear about our boundaries and our values, we feel secure. When we are unclear, it is all too easy for that line to be crossed, and we then feel ignored, unseen, of no value to others. Boundaries are a reflection of our values. When our values are threatened, who we are as a human is threatened, too.