Illuminating the coaching 'GLOW'

Coaching has been described as a ‘glow word’, a term that makes us feel good when we use it, despite it having no clear meaning. In the absence of a definitive definition of coaching, you might be asking yourself:

How should I understand more about what to expect from coaching?

and

How should I go about choosing an appropriate coach?

Here are some coaching questions that you might ask a prospective coach to reach your personal answers to these initial questions:

Who is the coach?

Asking who the coach is, allows the coach to share insights on what to expect and appropriate ‘fit’ with your organisation and employees. Trust is essential to facilitate personal exploration and to encourage new learning and personal discoveries that can emerge in a coaching relationship.

What approach does the coach take?

To expand clients’ individual and collective awareness look for an empathetic skill set offering psychological safety, ever-growing rapport and confidence, active listening, questioning, suspension of (the coach’s) values and judgment, reflection, comfort with uncertainty, and clear outcomes.

Where is the coach in their personal coaching development?

New coaches start with approaches that have worked for others (eg GROW). Coach maturity grows where the coach knows and works with their own values. It develops further where the coach can take an objective perspective on their own values and work with the different values of their clients.

When will the coaching be completed?

Coaches distinguish transactional and transformational change. Transactional refers to specific change (eg following promotion); transformational offers a more sustainable and holistic awareness of behaviour and options for change. Transformational coaching is deeper and takes longer.

Why are you a coach?

Understanding personal motivation for coaching including the coach’s purpose, and what led them to coaching informs both initial questions. Engagement with coaching supervision, professional accreditation and continuing professional development evidence professional commitment.

How aware are you as a coach?

Coaches are frequently engaged to help individuals or groups become more aware of their potential to change – explore different perspectives, build stronger working relationships, or simply know more of themselves. How does your coach demonstrate the depth of their own self-awareness to you?

To find out more about how the Boyes Turner Coaching Solution team can help you and your business take a look at their dedicated website.