Closing the spaces between us

The Journal of BACP Coaching

Coaching Today

October 2013 Issue 8

Closing the spaces between us: an integrated approach

11

A day in the life: serious work in beautiful places

13

A different terrain: travels in Mongolia

20

Transformation through coaching: compassionate leadership

26

On the coach: stress management

Coaching Today is the quarterly journal for counsellors and psychotherapists who are retraining and practising as coaches, as well as coaches from a diverse range of other backgrounds. It is published by the British Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy. BACP House 15 St John’s Business Park Lutterworth LE17 4HB T 01455 883300 F 01455 550243 The journal is distributed to members of BACP Coaching in January, April, July and October. Membership of BACP Coaching costs £20 a year for individuals, and £50 for organisations. For details, contact Julie Cranton: [email protected] Editor Diane Parker [email protected] BACP Coaching Executive contacts Chair: Jo Birch [email protected] Gill Fennings-Monkman [email protected] Dr Kate Anthony [email protected] Graham Wilson [email protected] Kirsten Leslie [email protected] Anne Calleja [email protected] Visit the BACP Coaching website at www.bacpcoaching.co.uk Contributions Contributions are welcomed. Please contact the editor. Advertising For rates, contact Jinny Hughes T 01455 883314 [email protected] or visit www.bacp.co.uk/advertising Publication of advertisements in Coaching Today does not constitute endorsement by BACP Coaching or BACP. Design SteersMcGillanEves Design Ltd T 01225 465546

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Editorial

Disclaimer Views expressed in Coaching Today and signed by a writer are the views of the writer, not necessarily those of BACP Coaching, its members or BACP. Publication in this journal does not imply endorsement of the writer’s view. Reasonable care has been taken to avoid error in the publication but no liability will be accepted for any errors that may occur. If you visit a website from a link within a BACP journal, the BACP/Therapy Today privacy policies do not apply. We recommend you examine all privacy statements for all third party websites to understand their privacy procedures. Case studies All case studies in this journal, whether noted individually or not, are permissioned, disguised, adapted or composites, with all names and identifying features changed, in order to ensure confidentiality. Copyright Apart from fair dealing for the purposes of research or private study, or criticism or review, as permitted under the UK Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1998, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored or transmitted in any form by any means without the prior permission in writing of the publisher, or in accordance with the terms of licences issued by the Copyright Clearance Centre (CCC), the Copyright Licensing Agency (CLA), and other organisations authorised by the publisher to administer reprographic reproduction rights. Individual and organisational members of BACP only may make photocopies for teaching purposes free of charge, provided such copies are not resold. ©British Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy ISSN 2049-1182

Diane Parker Editor, Coaching Today As I write this, I am preparing to say goodbye to the summer and return to school for the start of the new academic year – my final year in training as a dance movement psychotherapist. I am filled with excitement and trepidation in equal measure – acknowledging the challenges that lie ahead as I begin work in clinical placement in a psychiatric hospital, and also recognising that I am in transition as I shift from coach to therapist and continue my explorations of the intersection between the two. To say that my therapy training has had an impact on my existing coaching practice would be an understatement. As I make preparations for my final year then, I am also thinking longer term – about how I will integrate my new dance psychotherapy practice with my coaching practice and how that will shape my new identity. What will that look and feel like? Who will I be? And importantly, how can I best use these accumulated layers of skills and experience to help my clients? It feels appropriate to highlight these issues of identity and integrated practice in our cover

feature, in which two members of faculty from the University of East London’s (UEL) School of Psychology describe how their institution is responding to the new landscape through an integrated approach to training coach-therapist practitioners. With the introduction of a new Psychological Interventions subject area and the launch this September of a postgraduate certificate in Integrative Counselling and Coaching within that, UEL is leading the way in offering training and development that aligns with integrated practice. As the authors explain here, this approach presents challenges as well as opportunities for those of us entering and exploring this new landscape. But with the focus firmly on the bigger picture – that of our clients and the profession as a whole – we can look towards the future with hope and enthusiasm for further integration of our professions and the exciting potential that offers. The learning theme continues in this edition as doctor and healthcare leadership practitioner Lis Paice describes the powerful, transformative impact of coaching training on her work to promote a culture of compassion and caring – for patients but also for frontline practitioners – in NHS hospitals and the medical profession. And, in the Thinking Global series, BACP Coaching Chair Jo Birch offers a wonderful description of her personal and professional learning during recent project work in Mongolia. Feel free to get in touch with your thoughts on any aspect of integrated practice, including learning, development, research and identity. There is a lively forum on our LinkedIn group at www.linkedin.com (BACP Coaching Division – Meeting Forum) so do sign up, log in and join the discussion. We look forward to hearing from you. And for those of you who are training, teaching, embarking on or returning to study – here’s to a great new academic year. May it challenge, delight and transform you in ways you can only imagine. Diane Parker [email protected]

Features Responding to a new landscape: towards integrative practice

Dr Christian van Nieuwerburgh and Dr Aneta Tunariu

6

Thinking global Transformation and change

13

Coaching for compassionate leadership in medicine

20

Jo Birch

Lis Paice

Regulars Message from the Chair

4

A day in the life

11

On the coach

26

On the bookshelf

29

Research

32

Professional development days

34

Network round-up

36

National coaching network meetings

39

Executive coach and supervisor Jenny Bird Director of the Centre for Stress Management Stephen Palmer in conversation with Linda Aspey What you’re reading

4 Coaching Today –October – October2013 2013

October 2013 – Coaching Today 5

Message from the Chair

Jo Birch Chair of BACP Coaching

I’ve been thinking about the future… about learning, knowing and being

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have been captivated by educationalist Sugata Mitra’s prize winning TED talk, ‘Build a school in the cloud’.1 Around 14 years ago he noticed affluent parents were saying they had gifted children. He looked out onto the nearby Delhi slum and wondered about the families down there. Don’t they have gifted children? He had an idea for an experiment. He placed a computer in a hole in the wall and waited to see what would happen. The children of the slum were eager to discover. Their natural curiosity soon had them grasping the mechanics of the computer and exploring its wonders. Sugata replicated his experiment in a remote village… and then

another and another. Over and over children made amazing discoveries… yet no one ‘told’ them what to learn or how to learn it. Later he included a question for the children to see their progression. They chose their own direction and devised their own ways of discovery. They exchanged and imparted technical and operational information to each other – girls teaching boys, young children teaching older siblings. They were self-organising. One essential component that enhanced their learning was their spirit of collaboration – working together, supporting each other. Sugata also talks about the interactions from others that are helpful to support this kind of learning. He calls this the essence of ‘grandmothers’: being a supporting presence and encouraging exploration through responses such as ‘Tell me about it’; ‘How have you got here?’; ‘What comes next?’ I can see great resonance with my coaching work and how I want to be with the people who work with me. I want to be more and more the essence or spirit of the ‘grandmother’ – supporting the learning and growth of others through my own sheer delight and curiosity in the person and their journey. How does this resonate for you? How does this connect with your work – and your understanding of us as people, as continuous learners? This morning I was listening to Kofi Annan, in a conversation with young leaders at CAUX – Initiatives of Change.2 He believes the two most important things to ‘teach’ young people are first, to accept and be prepared for a world in which things constantly change – not to presume constancy in the world – and second, to be aware of and alive to difference and diversity. Kofi is pointing to a new vision for learning – not about facts and figures but about ‘noticing’ and adaptability, about seeing and celebrating our diverse world – understanding each other as people first, with all of our differences and similarities.

Kofi also talked about employment for young people. He suggested that governments should place greater emphasis on this. What I found most interesting was that he didn’t suggest governments should create jobs for young people – he said that, with the right support, young people could ‘team up and create their own jobs and companies’, that they are innovative and creative. As I see it, this connects with Sugata’s TED talk – the wisdom is already there, within; what is needed is the appropriate support to amplify it, bring it out, share it with others, make more through collaboration – and create a successful business, community and, perhaps, world. Knowledge and learning as we have known them are changing. The future might require different skills – perhaps more selfdetermination and greater self-awareness, improved sense-making through more acute ‘noticing’ skills – what is staying the same and what is changing… and what meaning I should make of this. We no longer need to retain, remember or recite knowledge. The data and information are always there at our fingertips. However, I believe we do need a more acute ability to make sense of what is there, to create options and possibilities, to embrace change and movement rather than hope for certainty and stability. It seems that this too is in the realm of coaching – particularly with our experience and our potential as practitioners to explore the complex inner world of thoughts and feelings and to use ourselves in the exploration of interpersonal relationships. Who would think I could move so seamlessly through Sugata Mitra and Kofi Annan to… the Oxford Brookes 3rd International Coaching Supervision Conference in June! I experienced this conference as different: there was a buzz of energy, a willingness to share ideas and discoveries; a community

connecting and collaborating. This is a vibrant and growing community of coaches, coaching supervisors, training establishments, researchers and academics working together to look at what we have in the field, at the new information and the emerging needs arising out of the coaching profession and to consider what best-fit supervision might look like in the future for our profession. This is an especially exciting conversation for those of us working at the coach–therapist interface, with our experience of supervision and this open space in which to consider what kind of provision might be best for us as we continue with our own professional development – holding, integrating, innovating and pioneering. The conference began with an exploration of mature ethical decision-making (Michael Carroll) and ended by looking at coaching supervision through the lens of complexity (Michael Cavanagh). Where I think the observations of Sugata Mitra and Kofi Annan have relevance is in this sensing that something different was happening here. I had the impression of a profession working together in a different way, embracing some of the ‘grandmother’ essence of joyous curiosity; of finding our way together, with no ‘single solution’; of sharing responsibility for creating a climate for discovery, and of open and generous encouragement of others. I felt a part of the process of building, observing and testing the emergent knowledge in the field. I was excited and inspired. References 1 Mitra S. Build a school in the cloud. TED talk; February 2013. http://www.ted.com/talks/ sugata_mitra_build_a_school_in_the_ cloud.html 2 Annan K. Kofi Annan on youth leadership. YouTube; 6 August 2013. http://www. youtube.com/watch?v=8kg08hpFX-0

I want to be the essence of the ‘grandmother’ – supporting the learning and growth of others through my own sheer delight and curiosity in the person and their journey

6 Coaching Today – October 2013


Responding to a new landscape: towards integrative practice As the University of East London launches a new postgraduate certificate in coaching psychology, Dr Christian van Nieuwerburgh and Dr Aneta Tunariu describe how an integrated approach to coach/counsellor training and professional development can better serve the needs of our clients.


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s coaching continues to develop and flourish in the UK and internationally, more people are seeking relevant qualifications in order to practise. Excitingly, the profession of coaching draws passionate and interested people from a wide range of disciplines and careers. Most are driven by a strong desire to support the growth and development of others. In many ways, it seems appropriate that this drive is usually initiated by a period of learning, growth and development on the part of the prospective coach. Due to the increasing popularity of coaching within organisations and for individuals, there is currently a wide range of educational and training providers offering courses ranging from a few days to postgraduate programmes than can take two years to complete. In this article, we will share our thinking about an integrated approach to the professional development and training of coaches and counsellors that may better meet the needs of our coachees and clients.


What is coaching psychology? Before we start, it may be helpful to clarify what we mean by ‘coaching psychology’. It has been defined as the ‘systematic application of behavioural science to the enhancement of life experiences, work performance and well-being for individuals, groups and organisations who do not have clinically significant mental health issues or abnormal levels of distress’.1 The programme leaders of the University of East London’s (UEL) MSc Coaching Psychology programme have proposed that coaching psychology training should be ‘underpinned by psychological and adult learning theories’.2 As it has developed, the profession of coaching has tended to define itself in part by what it is not – by differentiating itself from other one-to-one helping interactions.3 Its rapid growth in popularity in the UK from the 1990s onwards led some to call for the regulation of the profession and there have been attempts to develop a set of agreed coaching standards.

But it has also been argued that setting standards before the discipline is mature could stifle its creativity and hinder its development.4 We believe that coaching psychology is at a dynamic stage of defining and shaping itself and that this presents an opportunity to inform its development by bringing together learning, research and experiences from a range of related fields. An integrated approach There is increasing interest among psychologically-based disciplines such as coaching psychology, positive psychology,4 psycho-social humanitarian work5 and career coaching,6 and others, to move towards the creation of psychological interventions that: a) build on strengths rather than mend ‘deficits’;7 b) facilitate subjectively meaningful change for clients or organisations rather than recycling an overvaluing of the authority of expert-based, pre-determined treatment methods, and

The overall purpose of this subject area is to develop, implement and evaluate the outcome of psychological interventions driven by an intention to facilitate positive change in human beings

c) reflect openness to share knowledge and good practice from other related professions. The School of Psychology at UEL has recently launched a new subject area whose aim is to deliver programmes that can equip students with the necessary theoretical knowledge, professional skills and personal development closely aligned to this criterion for defining what may be called integrated psychological interventions. The Psychological Interventions subject area at UEL houses one undergraduate (BSc Counselling) and several postgraduate training programmes, each underpinned by concepts commonly associated with their respective fields but combining these with expertise from across the subject area to refine and expand the range of learning outcomes and skills provided to their students. Apart from a fruitful conceptual overlap across teaching, the programmes in this subject area share other essential considerations. First, there is an overarching, although sometimes latent, concern with the study of ‘change’ or ‘transformation’. Certain aspects of the human condition and behaviour (the self-system; relating to others; group processes; organisations; socio-cultural systems) are examined, discussed and understood through the lens of evidence-based knowledge and principles. The overall purpose of this subject area is to develop, implement and evaluate the outcome of psychological interventions driven by an intention to facilitate positive change in human beings. The counselling profession has long demonstrated that shifts in meaningmaking have a domino effect for an individual in terms of opening up further possibilities for actions.8 This in turn fosters greater flexibility in adaptations to environmental demands and delivers opportunities to flourish.9 A commitment to taking risks and confronting the taken-for-granted aspects of our psyche shows itself as both most threatening to the ego as well as most effective in engendering the kind of change that integrated psychological interventions can achieve. Facilitated narration, the act of voicing anxieties, noting personal patterns of repetition and grasping ‘at experiential level just how pervasive they are’6

tend to be followed by a shift in their significance as barriers to deliberate living. Second, the welcome offered to a dynamic integration of knowledge and good practice from related disciplines not only requires a vision of professional development and training for professionals that is theoretically firm enough to house innovations but also a creative engagement with epistemology and techniques for carrying out research. The Psychological Interventions subject area is already developing research approaches to reflect this invitation and offers models that adopt an ‘and-and’ rather than an ‘either-or’ approach to research methods.10 Third, the type of interventions discussed here are delivered through and for the intersubjective space between the client (or coachee) and the practitioner (or coach), and are therefore greatly dependent on the quality of their relationship. Fourth, there is a common concern with providing rigorous and structured learning activities for practitioners of these integrated psychological interventions.

The profession of counselling and psychotherapy is ahead in terms of institutionally agreed standards and processes for training programmes involving practitioner development and practitioner supervision. We believe that there are opportunities to learn and borrow examples of good practice from the counselling professions. Equally, the fields of coaching and psychology are developing a robust evidence base for their work and have been successful in creating effective commercial models of delivery. We contend that professionals from each of the



We believe that coaching psychology is at a dynamic stage of defining and shaping itself, creating an opportunity to inform its development by bringing together learning, research and experiences from a range of related fields disciplines have much to learn from one another, and therefore suggest that the establishment of the concept of integrated psychological interventions and their application by reflexive, confident practitioners will be a positive and necessary step forward. A rapidly growing cross-fertilisation between the professions of counselling and coaching is, for example, well illustrated by the rise of existential coaching.11 Existential psychotherapeutic principles celebrate the value of anxiety/angst as best able to reveal an individual’s traps and dilemmas. An existentially informed coaching approach to developing an integrated psychological intervention to deal with stress, for example, would facilitate openness to phenomenologically grounded experience as a way of gaining awareness of habitual modes of relating to daily life, such as a need for control.12 Ideas from existential philosophy and psychotherapy inform a new proposal for integrating counselling and coaching – the personal consultancy model now taught in the coaching psychology programmes at UEL. Responding to a new landscape In response to the possible new landscape of integrated psychological interventions, UEL’s postgraduate Coaching Psychology programme has been revised and revalidated to strengthen its psychological underpinnings and create the environment in which it can connect with other strands within the subject area. Already, postgraduate students completing an MSc in coaching psychology at UEL will consider humanistic, behavioural and cognitivebehavioural approaches to coaching. In addition to learning about traditional coaching models such as GROW,11 students can learn about motivational interviewing, solution-focused coaching and appreciative inquiry. In a core module entitled ‘Psychology of the Self in Coaching’, students will have the opportunity to learn from specialists from across the subject area, with lectures and seminars on topics such as existentialism, positive psychological interventions and psychotherapeutic approaches. Students are already taught a number of quantitative and qualitative research

methodologies in preparation for self-directed study within the field. One of the first steps towards integrating our offering across the subject area has been to allow students on the MSc Coaching Psychology and MSc Career Coaching programmes to share the core module, ‘Evidence-based Coaching Theory and Practice’. From September 2013, the School of Psychology will be the first higher education institution to offer a postgraduate certificate in integrative counselling and coaching. This programme will provide professional training for those who wish to integrate various counselling skills with coaching. We hope this is only the start of a journey and we are enthusiastic about the potential of a more integrated future for our professions. Working with BACP Coaching, UEL hosts regular networking meetings that bring together counsellors and coaches. Each event features an engaging speaker who brings a perspective on coaching for discussion by the group. Through networking events and other collaborative opportunities, it is hoped that we will be able to move towards effective integrated psychological interventions in a way that is helpful to our professions and our clients. By bringing together the learning, experiences and research from a number of disparate professional areas, we can turn our collective attention to celebrating our shared interests and passion. Dr Christian van Nieuwerburgh is an executive coach, academic and consultant and is a senior lecturer in coaching psychology at the University of East London. An international authority in the field of coaching, he has spoken at conferences in the US, the UK, Europe, Australia and the Middle East. Dr Aneta Tunariu is Principal Lecturer and Head of Psychological Interventions subject area at the University of East London. Her academic, research and practitioner specialism is the psychology of relating and she has delivered numerous training seminars and workshops in the fields of coaching, positive psychology and counselling, both nationally and internationally.

A day in the life I

References 1 Palmer S, Whybrow A (eds). Handbook of coaching psychology: a guide for practitioners. London: Routledge; 2008 (p.2). 2 Law HC, Van Nieuwerburgh C. Coaching psychology. In: Bayne R, Jinks G (eds). Applied psychology: practice, training and new directions (2nd ed). London: Sage; 2013 (p.232). 3 Van Nieuwerburgh C. An introduction to coaching skills: a practical guide. London: Sage; (in press). 4 Hefferon K. The body and positive psychology: the somatopsychic side to flourishing. London: McGraw-Hill; 2013. 5 Davidson S. The development of the British Red Cross psychosocial framework: ‘CALMER’. Journal of Social Work Practice 2010; 24(1): 29–42. 6 Yates J. The career coaching handbook. London/ New York: Routledge; 2013. 7 Sin NL, Lyubomirsky S. Enhancing well-being and alleviating depressive symptoms with positive psychology interventions: a practicefriendly meta-analysis. Journal of Clinical Psychology 2009; 65(5): 467–487. 8 Grant J, Crawley J. Transference and projection: mirrors to the self: core concepts in therapy. Maidenhead: Open University Press; 2002. 9 Popovic N, Jinks D. Personal consultancy: a model for integrating counselling and coaching. London: Routledge; 2013. 10 Colahan M, Tunariu AD, Dell P. Understanding lived experience and the structure of its discursive context. Qualitative Methods in Psychology Bulletin 2012; 13(1): 48–57. 11 Spinelli E, Horner C. An existential approach to coaching psychology. In: Palmer S, Whybrow A (eds). Handbook of coaching psychology: a guide for practitioners. London: Routledge; 2008. 12 Kongsted Krum A. How can ideas from the existential approach enhance coaching for people with work-related stress? International Journal of Evidence Based Coaching and Mentoring Special Issue 2012; 6: 57–71.

Executive coach and supervisor Jenny Bird on variety, travel – and the importance of restorative environments.

love to wake naturally… no alarm set and none felt. Today was like that: a bit of sun creeping through the curtains and the cat calling for breakfast. My favourite way to start the day is just sitting – near a window or, better still, as today, in the garden with a cup of Earl Grey, stroking the cat and listening to the sounds of the world getting on. I stroke the cat and feel the privilege of living close to another being and having no knowledge of how it is processing the world. Puts stuff in perspective at the start of the day! So I sit and let the light wash over me and the tea wash through me until I feel fully present and then we walk round the garden: me in my dressing gown and wellies, the cat, who is very old and slow, a few steps behind. I look at what has changed overnight and listen to the birds. This morning the major delight were the scents: a particularly glorious rich lilac and sweet peas. When I get back inside people are allowed to speak to me! I coach, supervise coaches, mentor people for professional accreditation, train internal coaches and leaders in coaching skills and run masterclasses and CPD workshops for coaches. So my days are varied: at least one day per week in London with coaching clients and often a day elsewhere in the UK. My coaching clients are usually senior leaders in the corporate world or UK public sector. I’m also running CPD and masterclasses for coaches in Luxembourg and Spain this year. One of my many pleasures in this work is the travel and I always try to stay in small hotels or B+Bs, which are usually very snug and give the local flavour. Today was an office morning. I was ready for two phone calls: one coaching, one supervising. I enjoy and value phone work, though I wouldn’t wish all my work to be on the phone. Today’s calls were a coaching client feeling a bit beleaguered by huge changes and a coach from France whom I have supervised for several years. After the calls, some brief reflection and a couple of quick emails, I emerge to inhale the lilac again. Wander around eating lunch as I prepare to go to London for the afternoon: then the familiar routine of driving to the station, through the lanes. I appreciate the train journey as another space to be or to think. I always sit in the quiet compartment and, I confess, I am the woman who

calls out ‘This is a quiet compartment, people!’ Today, I did some reflecting and client prep and then treated myself to half an hour with the paper. I meet most of my clients at the same place: for years it has been the Commonwealth Club. I am much saddened that it is closing and am tentatively moving to the RSA (the Royal Society for the Arts). The main reason for choosing these venues is that I can walk there from Waterloo, over the bridge, enjoying the changing scenery, the breeze and the people. And yes, it isn’t always as warm, still and pretty as it was today but it is always intriguing, even when raining sideways and endangering my hat. So I arrive at the club cobweb-free and ready to be with my clients. Coaching is such a fascinating job and I am constantly honoured by the trust of clients and the privilege of working with people in interesting times. We do some challenging processing this afternoon. For me the core skills of coaching are absolute presence with the client, listening till your ears squeak, being comfortable in unknowing and being willing to voice your truth without attachment. All this concentration can be quite tiring, so I don’t work with more than four clients in one day. I’ve been coaching for about 13 years and have been careful to undergo each of my major areas of professional development with a different training school so that I don’t become a ‘typecast’ coach. I like to find new perspectives, models and approaches with each additional piece of development I undertake. My hope is that one of the things that characterises my coaching is a really creative approach that draws on a wide variety of ideas and processes and keeps challenging my clients to new views and possibilities. I love variety and creativity and know that I move through the change curve rather quickly myself, so I’m always alert to finding a pace and approach that work for my clients without making them too comfortable. When I first came to coaching, I already had some basic counselling training. I’d also been a Samaritan for several years. That is still some of the most profound development I’ve ever had – both the training and the work – and it provided a base for much of my later work in different professional contexts. I started coach training with CoachU and was able to do teleconference



training, sometimes in the middle of the night, while continuing the day job. It was a great practical grounding. Later I also trained with the now defunct UK College of Life Coaching and then did a certificate in the psychology of coaching with the Academy of Executive Coaching and my supervisor training with Coaching Development. I’m now at the point of telling myself no more huge chunks of training! I also often tell myself I’ll never write another extended essay or thesis… but you never know what might creep up on you and I am actually currently writing a coaching book with a colleague. Indeed, I am currently engaged in several projects that my accountant views with suspicion and calls ‘non-core activity’. These are where my learning edge currently resides. So the book is a big stretch and working with someone else makes it a great learning opportunity. I am also running workshops with my daughter, who is an actor. We’ve taken the principles of improvisation and are using them to work with coaches on presence and intuition. There is nothing like creating learning opportunities for others to help you learn yourself and, on top of that, the workshops are often improvised as they evolve, so each one provides enough stretch to keep me going for weeks! Back to today and the reverse walk back over the bridge, this time among hurrying people and into a buzzing Waterloo. I notice that I catch the urgency of the bustle and whizz onto the train just in time, which is never a good plan as seats are scarce at this time of day. However, I work on the premise that if I keep walking I will find a seat – and I nearly always do. Today it works and I squeeze into a seat at a table and have another think before reading for a while. The think is somewhat more systematic than it might sound: it’s a gathering of my impressions of each client and what, with a little bit of retrospection, is my feel for the key pieces in our work. I also review how we worked and pose myself a few questions about how else I might have responded and what other possible approaches there were. I note things that need to marinate more or to take to supervision. Now, if the day so far all sounds somewhat Pollyanna-ish, it is! I have worked hard to set up my working patterns and business to be delightful

whenever possible. Before I became a coach, I worked for a long time in community education. I was especially passionate about my work with the people then known as ‘adult returners’. I worked with adult learners with very varied histories, including ex-offenders, recovering alcoholics and people who had left school early in trying circumstances. It was fabulous preparation for working with leaders in multinationals! However, we often worked in grotty places: leaking huts, draughty village halls, remote workshops and wobbly prefabs. So when I went freelance, I promised myself I would, as much as possible, work in delightful and delicious places. I try to do serious work in restorative environments and have fun. So all my work now is still around my passionate interest in how people learn, grow and manage themselves; it’s such a luxury to have choice about where and how I work and my aim for all my clients is that they should also have choice in their professional and personal lives. Many evenings I host a CPD teleclass or listen to assessment recordings. I like the irregularity of my working day: having a three-hour lunch with a friend, then working quietly in the evening. Just as it is getting dark (late in the day as it’s June when I write this), I walk around the garden again. Some flowers seem luminous in the dusk and the scents and sounds are different from the morning. It puts me back in touch with another rhythm. Jenny Bird MCC has been coaching since 2000 and works with senior leaders, including directors of FTSE 100 companies, leaders in financial and legal firms, senior civil servants, CEOs and directors in the NHS. She supervises coaches individually and in groups, assesses professional standards for the International Coach Federation and trains internal coaches as well as delivering CPD for coaches throughout Europe.

The Thinking Global series is drawing together a diverse collection of contributions to build a body of knowledge describing international coaching in all its facets and from multiple perspectives. In this contribution by series editor Jo Birch, she describes her personal experience of working globally, offering leadership support to the senior management team of a regional hospital in rural Mongolia as part of an international development project. Jo Birch is series editor for Thinking Global.

For me the core skills of coaching are absolute presence with the client, listening till your ears squeak, being comfortable in unknowing and being willing to voice your truth without attachment

Thinking global


Transformation and change starting with myself


Series editor Jo Birch found herself having to learn yet again that to go forward often means letting go of pre-fixed plans, staying open to new opportunities, overcoming internal fears and trusting the process… how often had she heard that?

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s I look out the window, squinting past the strong sun’s rays, I count… 18, 19… 20! I delight in watching the graceful, gentle movement of the Demoiselle cranes and their young as they paddle in shallow pools and streams. I look up into the pure blue sky and see countless birds of prey, some floating down to rest on fence posts – watching as the bus passes. At this time of year the steppe is littered with herds – horses and foals, sheep, cows, goats… camels here and there – young and old Mongolian herders ride, or walk, with their livestock. Mongolia – flourishing wild life, vast expanses of space, biggest ever skies. When I drove along this road for the first time in the winter I saw only three herds in the six-hour journey – now there are so many I can’t count them. In winter it was like crossing the top of a

cake, slicing through frosted icing – through deep, deep snow and ice, at around -30ºC. Mongolia has over 300 sunny days a year, winter and summer. It’s the second largest land-locked country in the world, said to have three million people and 43 million livestock. ‘Airag-o, airag-o!’, the young girl calls from the edge of the road. She hopes the driver will pull over, spilling passengers to buy from her tabletop stall. The family ger (a round tent like a yurt) has been moved near to the road for the season. She holds a round bowl of airag – fermented mare’s milk – balanced on the palm of her hand, arm straight and outstretched. Countryside airag is the best – especially that from Uvurkhangai, the province where I live. Mongolians eat meat in the winter, slaughtering animals in November when the

temperature drops well below freezing and into the winter averages of -30ºC to -50ºC. The meat freezes and lasts all winter. During the summer months traditionally only rice and dairy products would be eaten. Various factors, including greater wealth and wider availability, now mean Mongolians eat meat throughout the year. Vegetables are not too popular, except as animal fodder. It’s very common for Mongolian herding families to move up to four times a year. Everything is packed, in the traditional order, onto the van – previously onto camels or horses – and moved to the new location, depending on the season. Life in a ger is tough, with no running water, even in gers in the city or town, and fires need to be lit for survival in the extreme winter temperatures.



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’m travelling to the capital city, Ulaanbaatar or UB, from my home town, Arvaikheer. It’s a seven or eight-hour bus ride – 470 kilometres. It’s a slow journey but Mongolians are great travellers; they are nomadic people. The children on the bus rarely complain; they travel quietly, sleeping sometimes. No toys, books, crayons. Mongolians have a different concept of personal space to that in my country – during the ride it’s not uncommon to find a nearby baby being draped across your knee, or a stranger’s head resting on your shoulder. The majority (96 per cent) of the Mongolian population are of one ethnicity. Foreigners, like me, especially outside UB, are still rare. Babies and children look and stare – adults are friendly and smile… especially at my attempts to speak Mongolian. We have a music video on the bus – I hum along to the now familiar tunes – and then some slapstick Mongolian comedy, which makes everybody laugh. Sometimes the road ahead has crumbled and the bus needs to carve a new route through the steppe. The steppe may look gently undulating from a distance but anyone who has ridden across it in any motor vehicle can assure you it’s bumpy and unpredictable… and soon becomes a journey for those with a ‘good constitution’. There are very few roads here. Most travel is across the steppe on these turbulent tracks. A different terrain I’m wondering. I am providing leadership support to the senior team of a regional hospital. How does the history, land, environment and culture of the people affect what I am doing? How is it similar and different from how I would approach the task in the UK? Take this journey for a start. In a good, strong car it could take six hours. It’s the only way to the capital… in fact, there is no other town along the road. Therefore any time the hospital leadership team need to liaise with Department of Health or Ministry colleagues it’s a trip of several days to get there and back. Up-to-date IT equipment might make those journeys fewer, but we don’t have that. The hospital IT system is very basic. Our regional hospital covers five aimags (provinces). People can travel for up to two days to get here – not a journey to be taken lightly and

therefore often left much later than is good for the patient. The culture – there are so many things I could describe – where shall I begin? In rural Mongolia, nearest neighbours can be far away. Any passing visitor would expect to come into your home and receive a meal – imagine arriving in temperatures of -50ºC… you would hope that door would open… not much room for chance. Visits are rarely announced. At home and at work, anyone can walk through a door – there would be no knock, no formality, no matter whose office it is… or what patient is being examined. No goodbyes. The Mongolian word for goodbye is rarely spoken – only when it’s certain there will be no reconnection; at some point in a conversation, people very often simply walk away. Karaoke and competition – two great loves of modern Mongolia! A long tradition of song has been taken into a contemporary environment in small urban and rural spaces. Perhaps not a great influence on my work in the hospital! However, the national love of competition is evident at work. An internal innovation competition is rewarded by a trip to China. Young business leaders told me I should open workshops by distributing my cv and stating my credentials. The concept of rewarding participation was met with a blank look by colleagues: ‘No, let’s reward the winner!’ Modern Mongolia is changing. The world’s largest undeveloped gold and copper mine is now located in the South Gobi. This, with its associated industry and services, is one of the largest influences of change. The leadership required in new Mongolia seems different. In the past, up to 1991, Mongolia was under Soviet influence. Independence was celebrated, and the relationship and trading with Russia remains strong. The administration took care of some decisions: the party in power; how many animals to rear; equal wages on a Monday regardless of job. New ways of thinking seem necessary – a different capacity for discerning options, considering consequences and benefits, making choices… and a new model of international collaboration. Many of Mongolia’s biggest dilemmas are associated with greater wealth and fast economic growth. We know that even change

that is seen as ‘good’ and welcome can be challenging. The questions for leadership are many and complex…. How do we ensure fair wealth distribution? How do we manage the gap between the rich and the poor? How do we up-skill our workforce to meet the needs of today’s industry? What will happen to traditional farming, roles, society as we know it? And, as you might imagine, there are many, many issues to be explored with the source of this new wealth, and the impact of mining in the Gobi – on the environment, communities, tradition, on values and so on. Making myself at home Where do I start to tell you how this impacted on my work in the provincial capital? Or maybe a better question is: how did I adapt to fulfil positive outcomes amid all the complexity of being within a new culture at a time of great change? What was useful here from my life in the West? What supported me to retain my grounding and my sense of self in order that I could bring myself in as a resource for others? What was unhelpful? At the beginning my counselling skills supported me to build a picture of my new environment and to create bonds with new colleagues: listening, setting aside assumptions, noticing without judgment, holding the unfolding of a complex new system without rushing to label, compartmentalise or to fully understand. In orientating myself into the new environment, I didn’t look to provide the climate for growth for others: I needed to provide this for myself as I entered this space where everything seemed different. I searched for the familiar. I extended compassion to myself as I conquered the exhaustion, struggled with Cyrillic and tripped over myself in my desperation to be culturally appropriate and respectful while, quite honestly, often groping in the dark. Drawing on coaching skills, I extended my knowledge by asking the naïve questions, my curiosity opening cross-cultural dialogue and encouraging sharing. I laughed with Mongolian colleagues as I grappled with this newness and difference.

I was fully in the place of ‘not knowing’, so familiar to my years of counselling, and a principle that underpins my coaching. These sets of skills enabled me to stay in a place of discovery and open inquiry as I felt my way into understanding the system and systems within which I found myself. I could see how my coaching skills were supporting me – formulating, positioning and timing questions – and also how they were not supporting me! Sadly, one of my worst moments was in an early ‘coaching’ session with a senior staff member in which she so much wanted to pose the ‘problem’ and be informed of the one sure solution. She puzzled as to why anyone would be interested in asking or exploring questions. My interpreter also thought this seemed an unhelpful intervention and here it all unravelled, leaving me to learn some great lessons. First, the importance of clearly and fully preparing my interpreter with my purpose and intentions and, second, more importantly, noticing that, with the best of intentions, I still had not matched the system requirements. I had still come in with something that wasn’t what was needed or appropriate. So where did this leave me? During the time I was in Mongolia, around eight months, I had one sheet of flip-chart paper… just one. I was going to use this wisely! I used a simple framework 1 to map my discoveries about the system. Around the edge I scoped the system – what was around me, what was I seeing, hearing, sensing and observing? I detailed the key features of the national, regional and local strategic documentation, getting a sense of the aspirational outcomes for optimum health services across Mongolia. I then moved into a more interpersonal space and documented conversations with all senior staff in the regional hospital and also with ministry officials and senior national and international officers in relevant development agencies. What were their most pressing issues? What did they hope for from me? What didn’t they want or need? Last, I noted conversations with local people on their views and experiences. All was documented, including my early disastrous coaching session.

Overcoming resistance The most striking observation at this point was that nothing appeared coherent. Every part of the system seemed to hope for something different and certainly none of it seemed aligned to my placement description, which had been compiled two years before my arrival. The landscape had changed and I walked into a context that had moved on. This would be true of many consultancy contracts and there is place for re-evaluation in the early stages – to continually notice changes and not expect everything to be static. Mapping the system on my flip chart helped me to see the pattern of complexity. What on earth would that mean I could or would do? What does this all mean to me now? This analysis emerged on my flip chart in notes of various colours turning inwards in a spiral as I considered options, benefits, consequences… in this phase only two points of convergence emerged: teach the meaning of outcomes/ outputs – and teach English! No! No! No! My resistance kicked in. The first part was easy: teaching outcomes and outputs. I worked out how to join an innovative national ‘training-the-trainers’ scheme focused on rolling out improved business planning within the national health sector. I could work alongside Mongolian Department of Health senior staff to deliver the programme in the regional setting. It was a great week of training and I was able to receive and contribute to group learning and also ensure that any of my subsequent local interventions were consistent with the national scheme. The two small details of ‘outcome/output’ (encompassed within the broader programme) would enable the hospital not only to develop better strategic plans but also to describe their work more clearly and bid more successfully for future resources. However the notion of teaching English challenged me to the core. Internal fears of ‘failure’ lurked, nourished by my lack of experience, credibility – ability, even! I listened to myself, acknowledged my concerns, drew images, ran, rested, reflected and pretty soon something shifted in me. I decided to ‘trust the process’. How many times have I said this, heard this – here I go…

Sometimes the road ahead has crumbled and the bus needs to carve a new route through the steppe. The steppe may look gently undulating from a distance but anyone who has ridden across it in any motor vehicle can assure you it’s bumpy and unpredictable…



Nothing appeared coherent. Every part of the system seemed to hope for something different and certainly none of it seemed aligned to my placement description, which had been compiled two years before my arrival. The landscape had changed and I walked into a context that had moved on I embarked on an online Teaching English as a Foreign Language (TEFL) course before work and in the evenings to underpin the coming work and, to the delight of the whole hospital, especially the director, I announced that I would be running English classes with groups and individuals – both planned sessions and ad hoc. People could book me at any time of day or evening. This was an English-teaching intensive! I concentrated on anyone with motivation. The senior ‘young’ doctors came forward as a group. These were emerging leaders, heads of hospital departments, surgical specialties, traditional medicine etc. Mongolia is a country well used to young leaders. These young people would shape the health service to come and much of their opportunity for professional growth would depend on being able to access internet resources, conduct professional conversations with peers around the world and make applications for bursaries and resources – all requiring good English. I became hugely excited about my English programme, and fortune intervened with the arrival of a new interpreter who was also an English teacher. I tailored the whole English programme to the medical environment and to the challenges of leadership – first revising English basics and then moving into specific medical terminology. Fourteen years of hospital nursing combined with experience in community health service design all came together – the national culture may be different but the health setting was familiar. I made numerous games and resources from paper and ‘scotch tape’ – this staple ‘glue’ of Mongolia twisted and turned around my creations. I worked with the doctors to enhance their ability to speak about their professional specialty. We explored conversations between doctor and patient, extending their ability to reflect and question each other and give feedback. We played! We made videos and read news articles; we listened to ‘Adele’ and enjoyed exploring cultural differences. My choice to notice and release my own resistance had been a good one. The intervention was ‘English teaching’; however the outcome was improved leadership,

as shown by the new long-term aspirations of group members, new skills, confidence and connections. Opportunism and optimism Fortune struck once more. I heard a Merseyside accent in the post office in UB. I was immediately drawn to connecting, having lived on Merseyside most of my adult life. They turned out to be medical students from Newcastle University. In an opportunistic moment I saw an extension to my English programme! The students had a five-week placement in a specialist national hospital and were interested in experiencing facilities in the countryside. I could arrange that! And my doctors could have three days speaking English about their specialist areas. This was perfect. If I had not conquered ‘myself’ and my resistance, I would not have seen this amazing possibility. I returned to the countryside and set in motion everything that was necessary. Obtaining permission from the hospital’s director was easy – Mongolians are generally very optimistic and hopeful; they expect things to work out well. Cheap accommodation was secured from one of the few English speakers in town – the owner of the Loving Hut vegan restaurant. I matched young doctors to med students and came up with wider social events for the whole group, connecting the students to local Peace Corps volunteers for evening activities. In my small town there were only nine foreigners in the population of 25,000. I would not actually be there when the British students arrived. I was travelling in the Gobi that week. All I had to do was let go now and let it unfold. In the sweltering +44ºC heat of the desert I forgot about the project back in my town. On my return I gulped… oops… how had it gone? Over in the hospital I found the students dressed in scrubs, blending in with organisational life: working in outpatients, accessing information on the internet, supporting patients and staff, assisting in specialist surgery! This was a huge crescendo to my English programme. I was bursting with pride… some for me, for ‘going for it’ and most for this group of young professionals who had grasped the opportunity and were

using it to change lives. It had become a peer-topeer exchange, not the visitation by foreign experts that is so often a feature of international development programmes but something that was relevant to this part of Mongolia’s national developmental journey. The doctors stretched their capability in English communication, the students gained incredible experiences, all built mutual respect and together they made a remarkable impact on the hospital and community life. Leadership for the future depends on entering a new phase of growth – stretching and extending ability to be creative, to think through situations, consider options, engage others, to be collaborative. It requires a stretch and I used a number of other frameworks such as Action Logics2 as background reference points to help me understand the systemic shifts required and how I could create conditions for this change to occur in the distinct sphere where I had influence. Mongolia’s future may require a different kind of critical thinking than has been necessary before, new skills and abilities, embracing longer term and broader possibilities, and a willingness to enter unknown and uncertain domains with no sure answer. I loved Mongolia and recognise this account is only a very small part of my experience. My work there now involves a different context: executive coaching with the most senior corporate Mongolian leaders, helping them navigate the complexities of their roles in multi-national organisations. The similarities and differences in our cultures remain a key consideration in my coaching work. The medical students have gone on to create a social business and remain in contact with the doctors.3 Many people have a part to play in making Mongolia into the kind of nation its people want to see – a nation where wealth is shared; one that is driven by strong values and held by steady, confident leadership. My intention is to bring myself fully into the service of the people and the country that I grew to love so much, using the unique experience of living in the Mongolian countryside, learning with humility as I go along, and fully rejoicing in the successes alongside my Mongolian colleagues and friends.

References 1 Eoyang G. What? So what? Now what? YouTube; 19 March; 2011. http://www. youtube.com/watch?v=3b4xbZ_HU5U [accessed 27 August, 2013]. 2 Torbert B. Action inquiry: the secret of timely and transforming leadership. San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler; 2004. 3 See Medics2Mongolia http://medics2mongolia.com/ [accessed 27 August, 2013]. Jo Birch is series editor of Thinking Global and Chair of BACP Coaching. For a glimpse into volunteer life in Mongolia, visit http://jobirch.tumblr.com/


Coaching for compassionate leadership in medicine Medical doctor Lis Paice describes how her coaching journey has changed her practice as healthcare leader and educator, and helped her build a culture of compassion and collaboration within the profession.



L

earning to coach has been full of surprises for me. I was surprised how hard it is to learn some of the skills. I was surprised by how effective these skills are when mastered. But the biggest surprise has been the way it has changed how I work as a doctor and a leader. It has changed the way I think about things and the way I relate to other people. It is honestly no exaggeration to say it has changed my life. I didn’t stumble on coaching until I was late on in my medical career. By then I had taken on the role of Postgraduate Medical Dean for London, responsible for the specialist training of some 12,000 doctors. This was a big job, a leadership role far removed from individual trainee/trainer relationships. Nonetheless I found myself having to deal personally with a number of ‘trainees in difficulty’. These were junior doctors who were repeatedly falling at career hurdles, facing disciplinary procedures, or suffering from mental or physical ill health.1 There were at that time no systems or processes in place to support them. Having interviewed several of these doctors and having read the pleas from their employers (which boiled down to ‘Please take this trainee away and give me one that works!’), I realised we needed to set up some kind of support system. I


talked it over with a colleague at the Tavistock Clinic and together we set up the MedNet service, offering self-referral psychological counselling to doctors in training. The demand rapidly exceeded our expectations. We began to realise that the trainees coming to my attention were just the tip of the iceberg. There was a lot of unhappiness and exhaustion out there, and a lot of it was being caused by a toxic work environment.2,3 Young doctors were being sleep-deprived, worn down by heavy workloads and made anxious by poor supervision. To top it all, a trainee survey showed many young doctors felt bullied at work.4,5 Something had to be done. We embarked on a campaign to make the working conditions of doctors more humane. If employers and supervisors could not show these young doctors compassion, then how could we expect them to show compassion to their patients? One element of the campaign was to expose and tackle workplace bullies. Who were these appalling consultants who were making the lives of their juniors a misery, and how could we stamp out this behaviour? I wrote to the hospitals where the survey had shown the highest prevalence of bullying by consultants. The response of the chief executives was, ‘Just give me their names!

I’ll sort them out!’ The next time a trainee came to see me to complain about being bullied by his consultant, I got his permission to contact the chief executive. I made the approach by telephone. The chief executive seemed very happy that I had contacted her: ‘This is exactly the evidence I was looking for!’ Unsurprisingly, the next person I heard from was the consultant himself, wanting to know why I had not raised my concerns directly with him and why I had not wanted to hear his side of the story. I met him, and of course it all sounded very different from his perspective. He seemed just as bullied, beleaguered and in need of support as the trainee. Support not blame I talked it all over with wiser heads. That was when I first heard about ‘executive coaching.’ In future, we decided, we would focus more on support than blame. We would offer both ‘victim’ and ‘perpetrator’ six sessions with an experienced executive coach, with the aim of helping them to a better understanding of the interpersonal relationships underlying the problem. Much to my surprise, it was the ‘perpetrators’ who turned out to be most eager to accept the offer and who got the most out of the sessions. It seemed that, in

As a doctor, I was skilled at asking questions, but they were dictated by my professional agenda... I wanted to find out what was wrong with the patient so that I could fix it. Coaching starts from the premise that the client is OK and not in need of fixing. The light bulb that matters is the one that goes on in the head of the client, not the coach

the main, they were horrified to hear that they were seen as bullies. From their point of view they were just trying to make sure that their patients were properly looked after and their trainees properly trained.6 It seemed the pressures in the NHS were putting a strain on everyone, senior and junior. ‘Working in overcrowded busy outpatient departments and theatres, with artificial targets, in under-resourced environments, while simultaneously attempting to deliver the curriculum by transferring a lifetime of expertise in a few moments can be difficult at times, even for saints.’ Consultant surgeon accused of bullying6 The success of MedNet7 and the executive coaching scheme for ‘doctors in difficulty’ and their supervisors was encouraging, but clearly we needed to do more: prevention rather than cure. We decided to set up a coaching and mentoring service. The idea was to provide support for junior doctors before they became stressed or burnt out or started to struggle. The mentors were to be senior consultants and GPs who already had educational roles.8 The doctor appointed to develop the service felt that all the mentors should be required to attend a threeday ‘basic coaching skills’ course, provided by a company with an excellent reputation. It was my job to keep an eye on costs, and this sounded expensive, unnecessary and possibly even insulting. How would experienced professionals react to being told to take three days out of clinical practice to learn what was surely just a matter of common sense and experience? Rather than argue about it, my colleague urged me to take the course myself, to understand why this was important. It was pretty clear, that first morning of the course, as we sat in the obligatory semi-circle around the inevitable flip chart, that I was not the only reluctant learner in the room. The facilitator must have sensed the resistance because he got us straight into an exercise: get yourselves into pairs and take turns to give each other advice about how to make some change in your life. Everyone perked up. This was going to be a chance to demonstrate that we already had all the ‘basic coaching skills’ we needed, honed through years of medical practice. My partner’s problem was something I had experienced myself and I had plenty of advice for him. I was sorry when we had to swap roles, especially as he had nothing to tell me about solving my problem that I hadn’t already thought of for myself. His enthusiasm for his own suggestions

was quite oppressive. In discussion afterwards, it turned out that everyone had found the experience of being advised uncomfortable and unhelpful. And yet we spent our lives doing it. We prided ourselves on the quality of the advice we gave our patients and our juniors, generously sharing our expertise and explaining anything that wasn’t clear. Surely that was our job? The facilitator had heard it all before. He accepted everything we had to say about our jobs as doctors but if we wanted to learn to coach, we would have to shake off the habit of advice giving. ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive – especially if the gift is advice!’9 Those three days turned out to be the beginning of a learning journey that most of us who attended that course are still on. I found the journey so absorbing and surprising that I wrote a book about it.9 The service was well-received by doctors applying to be mentored,10 and more and more mentors had to be trained. The feedback from these about the wider benefits was also very positive. It seemed as though learning to take a coaching approach gave senior doctors the skills to manage performance issues within their own teams constructively and get the best out of their own juniors. It turned out to have an impact on the way they approached consultations with patients too. ‘It is amazing how many of the mentors are coming back and telling me that the training has revolutionised the way they themselves work with their patients.’ Coaching trainer9 Respect and trust So what is it about learning to coach that makes such a difference? For me it boils down to a single word – respect. The principles of coaching take respect for the client to a new level. If you really believe in the resourcefulness of the client, it follows that the best way you can help is by unleashing that resourcefulness – something best done by asking powerful questions. As a doctor, of course, I was pretty skilled at asking questions, but they were questions dictated by my professional agenda. I wanted to find out what was wrong with the patient so that I could fix it. Coaching starts from the premise that the client is OK and not in need of fixing. Coach and client are equals, working together to help the client make the changes he or she wants to make. The light bulb that matters is the one that goes on in the head of the client, not the coach.

The six principles of coaching 11 1. The client is resourceful 2. The coach’s role is to develop the client’s resourcefulness 3. Coaching addresses the whole person 4. The client sets the agenda 5. The coach and the client are equals 6. Coaching is about change and action Even outside the coaching encounters, my behaviour changed. I talked less and listened more. I paid attention to the language people used and did not make assumptions based on my own experience. I controlled a tendency to be judgmental. These new skills and attitudes stood me in good stead when I took on a new leadership challenge. I was asked to chair an initiative to integrate health and social care across a large chunk of London. It would be my role to get a variety of people and organisations to agree to work together around the needs of patients. Acute general hospitals, mental health trusts, community health trusts, GPs, social care and patient charities all needed to work together and communicate with each other in order to ensure everyone was acting in the best interests of patients. Patients had made it clear they were fed up with having to deal with services that did not communicate with each other, but it was hard to overcome the obstacles presented by myriad organisations, all with different IT systems, funding streams, governance and cultures. It would be a challenge to get everyone in a room, let alone reach an agreement. The first meeting I chaired was difficult, with some people expressing cynicism about the purpose behind the initiative and questioning each other’s motives for engaging. The comments made suggested that tribalism and stereotyping were alive and well. Without the engagement and support of clinicians and managers, this initiative was not going to work. I tried to apply to the situation what I had learned as a coach. It was clear that we needed to agree a common goal, common values and a set of common principles. The people in the room were altruistic, able and resourceful. The main obstacle was lack of trust – in the proposed changes and in each other. I decided we would only achieve trust if people felt respected and valued. At the next meeting I put all my effort into modelling respectful behaviour myself, as chair, and making sure that every voice was listened to with equal attention. I made sure people rephrased metaphors or dramatic phrases into simple, clean


language. I used frequent summarising to check understanding and establish common ground. I offered feedback to the participants, as a group and individually. As people started to develop a vision about what we could do to improve care for patients, and started to see that everyone was facing the same problems in achieving it, respect and trust grew. It became clear that we were all on the same side, trying to do our best for patients, and that fragmentation of services was doing no one any favours. We needed to make sure that the staff who worked with each patient communicated with the patient and with each other, and that the services employing these staff talked to each other and shared relevant data. It has been a privilege to watch the way the representatives of all those organisations have worked with each other and with patients to develop a culture of mutual respect and to commit to change the way they work.12 Their collaboration even won the Leadership Academy’s accolade of NHS Partnership of the Year 2012!13 That issue of workplace bullying has been in the news again. No one who has followed the recent scandals in the NHS can be unaware of the risks of allowing a culture of fear to develop within any organisation, but especially in healthcare, where collaboration and compassion are so important. The recent report14 into the culture of the Care Quality Commission makes good reading for anyone intent on addressing a culture of bullying or harassment in their organisation. It recommends training senior staff to show that they value those who work for them, rewarding them for creating a positive and supportive atmosphere, and encouraging them to role model this kind of behaviour themselves. It recommends that all staff be offered training in working with others and how to have difficult conversations effectively. And it recommends a coaching and mentoring approach to managing staff, creating a culture of support and collaboration rather than fear and isolation. From my own experience I would agree with every word of that. If you are a leader there are few personal development exercises more worthwhile than learning to become a coach and mentor. Lis Paice OBE FRCP FInstLM is a doctor, executive coach and chair of two integrated care pilots in London. Her recent book New Coach: reflections from a learning journey is published by McGraw-Hill.

References 1 Paice E, Orton V, Appleyard J. Managing trainee doctors in difficulty. Hospital Medicine 1999; 60: 130–133. 2 Paice E, Rutter H, Wetherell M, Winder B, McManus IC. Stressful incidents, stress and coping strategies in the pre-registration house officer year. Medical Education 2002; 36: 56–65. 3 Hale R, Hudson L. The cobbler’s children: how the medical profession looks after its own. British Journal of Hospital Medicine 1992; 47: 405–406. 4 Paice E, Aitken MA, Houghton A, Firth-Cozens J. Bullying among doctors in training: cross sectional questionnaire survey. British Medical Journal 2004; 329: 658–659. 5 Paice E, Smith D. Bullying of trainee doctors is a patient safety issue. The Clinical Teacher 2009; 6: 13–17. 6 Paice E, Firth-Cozens J. Who’s a bully then? Career focus. British Medical Journal 2003; 12: 326. 7 Meerten M, Bland J, Gross S, Garelick G. Doctors’ experience of a bespoke physician consultation service: cross-sectional investigation. The Psychiatrist 2011; 35: 206-212. 8 London Deanery. Coaching and mentoring. http://mentoring.londondeanery.ac.uk/ 9 Paice L. New coach: reflections from a learning journey. Buckingham: Open University Press/ McGraw-Hill; 2012. 10 Viney R, Sensky T, Paice E. Why do doctors want a mentor? A study of applications to a UK mentoring service. The International Journal of Mentoring and Coaching 2012; 10: 39–54. 11 Rogers J. Coaching skills: a handbook (3rd ed). Buckingham: Open University Press/ McGrawHill; 2012. 12 Vize R. Integrated care: a story of hard-won success. British Medical Journal 2012; 344: e3529. 13 NHS Leadership Academy. News. Outstanding health leaders named in national awards. Leeds: NHS Leadership Academy; 11 December 2012. http://www.leadershipacademy.nhs.uk/about/ media/news/leadership-awards/outstandinghealth-leaders-named-in-national-awards/ 14 People Opportunities Ltd. Exploring bullying and harassment in the CQC: summary document. Doncaster: People Opportunities Ltd; July 2013: http://www.cqc.org.uk/sites/ default/files/media/documents/bullying_and_ harassment_in_cqc.pdf (Accessed 27/7/13)

Special offer exclusively for Coaching Today readers Copies of Lis’s book New Coach: Reflections from a Learning Journey are available to buy directly from the publisher at a special 20% discount. This offer is exclusive to readers of Coaching Today. To claim your discount, visit www.openup.co.uk/paice and enter promotional code COACH13.

On the coa ch © Ed Miller


Stephen Palmer, founder and Director of the Centre for Stress Management, talks to Linda Aspey about his philosophy and work.

LA What drew you to coaching and how did your journey start? SP My journey into this type of work started very early, in fact when I was a child – I was always interested in what made people tick. When I was about 10 years old I used hypnosis on myself and tried it out on my sister. As a teenager I became interested in primal therapy. A friend and I talked about setting up a therapy institute sometime in the future. Later in life I went down the psychology route and he the psychiatry one. In 1987 the original vision came into being with the Centre for Stress Management.

results and improve their workplace performance too. Stress counselling was a tertiary intervention and I wanted to focus on primary interventions. I realised that coaching could also be a primary intervention. I’m particularly talking about approaches that take a solution-focused and cognitive behavioural stance. As therapies, they can be easily adapted to coaching. We set up the Centre for Coaching in 2001. It was around 2002 that students attending our Certificate in Coaching course at the centre asked me which professional bodies to join. After a discussion relating to the cognitive behavioural psychological coaching they were being trained in, I suggested that we could set up a LA How did your career evolve from new professional body that was inclusive. that point? The outcome from this discussion was that SP I was particularly interested in effective Katherine Tulpa, Alex Szabo, Gladeana stress management, both one-to-one and in McMahon and I became involved in setting up groups. At that time most of it was around a a professional body. I still have the original one-to-one model. Organisations were not letter pinned on my wallboard dated 7 May particularly interested in organisational stress 2002, signed on behalf of the Secretary of prevention at that time. Then, in the 1990s, State giving us the go-ahead with the name, with stressed employees taking their employers to court, organisations became more Association for Coaching. Our Associate Director at the centre, Michael Neenan, gave interested in stress prevention. In those days the Health and Safety Executive recommended the inaugural meeting lecture at the RSA (the Royal Society for the encouragement of Arts, a risk assessment approach, which tended to Manufactures and Commerce). Exciting times. focus on workplace stressors such as work overload etc. As a therapist and trainer I realised The rest is history. that organisational change would not always LA Coaching has become extremely popular tackle an employee’s stress levels. over the last 10 years or so – do you have a view For example, if an individual has a rigidly perfectionistic attitude such as ‘I must perform as to why? SP Sportspeople were often hired to give well at all times’, then this puts pressure on motivational lectures to leaders, so the concept them and organisational change is unlikely to of having a coach was not alien to them. work. So I wondered ‘How can I really help Coaching is accepted in top sports – and now, in employees, not just the organisation?’ The many cases, in industry it’s seen as a badge of trouble was, by the time we saw them for office, a positive perk. People don’t mind saying stress counselling many were already burnt ‘I’ve got a coach’ but they’re less likely to say out. I realised that a primary intervention they’re seeing a counsellor. What has changed a tackling the stressors (in this case, internal lot too in the last 10 years is that we used to see demands and attitudes) would give better

a lot of life coaches advertising their services; now it’s much more likely to be called ‘personal coaching’ for the individual. Another parallel issue is health and wellbeing. Those of us lucky enough to have jobs are more concerned about wellbeing than in the past and there has been an increase in evidence-based health and wellness coaching internationally. I think coaching is here to stay. And now that so much more research is being done, for example in the field of coaching psychology, I think it can only get better and better. LA Do you have a particular life philosophy that is present in your coaching? SP I think it would be stoicism. Marcus Aurelius’s book Meditations1 made a big impact on me. I’m not expecting my clients to be stoical but it does work for me and informs my practice. Whether used within cognitive behavioural therapy/coaching or rational emotive behavioural therapy/coaching, it’s the philosophical stance I choose. In the workplace there is no time for stress and poor performance: people want to resolve their challenges and do so pragmatically and Albert Ellis’s ABC (Activating Event, Belief, Consequences) helps it to happen quickly.2 LA Who or what have been your biggest influences in your professional life? SP My grandparents were a big influence on me from an early age. I used to live with them during the week for my first 10 years. My grandfather was a turf accountant. I now realise that I imbibed the idea that people ran their own businesses. I don’t bet, apart from on the Grand National, by the way! When I was 14 or 15 I started a mail order electronics company with a friend. We were building what was known as converters for radio hams (amateur radio enthusiasts). It was great fun too. Then when I got into therapy work my biggest


influences were Isaac Marks (behavioural therapy), Aaron Beck (cognitive therapy), Windy Dryden and Albert Ellis (rational emotive behavioural therapy (REBT)) and Arnold Lazarus (multimodal therapy). In the early days at the Centre for Stress Management with Michael Neenan and Gladeana McMahon, we adapted these approaches for organisational work and coaching. In my 1996 book Dealing with People Problems at Work3 we didn’t use the terms ‘counsellor’ or ‘coach’; instead we used terms such as ‘a face-to-face problem-solver’ or ‘problem-solver manager’, combining REBT, cognitive and problem-solving skills. Also feedback from my clients and trainees has been a big influence. I’ve written over 200 papers and written or edited 40 books and each of these have influenced me further. LA What’s been your most memorable learning experience? SP I suppose if you consider that I spend a lot of my life giving lectures, running workshops for my own centre and also speaking at conferences and so on, perhaps I should share a learning experience that relates to that work. When I was about 12 years old at school I gave my first classroom lecture on an area I had been experimenting with, as I previously mentioned – hypnosis. I prepared the lecture and read directly from notes. My teacher’s feedback about the content was fine although I think she may have been a bit surprised about the topic. However her comments about my delivery were negative as she didn’t like me reading from notes. That experience has stuck in my mind. Since then I don’t read from a script unless I’ve been asked to when working overseas and the translators need written notes. Today I’ll use PowerPoint slides to keep me focused on the topic, and the rest is just what I say in the moment.

In the workplace there is no time for stress and poor performance – people want to resolve their challenges and do so pragmatically



In many cases in industry having a coach is seen as a badge of office, a positive perk LA How do you take care of yourself in the work and how do you switch off each day? SP Generally when I’m working with clients or coachees or running workshops, they or the event get all of my attention. Interestingly, this switches me off from all my other responsibilities. I have to stay alert to pick up their core beliefs and I might feed these back in how they might link to their current behaviour. So I am focused and it helps me personally. If you have ‘high frustration tolerance’ – which I do – you may find something hard work but, in the jargon of REBT, ‘I know I can stand it’. For total relaxation I enjoy walking. I make sure I have a 20-minute walk every day. I really enjoy coastal walking listening to jazz, a candlelit dinner every evening with jazz playing in the background. I’ll try to find a jazz club wherever I go in the world with my job. LA What are you reading right now? SP On a daily basis I read a wide range of journals that inform my research, practice and general interests in areas such as psychology, health education, biology, accountancy and health and safety. In the past 24 hours I’ve been dipping into a book I co-edited with my colleague Michael Neenan, Cognitive Behavioural Coaching in Practice.4 When I’m developing a new workshop or presentation I find it useful to re-read what I and my close colleagues have written about the topic, as well as new material.

LA How would you like your life and your work to be remembered? SP In the work sphere, perhaps I would like to be remembered as a facilitator and collaborator. My work with professional bodies has been of immense satisfaction and I’d like to think that I’ve helped the profession and the practitioners. I’ve collaborated in a lot of research and I hope this will all be useful. By my clients and coachees, I’d like to be thought of perhaps as somebody who was supportive and challenging as and when necessary. And by my family – we have a lot of young people in the family and I hope they’d say I have been supportive. We stay in touch by text or Facebook. For my partner – well that’s up to her to decide how to remember me! Certainly she is my support! References 1 Marcus Aurelius. Mediations. London: Penguin Classics; 2006 (first published AD 171–175) (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ Meditations for online English translations/ editions). 2 Dryden W, Neenan M. Essential rational emotive behaviour therapy. Chichester: John Wiley & Sons; 2003. 3 Burton T, Palmer S. Dealing with people problems at work. Oxford: McGraw-Hill; 1996. 4 Neenan M, Palmer S (eds). Cognitive behavioural coaching in practice: an evidence-based approach. London: Routledge; 2011.

On the bookshelf: What you’re reading

The first 90 days: proven strategies for getting up to speed faster and smarter Michael D Watkins Harvard Business School Publishing 2013 Hb £20.00 ISBN: 978-1422188613 If you are involved in coaching executives then it’s almost certain that at some time you will have been asked to help them with a ‘transition’. It has been said that ‘transitions’ – essentially, stepping into new roles, whether as a promotion or through ‘onboarding’ – are the most challenging events in any executive’s career. You will possibly even have helped them create a plan for the first 100 days/three months without necessarily realising who it was that, probably, first coined the phrase and, certainly, laid the intellectual foundations for these plans. Back in the late 1990s Michael Watkins, then a Harvard Business School teacher, noticed that there was very little known about this tough stage in the executive’s life, let alone how to make the transition relatively painless and, indeed, to best effect. At that time, some firms gave their new executives a considerable degree of latitude – not expecting results for some time, fixing performance bonuses for the first year, and so on. Others were less tolerant, especially if the appointment was politically sensitive, expecting very visible results within days or weeks at most. Against the advice of his peers, Watkins set about researching executive transitions. Then,

in 1999, he was engaged by Johnson & Johnson to develop and deliver a programme for newly appointed senior managers that would enable them to accelerate their transition phase. Over the next couple of years he ran this programme for several hundred such people and documented his findings of what worked, what did not, what the variables were between different executives and so on. The first edition of The First 90 Days appeared in November 2003. By summer 2004, it had reached the Business Week bestseller list and remained there for 15 months. Over the next decade, its balance of examples, deductions, tools and practical tips have proven themselves to executives all over the world. In that time, sales have reached 800,000 English copies, and 27 translations. The tenth Anniversary edition has just been published, and it is every bit as good as its predecessor. Watkins’ approach focuses on 10 key areas: upfront mental preparation; a systematic approach to learning about the environment in which the executive is operating; devising an effective strategy; building in some early wins; gaining consensus with key stakeholders (especially their boss) for the 90 day plan; aligning the organisation’s structure to achieve the plan; systematic changes to the team; identifying and building coalitions, internally and externally; striking the right work/ life balance; and, finally, investing in the development of everyone around them. The book takes each of these themes and expands them very comprehensively. If you are used to working in a highly reactive fashion, you may find this approach a bit too structured and some of the exercises a little prescriptive. In the past, I have used the first edition as a reference source, dipped into it on occasions, recommended it to some clients and worked through it systematically with others. The most effective use has definitely been with

clients who have an intellectual bent – we’ve agreed on a couple of chapters to begin with and they have gone off to do their homework. At our next session, we reflect on these, develop our own materials based on those set out in the book, and agree how and when they will be put into place. Then we agree which two chapters we will focus on next, and so on. The First 90 Days provides a rich source of material for any executive coach and, of course, any uncoached executive. I highly recommend it. Dr Graham Wilson works as a confidant to senior executives, helping them find new roles and exceed expectations www.executive-post.info www.the-confidant.info



It’s a very ambitious author who tries to pen a book aimed at both clients and coaches with the express purpose of helping them all understand coaching

Coaching understood: a pragmatic inquiry into the coaching process Elaine Cox Sage 2013 £24.99 ISBN: 978-0857028266 Coaching is an extraordinarily diverse field. Aside from the technical coaching environment, epitomised by sports coaches and personal trainers, it ranges from individuals who have had fewer than two days training to those with PhDs. It attracts clients as varied as the stuck-at-home mum and the City high flyer, the lost soul and the passionate social activist and every shade across this vast landscape. So, it’s a very ambitious author who tries to pen a book aimed at both clients and coaches with the express purpose of helping them all understand coaching. If anyone were qualified to tackle this task it would be Dr Elaine Cox, Director of Coaching Programmes at Oxford Brookes, co-editor of the Complete Handbook of Coaching. Elaine’s skill is in drilling below the surface of the subject to provide an intellectual depth so sadly missing from many other coaching publications. Chapters 4 to 9 focus on the core skills of many coaches – listening, clarifying, reflecting, becoming critical, questioning, and being present. They are superb. They are not simplistic –they provide a structure that will help any coach who aspires to deepen their understanding of

what they do. Written by an academic, they contain good references and plenty of keywords that will provide a coach who wants to go one step further with all they need to start their own researches. What’s more, while Cox’s approach is to interpret the work of other authors, the chapters are not written in quasi-academic, pseudo-scientific, gobbledegook – they are accessible to any intelligent, inquiring, practising coach. These chapters, though, highlight the difficulty of writing for a diverse audience. I cannot believe that most clients have any interest in this depth. Indeed, I suspect that some could feel manipulated if they thought that all this was going on in the mind of their coach as they spoke. Ask yourself, would your clients want to know that you were generatively listening while witnessing their significance? Unless they were students of coaching, I doubt it. Chapter 10, ‘Integrating Experience’, introduces an area missing from much of the coaching literature and training. It’s one thing to provide an opportunity for clients to understand themselves better and either be satisfied with their lives or set out to achieve more; it’s another for the coach to understand their role, and the dynamics and processes involved, in transforming this experience into effective learning for the future. Cox tackles this in the same informed and reasoned way as the preceding chapters and provides the reflective coach with an excellent primer on this fascinating aspect of their work. In her introduction, Cox provides an intellectual framework for the process of coaching. It surprises me that some coaches, and many authors, need this spelling out. It seems blindingly obvious that coaching is about learning, involves reflection, is facilitated by the coach, and features an exchange between people. That this is iterative is also rather obvious, given the stubbornness of most minds.

So, I inwardly cringe when I see an author presenting a simple model of the process. This was certainly my reaction when I first opened Coaching Understood. To be honest, I had to force myself past this obstacle. I am so glad that I did and, if you also have my initial reaction, I’d urge you to do so too. Delve into the core of the book and then fill in the gaps by reading the introductory three chapters later. In summary, this is an exceptional book, written by an established academic, providing tempting insights into the depths of the process of coaching for the practitioner who would like to be far better informed. Dr Graham Wilson works as a confidant to senior executives, helping them find new roles and exceed expectations www.executive-post.info www.the-confidant.info

If you would like to contribute a book review in a future issue of Coaching Today, please contact the editor at [email protected]

The hidden history of coaching Leni Wildflower Open University Press 2013 Pb £22.99 ISBN: 978-0335245406 This book, part of the Coaching in Practice series edited by Jenny Rogers, starts by looking at how and where self-help theories first began in America in the 1930s and goes on to cover aspects as diverse as marketing and spirituality. It provides clear explanations of the many different influences on coaching’s evolution up to the current day and sets the development of coaching within its historical context. Interestingly, it goes further and links the main historical events of the time with contemporaneous schools of thought over the same period. The book is divided into three parts, reflecting the chronology of the theories presented, each containing several chapters. Each chapter starts with a brief introduction written by coaches who are experts in their own field and ends with an ‘Implications for Coaching’ from the author. These sections give some very useful insights and guidance on improving your practice by offering practical suggestions on how to use elements of the theories in your client sessions. The tone of these sections felt a bit didactic on occasion but, since I feel that this book should be required reading on all coaching courses, this is being really picky.

The focus is on the major protagonists of each theory as it becomes incorporated into the world of coaching. For example, you discover that sports psychology ‘has a history going back to the 1890s’, but the chapter mainly discusses Tim Galwey and the Inner Game and how it influenced coaching in other professional areas. We are encouraged to understand the wider context of coaching, including psychotherapeutic tools from Freud, Jung, Reich, Perls and Rogers; Deborah Tannen’s work on communication and Kurt Lewin’s ideas on social psychology and group behaviour. Importantly, the book offers a balanced picture: there is critical discussion of theories that are seen today in a more controversial light. Trainees will find the book easy to read and absorb, as it is written in a very accessible style and gives a firm foundation for understanding how theories in other fields have been developed and integrated into current coaching theory and practice. The book successfully sets coaching within a broad theoretical context that I believe will give trainees, and perhaps even experienced coaches, increased confidence in their skills as proficient professionals. In addition, experienced coaches will want to dip into it as a resource that will widen their knowledge and help them improve their skills and techniques. This is a comprehensive, easy to read account of many of the concepts in current use in coaching, together with clear explanations as to how they have come into being and been developed. In addition, it offers a wealth of information that signposts the reader to further reading and exploration of the ideas it contains. I am sure I will return to it again and again. Ghyslaine Clarke is a coach and Gestalt psychotherapist working in private practice and an Associate with Psychology of Success

Research


A Our regular update from research columnist Barry McInnes

pparently it was none other than Geoffrey Chaucer, the father of English literature and poet, who in 1374 penned the immortal words: ‘All good things must come to an end.’ And so it is, dear colleagues, that this will be my final column in Coaching Today. I hope, therefore, that you’ll permit me the indulgence of a few paragraphs of light philosophical rambling as I ponder the journey to date and offer a few thoughts on the place of research in modern coaching practice. In my first ever column I outlined my hopes for research in coaching and the place of my column within that as an opportunity to explore the interface between research and practice. I stated my belief that the important conversations in this space are those that take place not between researchers but between researchers and practitioners, and also that we as practitioners should see routine evaluation as a key part of our standard reflective practice. I also wanted to draw attention to current news and developments in what I then called the ‘space between’ research and practice, and for the column to become a vehicle for conversations between us – why do research and what can it contribute to our practice. In my brief biography I also said that I was working on the perfect sourdough bread technique! Eighteen months on and six issues later, how are my aspirations faring? Columns in the intervening issues have ranged freely over subjects as diverse as coaching’s evidence base, neuroscience, access to publicly-funded research, the power of single session interventions, the International Coaching Federation’s global study of coaches, the European Mentoring and Coaching Council (EMCC) and BACP 2012 Research conferences, Smile Coaching, the role of hope in change, self-acceptance and its relationship to accessing coaching, goal setting and values, psychopathy and the US presidency, integrated models of coaching, coach maturity and developing depth, what lies behind that flash of inspiration, and the correlation between chewing gum and enhanced concentration. Even if you can’t forgive me that shockingly long last sentence, I hope that you can concede


If we believe that our therapeutic training brings something uniquely valuable to the work, and we want to market that uniqueness, then we need to consider how we can demonstrate that value that it’s a fair attempt to profile some of the news and current developments and aspirations. Even this, however, has not been without its frustrations. There are all too few professional coaching and research journals to make this kind of profiling feasible, but there are even fewer available without subscription. Keeping on top of all the potentially relevant research in the field requires no small investment. Dialogue and debate On the issue of holding a conversation about research, while some readers have been good enough to respond to points in previous columns, my conclusion is that this type of journal probably isn’t the best place to conduct that dialogue. Conversations need to be much more dynamic than can be achieved where there is a three-month time lag, and that’s why I’m encouraged by signs that these conversations are also beginning to happen in other places. Our colleague Carolyn Mumby, who ran the recent BACP Professional Development Day ‘Introduction to building a coaching approach’, sent a pre-course questionnaire to participants to solicit their interests. Among the responses was the question ‘How is research supporting coaching practice?’ It’s a good question, on which I will expand in a moment. A further conversation is taking place on the LinkedIn Coaching Meets Research forum, where a recent post asked ‘What aspects of coaching need to be researched?’ On our own BACP Coaching LinkedIn forum I’m delighted to see that Graham Wilson, the BACP Coaching Executive’s new Specialist for Research, is posting research-related news. Credible evidence Hopeful signs then but, as someone who for many years has straddled the worlds of both therapy and coaching, I can also see a gulf between the two in terms of their respective evidence bases. The weight of evidence for the efficacy of therapy interventions is so substantial that it’s simply not credible to question it any more. We can skirmish around the edges of what factors account most for

change through therapy, but even that’s increasingly evident. As far as coaching is concerned, I see nothing like this weight of evidence. Nor, with the development of hybrid therapeutic coaching models, do I see much agreement – if ever there were any – on exactly what coaching is. Is it a psychological intervention? A developmental/ educational intervention? A psychodevelopmental intervention? There may be troubles ahead, as the song goes. I don’t pretend to have the answers, but I do know enough to know that if you want to have solid evidence that ‘it’ works, then you must first define what ‘it’ is. Is this, frankly, of any importance? Isn’t it enough that individuals and organisations have sufficient faith in the promise of coaching to buy into it? I will argue that, no, it isn’t. My first line of reasoning is market-related, and I start with a question: do you think that coaching should be available more widely, for example in schools? If so, should it be publicly funded? If your answers are broadly ‘yes’ and ‘yes’ then, whether provision is in schools or elsewhere, there is no way of achieving this goal without a credible evidence base. My second argument is also market-related. Increasingly we are going to be competing for clients, both between us as coaches with therapeutic backgrounds and with more ‘traditional’ coaches. If we believe that our therapeutic training brings something uniquely valuable to the work, and we want to market that uniqueness, then we need to consider how we can demonstrate that value. Third and last, clients are getting more demanding. More clients are coming to me and saying, in effect, ‘If I invest, what return can you reasonably assure me?’ It’s not an unreasonable question, and I may need to offer rather more than the stack of testimonials on my website (I speak metaphorically because I don’t in fact use testimonials). There is a lot of research happening, and a lot of very good research. A good deal of it has contributed to my reflection and found its way into my practice. An example of this would be developing greater precision in defining goals, and finding ways to determine to what extent the client’s goals are linked to their wider value

system. Some of this research has been qualitative and some quantitative. There needs to be both in the research spectrum, but we should also understand that, in the fields of social policy and budget allocation, quantitative research carries more weight. I attended last year’s EMCC Research Conference in Sheffield, where Jonathan Passmore made a passionate and coherent argument for a randomised controlled trial of coaching, and a meta-analysis of the common factors that support successful outcomes. My sense, however, is that the vast body of practitioners with an interest in research are in qualitative research territory. At the conference, as I recall, all but two of the workshops over the two days were exclusively focused on quantitative methods. Worse, at the 2012 BACP Research Conference, of the 150-odd keynote presentations, workshops, poster presentations and other events, not one focused on coaching. The same was true of this

year’s conference. What potential is there, I wonder, for a coaching strand within the 2014 research conference? I’m hopeful we’ll get there, especially if we’re just a little clearer about where ‘there’ might be. Our arrival, just the same as wisdom, may well be just a little after it’s required. As for the perfect sourdough bread technique, like so many other things in life this is still a work in progress, but I am happy to report that my sourdough starter is just two months off its third birthday, though thankfully not yet toddling. Thank you for being with me, thank you to the Coaching Executive, and to Coaching Today Editor Diane Parker for all their support and encouragement in developing this column. To paraphrase another great man of letters, I wish everyone, friend or colleague, well, and that is that, the end.



Professional development days T

he new series of BACP Professional Development Days (PDDs) will commence in October 2013, with 12 different workshop titles available through to March 2014. There are a number of practicebased titles suitable for therapeutically trained coaches such as ‘Working with loss and bereavement in therapeutic work’ delivered by Sally Flatteau-Taylor. Returning in March 2014 by popular demand, ‘An introduction to building a coaching approach’, delivered by Carolyn Mumby, will focus on business development and is suitable for practitioners who want to explore the possibility of adding coaching to their repertoire. Professional Development Days are one-day specialist workshops offering a range of very practical learning opportunities. The days provide participants with the opportunity to

gain valuable CPD, with clearly defined learning outcomes, to help you develop your portfolio of practitioner skills. The days are designed to be flexible, interactive and tailored to the needs of delegates to ensure that everyone gains maximum individual benefit from attending. Each PDD is led by an expert tutor and the numbers are limited to 25 people. If you are interested in attending one of these Professional Development Days or would like more information relating to other topics available, please visit www.bacp.co.uk/events or call BACP Customer Services on 01455 883300. Rebecca Gibson CPD Officer

Date

Topic

Presenter

Venue

15 November 2013 London

Making the most of supervision

Sally Despenser

Holiday Inn London Stratford City, 10a Chestnut Plaza, Westfield, Stratford City, London E20 1GL

22 November 2013 Newcastle

Tight ropes and safety nets: counselling suicidal clients

Andrew Reeves

Hilton Newcastle Gateshead, Bottle Bank, Gateshead, Newcastle-upon-Tyne NE8 2AR

28 November 2013 Southampton

How to ethically set up, market and develop a successful private practice

Martin Hogg

Holiday Inn Southampton, Bracken Place, Chilworth, Southampton SO16 3NG

2 December 2013 London

Working with couples and sex addiction

Paula Hall


6 December 2013 Birmingham

Legal issues in therapeutic work with children and young people

Peter Jenkins

Holiday Inn Birmingham City Centre, Smallbrook, Queensway, Birmingham B5 4EW

22 January 2014 Glasgow

Understanding and recognising sex addiction

Paula Hall

Hilton Glasgow, 1 William Street, Glasgow G3 8HT

23 January 2014 Belfast

How to develop an ethical online presence for your private practice, using a website, social media and online tools

Martin Hogg

Hilton Belfast, 4 Lanyon Place, Belfast BT1 3LP

27 January 2014 Birmingham

Counselling confidentiality, data protection and access to records

Peter Jenkins


29 January 2014 London

Thinking about retirement or leaving the profession? Identity, loss and letting go

Sally Despenser


7 February 2014 London

Working with loss and bereavement in therapeutic work

Sally Flatteau Taylor


13 February 2014 Southampton

Supervision skills, dilemmas and challenges

Sally Despenser

Holiday Inn Southampton, Bracken Place, Chilworth, Southampton SO16 3NG

28 February 2014 Manchester

Working with loss and bereavement in therapeutic work

Sally Flatteau Taylor

Holiday Inn Manchester Central Park, 888 Oldham Road, Newton Heath, Manchester M40 2BS

4 March 2014 London

An introduction to building a coaching approach

Carolyn Mumby


12 March 2014 Glasgow

Working with couples and sex addiction

Paula Hall

Hilton Glasgow, 1 William Street, Glasgow G3 8HT

17 March 2014 Bristol

Counselling confidentiality, data protection and access to records

Peter Jenkins

Holiday Inn Bristol Filton, Filton Road, Bristol BS16 1QX

Date

Topic

Presenter

Venue

9 October 2013 Manchester

Supervision skills, dilemmas and challenges

Sally Despenser

Holiday Inn Manchester Central Park, 888 Oldham Road, Newton Heath, Manchester M40 2BS

14 October 2013 Bristol

Legal issues in therapeutic work with children and young people

Peter Jenkins

Holiday Inn Bristol Filton, Filton Road, Bristol BS16 1QX

21 October 2013 London

Understanding and recognising sex addiction

Paula Hall


24 October 2013 London

How to develop an ethical online presence for your private practice using a website, social media and online tools

Martin Hogg



An introduction to tendering for the provision of a psychological service within the NHS

Pat Seber

Holiday Inn London Stratford City, 10a Chestnut Plaza, Westfield, Stratford City, London, E20 1GL


Building relationships with commissioners

Helen Hardy


20 March 2013 Newcastle

Thinking about retirement or leaving the profession? Identity, loss and letting go

Sally Despenser

Hilton Newcastle Gateshead, Bottle Bank, Gateshead, Newcastle-upon-Tyne NE8 2AR

7 November 2013 Birmingham

How to ethically set up, market and develop a successful private practice

Martin Hogg


21 March 2014 Belfast

Tight ropes and safety nets: counselling suicidal clients

Andrew Reeves

Hilton Belfast, 4 Lanyon Place, Belfast BT1 3LP

Network roundup


T

his is my last round up of the activities happening across the UK; by the time you read this, I will have stepped down as BACP Coaching Executive Specialist for Network Groups. I have loved the 18 months in the role, supporting and expanding the network groups, encouraging new people to start up a group and answering questions from our membership. It really is inspiring to hear about the exciting debates and discussions that go on in the groups, as well as supporting and promoting the work of coaching and coach therapists. I’d like to take this opportunity to formally thank the Network Group Organisers who arrange these meetings for you to ensure that you have an opportunity to network, learn and grow. They are a dedicated and passionate band of volunteers and BACP Coaching’s frontline ambassadors – thank you all for your support, encouragement, hard work and commitment. Dr Trish Turner BACP Coaching Executive Specialist for Networks Email: [email protected] Call: 07729 332 174


Birmingham There was a great response to our inaugural meeting back in June 2013. Unfortunately, not everyone who wanted to was able to attend. However the meeting went well, with a good attendance for a first meeting at such short notice. There was a good mixture of experienced therapists/coaches and people new to coaching and counselling. We discussed what we wanted to get from the meetings and the kind of things we would like to include, as well as the length and frequency of meetings. Mo Perkins talked about her experience as a book reviewer for Therapy Today and Coaching Today. She talked about the anticipation and enjoyment of getting a free book through the post to read and comment on and getting to keep the book. Her most recent review for Coaching Today was Executive Coaching by Sunil Unny Guptan. The rest of the meeting consisted of general discussions about coaching and the overlap with counselling and psychotherapy, and the challenges of getting work, particularly in the corporate environment. Everyone said they enjoyed the meeting and we look forward to future meetings. Alison Baker [email protected]

Brighton & Sussex The Brighton group is co-ordinated by Kim Crewe and Barry McInnes. They have not had another meeting since the update in the last issue, but do keep checking the BACP Coaching website for dates or contact Kim directly for news. Kim Crewe [email protected]

London/University of East London (UEL) Before the academic year ended for the summer holidays we heard presentations from Katherine Long on Coaching and Spirituality, from Christian Van Nieuwerburgh on Mental Toughness and from Jane Harders of Portfolio on Executive Coaching. Each of these workshops was thought-provoking and relevant and made all the more stimulating by questions and contributions from the large group in attendance. The new year began in September, to correspond with the academic year at the university, when Gill Fennings-Monkman took over as Network Group Organiser (see contact details below). Gill and Christian will be presenting an outstanding line-up of speakers, having worked on this over the summer. I hope to get to attend one or more meetings throughout the year. I have thoroughly enjoyed the year co-ordinating UEL network groups and shall miss the coaching colleagues who attend regularly and our dynamic discussions. Jo Birch Please contact Gill Fennings-Monkman [email protected] for information about forthcoming meetings

Central London At the central London network meeting entitled ‘Definitions, Definitions, Definitions’, Gill Fennings-Monkman reported from her MA research project comparing coaching, counselling and the approach of multi-skilled practitioners. We debated the BACP position statement, generating fascinating and varied responses to the idea of defining coaching and therapy. Can definitions enable us to communicate more effectively with the client about the process, reducing uncertainty? If we are clear about the objective, does it mean that change is faster and the therapeutic alliance is strengthened? On the other hand, definitions can be limiting and, for some, the mystery and power of the process may be lost. We explored how we market ourselves as coach-therapists – are clients attracted by a less stigmatised and more positive approach? Do clients care as much as we do about how we define the specific aspects of our work? We took the opportunity to reflect on and revise how we describe what we do, and some rose to the challenge of creating an elevator pitch! Forthcoming topics include an exploration of coaching supervision, using mindfulness in coaching, and coaching with particular client groups, for example with offenders, carers, young people, survivors of domestic violence, and others. Please contact Mary Pelham at marypelham@ personalconsultancy.net to book your place. Carolyn Mumby [email protected]

North West Those who share our enthusiasm for coaching and networking are invited to join us at the North West BACP Coaching Network meetings. We meet and share our practice experiences and receive updates on BACP Coaching activities. Group members provide trigger stimuli to lead personal development sessions. Most of all we appreciate belonging to a group of like-minded professionals with whom we look forward to meeting regularly. In the last quarter Figen Murray provided a case study for role-play, debriefing and discussion illustrating differences between the counselling and coaching approaches. A lively discussion ensued encouraging us to challenge ourselves and how we work in our own modalities. Joy Wanless [email protected]



National coaching network meetings Network group meeting dates: autumn-winter 2013 Cambridgeshire Since its inception last November, the Cambridge Network has grown from five to nine members. The four meetings to date have involved interesting presentations and lively debates. Topics have included contracting, profiling as a diagnostic tool and confidentiality with the organisational client. The role of meeting facilitator is shared among members. Future topics include: • Managing the tension between the ‘I’ and the ‘We’ in the workplace • Shortfalls in leadership • The need for and role of supervision and support • Managing a working life into retirement • Ethics and best practice • Recognising and respecting boundaries • Knowing and honouring personal limitations and ego. We agreed that we would be more than a talking shop, and instead a place where we can share problems with fellow professionals and learn something new at each meeting. If you are in the Cambridge area and want a professional boost every six weeks, come and join us. You will be very welcome! Please contact Phillip Cooke (see details below). Phillip Cooke [email protected]

Oxford region We are a gradually growing group with members ranging from those who are launching their coaching business to those who are supervisors, experienced counsellors and executive coaches. Some of us develop and run coaching training and are involved in academic research. We are a diverse and a lively group and we welcome you to join us. The Oxford Network celebrated its second year anniversary with Dr Kate Anthony facilitating our meeting in June on coaching and therapy online. We explored new developments in technology and how it can help better serve our clients. Sixteen of us stepped into our ‘avatar’ (online identity) and learned of the opportunities to develop our businesses within the ethics of online coaching/therapy, how to manage the dynamics of the relationship and what we could create, using our virtual office. At our April meeting, member Patti Stevens, co-director of APECS and visiting lecturer at Henley Business School, shared with us the Coaching Signatures Profile™ tool (CSP) – a psychometric tool she has developed, which explores a coach’s ‘posture’ – their natural and preferred coaching style. Patti contextualised the CSP tool by opening up a discussion about the importance of supervision for coaching practitioners. It was fascinating to learn how the tool works with metaphor, encouraging the coach to create and explore their own coaching landscape. It was a stimulating evening, introducing us to an exciting way of approaching supervision and professional development. Meetings are planned quarterly, so please look at the BACP Coaching website for updates. Forthcoming topics include ethics in coaching, research in coaching and counselling, boundaries, leadership supervision, and mindfulness in coaching leaders. Anne Calleja [email protected]

South West This is a huge geographical area, but we are very keen to get the ball rolling, though it may mean people have to travel in the first instance. An inaugural network meeting will be taking place before the end of this year; the venue will be in the Plymouth area. Please get in touch with Alan Chatting (see below) if you are interested in attending. Alan Chatting [email protected]

For more information on forthcoming meetings, visit the BACP Coaching website at http://www.bacpcoaching.co.uk/Localgroups.php

October

Contact

Thursday 10 Brighton

Hypnotherapy and NLP with Jonathan Conway The Dialogue Centre, 24 Windlesham Road, Brighton, BN1 3AG, 6.15–8.15pm

Thursday 10 London

Topic – tbc UEL Stratford Campus, Water Lane, London E15 4LZ, 6–8pm

Tuesday 29 Cambridgeshire

Topic – tbc Cambridge Golf & Conference Centre, 6.45–8.45pm

November

Kim Crewe [email protected] Gill Fennings-Monkman [email protected] Phillip Cooke [email protected] Contact

Wednesday 13 Central London

To be arranged in consultation with the network group nearer the date. Please email Carolyn if you would like to be put on the mailing list and kept updated of topics as they are arranged. There will be time for networking at the beginning of the meeting. Members of BACP Workplace will also be invited to attend. Atos Healthcare, 4 Triton Square, Regent’s Place, London NW1 3HG, 6–7.30pm

Thursday 14 Manchester and NW

Topic – tbc Marriage Care, Clitherow House, Lower Chatham Street, Manchester M156BY, 6.30–8pm

Joy Wanless [email protected]

Tuesday 26 Birmingham

Topic – open session Venue: tbc, 6.30–8.30pm

Alison Baker [email protected]

Thursday 28 London/UEL

Topic – tbc UEL Stratford Campus, Water Lane, London E15 4LZ, 6–8pm

December

Carolyn Mumby [email protected]

Gill Fennings-Monkman [email protected] Contact

Monday 9 Oxford

Topic – tbc PPC Head Office, 4200 Nash Court, Oxford OX4 2RU, 6.30–9pm

Tuesday 10 Cambridgeshire

Topic – tbc Cambridge Golf & Conference Centre, 6.45–8.45pm

Anne Calleja [email protected]

Phillip Cooke [email protected]