Coaching and the Meaning Making Process

Adrian MyersAdrian Myers

1010THTH Annual Coaching and Mentoring Research Annual Coaching and Mentoring ResearchConference Conference Oxford, 16 January 2014Oxford, 16 January 2014

The focus of the presentation

Outline Methodology and some key findings from research

Background to Research

Whole session - differently from de Haan et al (2010) - critical moments

Both, coach and client contribution – differently from Greif et al (2010) - behaviours of the coach

Development of a Q-Set

Methodology

Q-Methodology (Stephenson, 1935, Brown, 1980, Block, 2008, Stainton Rogers, 1991, Watts and Stenner, 2005)

“Qualiquantological” (Stenner and Stainton Rogers, 2004)

Correlations between persons are the variables of interest

Identifies viewpoints shared by groups of individuals expressed as factor representations

Research also involved a thematic analysis of spoken accounts (mixed methods)

TOPIC List of Descriptors

“Q-Set”

Participant group selection

Participants sortDescriptors (saliency)“Q-Sorts”

NumericalData

CorrelationsBetween sorts

FactorAnalysis

Factor Array

Interpretation

Q-Methodology (Process Steps)

Sample of statements

24 Coach expands on client's statements

2 There is an exploration of the client's values

63 Coach asks questions that appear to open new possibilities for the client

55 Client takes initiative in structuring the session

46 The session is fast-paced

41 Coach asks questions helping the client to elaborate

19 There is a discussion of external feedback

‘Factor Array of Factor exemplifying’ Q Sort

-5 -4 -3 -2 -1 0 1 2 3 4 5

53 47 13 6 9 1 10 5 2 4 41

54 58 43 8 16 3 17 7 27 30 63

64 45 18 19 12 24 11 37 36

(2) 70 46 21 29 14 25 15 39 79 (2)

59 28 42 20 26 31 40

(4) 60 32 48 22 34 35 75 (4)

44 49 23 65 38

(6) 51 56 33 66 57 (6)

78 61 50 68 73

67 52 71

(9) 69 55 72 (9)

76 62 74

77

(12) 80 (12)

(14)

-5 -4 -3 -2 -1 0 1 2 3 4 5

Research 2 (Myers, 2010-2013)

The research design involved interviewing coaches, clients and observers

• 6 different experienced coaches were asked to facilitate an actual video-recorded coaching session with an existing client or a client volunteering to be coached (content: leadership performance & career decisions)

• Immediately after interviews coaches and clients were interviewed (free recall of sessions)

• They were also asked to complete Q Sorts

• At a later date, each video was shown to a different group of coaches (1 recording per group) who were asked to discuss session and complete Q Sorts

• 6 coaches, 6 clients and 37 observers in total

Significant Correlations (p<0.05) %

COACH & CLIENT COACH & OBSERVERS

CLIENT & OBSERVERS

BETWEEN OBSERVERS

NLP (6) 100 50 83 87

MIXED (6) 0 50 100 93

MIXED (4) 0 50 0 50

MIXED (8) 0 87.5 25 79

TA (4) & CBC (2) 100 0 33 0 & 100

MA (5) 0 40 N/A 70

The coach- observers identified many limitations in the approach of the coaches

“I thought it was superficial, there was no depth whatsoever, there was no challenge of the client”

“I was very struck by the directiveness...It seems to me, the coach was adopting quite an expert attitude, almost looking down her glasses... So there was this rather strange power differential going on which didn’t allow the client to talk her own stuff”

“There was a lot of rescuing going on...it was rescuing that had not been asked for”

“We are not perfect but we are used to picking up on the energy and we’ve referred to the tension between them, how not relaxed the coach was, some of the behaviour of the client. For me, there was a sense of uneasiness”

Observers seemed to draw on their own mental models of what was important in coaching

“That’s his embedded thinking. You can’t unravel on embedded thinking. All you can do is create new thinking. So giving more attention to what has happened historically is just going to do more and more of it.”

“I thought, “Oh my God, you’re nervous”.

“If I were doing this as a CBC coach, then I’d really want to be looking at these beliefs”

The greater the gap between the coaching model of the observers and the coaching model of the coach, the stronger the criticism (1)

Coaches from a Transactional Analyst background observing a coach from a Gestalt orientation (: lack of awareness/power imbalances in the relationship)

NLP Group of Coaches observing a person-centred coach (: not enough activity)

Person-centred coaches observing coaches perceived as directive (: inattentive, dominating)

And................................

Observers thought sessions lacked structure, lacked breadth of exploration, lacked depth of exploration; thought the coach gave unnecessary advice, colluded with the client, worked to their own agenda, did not contract sufficiently, used interventions inappropriately; that sessions lacked energy, that the coach misunderstood the client, used humour inappropriately, did not signpost sufficiently, did not hold the client, limited the scope of available options, was insufficiently transparent about their approach, did not balance challenge and support appropriately, missed opportunities; were concerned that the coach was unprofessional.................................

And sometimes irrespective of the specific orientation of the coach, there were just lots of concerns....

Only one of the 6 observer groups provided a more balanced evaluation

“She almost, quietly and hardly you can tell it…gave him permission to say, ‘you don’t have to carry on doing this if you don’t want to.’”

But these views were balanced by negative comments:

“There wasn’t any of that process checking going on in the session...it was like ’this is what I am and this is what I give and you sit there and take it…I’m not going to check this out with you…there’s something almost ethical about that.”

The clients spoke very highly of the coach and of the session

“I came out feeling much more positive; confidence level was much better...”

“She shows a tremendous amount of empathy... She very much puts me at ease”  

The coaches also thought that the sessions had been very positive but their focus was more on the client’s learning

“I guess the biggest navigation for me is: is he getting something out of this? Within what I think needs to happen in a last session? Is he engaged in learning for himself? Is he meeting his needs? Is this useful in the moment for him? Is he engaged?

And pretty much all the way through that: absolutely “yes! So, was this on his agenda…and my strong sense was ‘Yes.’ Was he engaged and learning something? Yes!

There were many differences in perceptions (1)

“There was another connection where she suddenly had an insight about negotiating…it was a lovely smile and “Ah ha”...There was a lovely broad smile and we just stood there in that moment” (Coach)

“It just kept going out of connection and then some moments in and then out”. (Observer)

(Connection?)

There were many differences in perceptions (2)

“Because we can talk about a concept for hours and hours and not achieve anything but she will come up with an actual exercise… ‘Do this on paper’ ‘Come back with some concrete feedback we can talk about at the next session.’ When you have to put your ideas, values, beliefs and concepts on paper, then you start to challenge yourself and consider things really fully. (Client)

“...and when she was writing the notes, I thought the client was probably writing a shopping list because that would be the most meaningful thing she could get out of those particular points.” (Observer)

(Note –Taking)

There were many differences in perceptions (3)

“As soon as you hear the client saying ‘Yes, Yes, Yes, Yes’ and the mirroring from the client to the coach, that they weren’t separate and equal in relationship; they were transacting from ‘I’m the expert, you’re being done to….This is coaching and you are behaving as a coachee” (Observer)

“It was always following where I wanted to go….she always asked me permission…’Can I suggest this?’…so if you don’t want to do it, don’t do it” (Client)

Persecution?

What seemed to be happening in the sessions is that coach and client co-created a sense of meaning

For one coach-client, note taking had become a way of doing coaching

For another client, he enjoyed the opportunity to reflect and seemed to find this beneficial

For another client, the coach was tapping into “just what she needed”

Either the observers could not sense what was happening or the coach was making a lot of ‘mistakes’ that the client did not register immediately or

consciously (or something about the method impacting on the process)

Co-Creation of meaning included the client making positive attributions to actions/ comments of the coach that were considered by observers as ill-judged

One Observer group was very concerned that the coach had not seemed to have understood the core client issue...

The coach said it wasn’t necessary to know...

The client assumed the coach did know and that their silence showed their experience, not to have to name the issue…

Challenges in relation to the quality of coaching

Are Professional Coaches making a lot of mistakes on a day to day basis? Could the quality of coaching of even experienced coaches be significantly improved?

How would coaches be able to identify their ‘mistakes’ or ‘inappropriate’ approaches? Are they actually ‘mistakes’, if neither the client nor the coach experience them as such?

Implications for Practice

If coaching is co-creation of meaning between the client and coach can the quality of it be

a) assessed

b) improved

c) supervised?

If you are a fly in the room observing your own session what would you see?

What might you see if you were a different fly?

References

Bachkirova, T., Sibley, J. and Myers, A. 2011. Development of an instrument for microanalysis of the coaching sessions, Institute of Coaching, McLean Hospital, Harvard, USA, http://www.instituteofcoaching.org/Index.cfm?page=breakingresearch

Block, C. 2008a. Psychotherapy Process.

Block, J. 2008b. Q-sort methodology, American Psychological Association.

Brown, S. R. 1980. Political subjectivity: Applications of Q methodology in political science, Yale University Press New Haven, CT.

de Haan, E., Bertie, C., Day, A. & Sills, C. 2010. Clients' Critical Moments of Coaching: Toward a “Client Model” of Executive Coaching. Academy of Management Learning & Education, 9, 607-621.

Greif, S., Schmidt, F. and Thamm, A. 2010. The Rating of Eight Coaching Success Factors - Observation Manual. (Accessed: 10 October 2010) (http://www.home.uniosnabrueck.de/sgreif/downloads/Rating_of_Coaching_Success_Factors_Version4-May_2010.pdf)

Rogers, W. S. 1991. Explaining health and illness: An exploration of diversity, Harvester Wheatsheaf Hemel Hempstead.

Stenner, P. & Rogers, R. S. 2004. The example of discriminating between emotions. Mixing methods in psychology: The integration of qualitative and quantitative methods in theory and practice, 101.

Watts, S. & Stenner, P. 2005. Doing Q methodology: theory, method and interpretation. Qualitative Research in Psychology, 2, 67-91.