What exactly is Coaching?

Many people, when asked to define coaching, often couch their answer in the ‘negative’ – for instance, coaching is neither counselling nor training, mentoring nor management, and so forth.

While these statements are correct and helpful for understanding, their usefulness is limited in actually defining coaching. 

Socratic Coaching therefore suggests the following as a useful definition of coaching: 

Coaching is both a process and a relationship between two people, the coach and coachee, where the coach facilitates the agenda of the coachee; an agenda, primarily focused on a change or transformation, that enables the coachee to both (a) make that transformation and (b) maintain that transformation in the future.

It is this symbiotic interaction of process and relationship and how they are approached that underpins what coaching actually is, as opposed to what it is not.

How does Coaching work?

There is no straightforward answer to that. Let's look at it from a 'business environment' perspective...

The world of business is complex, minds get cluttered easily and individuals and teams get stressed and anxious - often due to a lack of support. When an individual or team is in over their head, it may mean they have been failed and/or not given the tools or support they need for themselves and the business to succeed. 

Coaching can help identify the real or actual problem(s) and from there work with individuals and teams to empower them to address those issues.

Whilst there may be occasional similarities, every situation is different as every situation has its own unique context. It has to - after all, the people involved are different and bring their own unique set of 'stuff' to the table. 

Therefore, there are no 'boiler-plate' solutions for individual contexts and coaching works by working with people in their specific context.  That is why 'context' is always the starting point for all Socratic Coaching engagements. 

To Zoom or not to Zoom?

Does coaching work online?

As a coach, I was wary about conducting sessions online. But the pandemic soon shook me out of my torpor and I got with the programme very quickly - as most of us had to.  Did it work? Does it work? Well, you don't need to listen to me - here's what clients' fed back....

- 'Zoom worked very well and is convenient'.

- 'Zoom is more convenient for me due to time pressures'.

- 'I feel Zoom worked very well actually - to my surprise'.

- It was the first time I was coached through Zoom, so it was really nice to be able to experience that. I don't think face to face would have worked better - in fact I feel potentially Zoom enabled me to be more honest if anything during some sessions as I did not have to face directly the body language of my coach and worry about their reaction to what I might have said.

- "For me it (Zoom and the coaching) worked well as it enabled me to save time that I would have otherwise spent to go to a location. The only downside for me was the potential interruption I could get from my own environment as I was at home, so I had to make sure to minimise the potential interruptions beforehand. Coaching in a location would have been better to ensure there would be no interruptions and thus the session could really flow from beginning to end'"

So, yes, it does work. In missing out on body language, we naturally lose something, at least somewhat. There may also be some loss in the early stages when establishing rapport and a trusting relationship but on the other hand, we can also save time as well as lose some of our potential inhibitions.

Like many things, there are swings and roundabouts, and I would say the efficacy of coaching online is person and context dependent. The great thing though is that you now have the choice. 

What about

Team Coaching?

Let’s defer this answer to a Senior Manager who uses team coaching:

"Investing in our people through coaching is a road paved with gold! If you have happy staff that don't feel like a number, they will represent themselves and their employer with professionalism and confidence - you can then retain staff and build on a strong foundation for your business. There is a huge drive on at the moment for recruitment and one of the biggest challenges for any business - our business included - is to keep their good people.  They [management] can often focus too much on what they need to get (attract new people), rather than what they have (existing staff). Coaching can unlock people’s potential. I know from personal experience!"

From our experience, team coaching works best when there is a specific agenda. For instance, 'What is the team trying to achieve?'; 'How is the team going to deliver a 'non-typical' project?'; 'Where does this team 'fit' in achieving and/or executing the organisation's strategic plan'? 

If you have a team and there is some disconnect between what is expected and what is actually being delivered - or indeed, how it is being delivered - coaching is a great step in addressing that disconnect.

What about

the Cost?

Coaching costs money. We'd love to do it for free but it's a business, just like yours.

Many successful people use coaches. Beyonce and Whitney (Houston), to name but two amazing singers, used voice coaches; Tiger Woods and Rory McIlroy, two of the most successful golfing superstars over the last 25 years would not have achieved what they did, nor stayed where they were for so long, without good coaches.

And great teams use great coaches - Manchester City and Barcelona achieved much under Pep Guardiola while Liverpool under Jurgen Klopp has been the only team to challenge City's domestic dominance for the last five years.

If it seems that I am using lots of sports 'coaching' analogies, that is because coaching in sport has been established for a long time and is accepted as a necessity in that field to improve performance and deliver results. It is also readily identifiable. John Madden was a famous and extremely successful NFL (American Football) coach - in fact, he was so successful that he was known simply as 'Coach Madden' long after he had retired as an NFL coach and worked as a sports broadcaster. He also lent his name to the most successful NFL sports video game of all time.   

Other fields have been slower to adopt coaching but it is changing.  Great coaches (voice, sports, etc) earn 'great' money because of their abilities in their specific field - as indeed do some 'superstar' business coaches (such as Tony Robbins and Jim Collins).  What do all of these great coaches have in common? They add VALUE.  And those who use them see their use not as a cost but as an investment - in themselves, their abilities and their results, not just for now but also into the future.

Socratic Coaching will not be the cheapest in the marketplace.  We have far too much expertise and experience to undersell ourselves and we do not expect our clients or you to undersell yourselves either. Each engagement is bespoke and tailored to our clients' needs and is therefore priced to deliver value in meeting our clients' requirements.

I would suggest that coaching is an investment in you and/or your company's success. As a CEO whom I worked with some a little while back said; 'When you have someone in your corner who is only interested in one outcome - helping you become more successful - you are not thinking about the cost, only the results'.

Will Coaching help me?

Truth be told, that can't be answered until you try it. But here is our experience...

Individuals (and teams) who approach coaching with an open mind and a 'coachable' agenda, will always benefit from good coaching.  People who have a 'closed-mind' generally won't and Socratic Coaching seeks to identify both of those parameters (open mind & coachable agenda) in the initial conversation.

Generally, if we feel reluctance, or over-scepticism, we do not proceed. Why have a relationship with someone who doesn't want to have a relationship?

If you feel open to exploring coaching, please reach out to us. We're not scary and we will only work with you on whatever it is you wish to work on or, in other words, - Your Agenda, Your Aspirations, Your Success!