Who’s Afraid Of Coaching?
Writing in The Guardian (UK) this weekend, Lindsay Swan describes herself as a coaching convert. “I know enough successful people who can attest to its effectiveness, to convince me it is more than New Age flim-flam.” For her it was a question of finding the right coach, which she evidently achieved.
By contrast, Craig Harper writes about personal development fraud in an article on Coachglobe.com “Despite their philanthropic, selfless, all-about-you overtones, their primary (if not, sole) objective is …. to make money”, he says of coaches.
How can we be assured as smooth a journey as Swan with her coaching? And what made Harper quite so anti-coaching?
Where is the real proof that coaching interventions actually work? And what does Harper base his opinions on? Where’s the moderation in the discussion about whether coaching is ‘good’ or ‘bad’?
Anon said,
February 20, 2007 @ 1:53 pm
Why do people need to be ‘afraid’ of coaching? It is up to them to do it or not do it as they please - unless they are forced to do it by their management team, or denied it because their management team thinks coaching is a waste of money. Oh, I see what you are getting at.
Tom Greives said,
February 26, 2007 @ 3:02 pm
This comes down to the responsibility of the person who is being coached. There are charlatans out there in the market who call themselves coaches and are out solely for number one and their bank balance. That is it is imperative that you shop around and interview several coaches. Ask for referrals, quote Craig Harper and ask them their views and why they are involved in coaching. Once the coaching starts, if it is not working for you - tell the coach and tell them why. If nothing changes, fire them!
There are some truly gifted coaches at work and when you enter into a coaching assignment with them, you can make huge strides forward. Don’t damn the entire industry for a few bad apples - just do your research and have some sample initial sessions. If they can’t impress you then, move on and find one who can.
Tom
Julia said,
February 27, 2007 @ 3:27 pm
The whole point is that whether you consider coaching effective depends on your subjective view/expectation/enjoyment level/value set. The measurement argument falls flat because the measurement can only be at the behavioural level or the financial (interesting conversation, but a lot of time and effort to establish not very much I’d say) - what coaching at its best achieves is attitudinal shifts. How are you going to measure that?
Martin Haworth said,
March 13, 2007 @ 6:39 pm
Harper must be reading his adverts (though he doesn’t have to look to hard. £60K a year for minimal learning is something of a carrot to dangle.
Having said that, a recent ICF survey indicated that around 70% of coaches have less than 10 clients - hardly finincailly viable - and certainly not a fortune.
As for attitudinal/behavioral shifts, well, they are measured by movements in achievement and a demonstration that newly developed skills are replicating the behavioral changes brought about by the coaching experience.
And then on to the next shift, I’d say.
Regards
Martin