Monthly Archives: August 2013

A picture is worth a thousand questions

I work with senior leaders and executives to enable and empower them in establishing new ways of being or behaving to raise their level of influence and leadership. Most of these leaders are already highly successful in their career and are senior managers or C-Suite executives. They just want to be better – whether it is a promotion they seek, significant organizational change or some other life transition that created the desire for coaching in the first place. My clients represent a multitude of geographic, cultural and racial backgrounds – from Australia to China, to South East Asia, the Middle East, Europe and on to the US. Typically in their mid 30’s to late 40’s, men and women – all have one thing in common, they are going through, or about to go through some sort of transition in their work or life.

I’ve spent years developing my leadership coaching and business mentoring skills (and spent a considerable amount of money in doing so). Yet, there are times when a client simply cannot get the breakthrough they need. Few executives are keen on delving into the recesses of their childhood or home life – heck this is the business world where balance is about debits and credits not life. As their coach it can take a long time to establish sufficient trust to go where they need to go, for them to recognize the emotions of their obstacles to personal progress and create new, sustainable alternative thinking, emotions and hence actions.

Senior executives, like all of us, are similarly plagued by our own cognitive biases. This has worked for me in the past, ergo; it will continue working for me in the future (confirmation bias at play). However, as coaching guru, Marshall Goldsmith tells us; “What got you here, won’t get you there.“
So, how to break through easily, quickly, effectively without a full understanding of NLP strategies, hypo-therapy techniques and a bank of BDQs (Bloody Difficult Questions)? Enter “The Coaching Game.”

I first came across The Coaching Game a couple of years ago, searching for some tool or solution to the regular dilemmas my clients face. I bought a set and a few days later played with it for myself. Whoa! I was rather shocked – either I am the best self-coach in the world and brilliant, or I had stumbled across something that helped find new possibilities to resolve old issues. By the way, it is the latter and yes, even I have “issues.”

I immediately started using TCG within my coaching sessions. Combining them with my own templates and tools to help clients more quickly, almost effortlessly, find their own new possibilities to their issues.

Why does The Coaching Game work so well in executive coaching?

Using the pictures (whether randomly chosen or chosen by the client) and focusing their attention completely and utterly and linking something about the picture, or the word, or the associated story, or an associated quite to their issue creates a new connection. Both emotionally in the limbic brain, and cognitively. As their coach, I then guide them through questioning to explore the connection in relation to resolving the issue. We have by-passed the cognitive biases – sure they come charging back in order to dispute any new solution, but the thought has taken hold. The client has a new way of thinking on the issue. Is it worth testing in the workplace? Perhaps at home first?

By combining a structured executive coaching approach and The Coaching Game, my client’s get better, more sustainable results in less time. And there’s the rub. Using TCG will reduce the time you need to spend with clients – for many coaches, that means fewer hours sold. My own solution to that dilemma? Sell fewer hours for more money. And the card that gave me the courage to make that bold step? Habits.

And, for most of my clients, they get a TCG set for themselves and continue through self-coaching, and we continue to have fascinating discussions about how they got that solution from that picture. The human brain, vastly complex and we will probably never fully understand.

They say that “a picture is worth a thousand words” – for me, “a picture is worth a thousand questions!”

Next month, I’ll share how I, and my coaching team use TCG in our structured coaching programs and within our own templates.