Feedback after the first session of coaching

The first coaching session with Leninka was very interesting. In the beginning, when I was the coach, I thought that it will be an easy exercise, but afters a few minutes, I found that it was more difficult that I thought. Indeed, I think that the most difficult part was to listening well the coachee. It was difficult to stay focused on what the coachee, because, even in a private room, there could have a lot of distractions. Also, afters a few minutes, I lot of other thoughts can pass in your head and it could be hard to stay really concentrated on the conversation. Also, the language and the cultural differences can add some difficulties in the coaching session. Sometime, the other person could have another way to express herself or use some worlds that you not necessarily understand well. Also, sometime, it’s difficult to just listening and not interrupt the coachee when she was talking. Indeed, you need to wait the right moment to talk and not do that anytime that you want. I discover that it’s really important to let the other person talk without interruption and to just listen. When your just listen, we became more concentrated, even it’s difficult, about the message and the nonverbal language of the other person. Also, you became more able to give a better constructive feedback after. But, sometime it’s just difficult to remember all the things that she said and that you want to use or talk about when it’s your turn to speak. So, you need to be more selective in the information. 

As a coachee, it was the contrary. Indeed, it was easier that I thought to express myself and my opinion. I was really comfortable to say what I wanted to talk about. I felt free to express myself in a trusted and no judgemental environment. So this exercise made me realize that coaching is really more difficult that I thought when you are the coach and it was little bit easier when you are the coachee. But, despite the difficulties, I had a really good experience and I learned some things about me (like the fact that I need to improve my listening skills) and the other person, Leninka.  

My reflective entry

In the coaching session, I found interesting discoveries. As a Coach, I tried to put in practice all the keys of coaching. I think the most difficult key was to be a good listener. You need to concentrate yourself to listen carefully and give the perception that you are doing it too to the coachee. I wanted to give an environment of trust for the coaching session and I try to make comfortable the coachee so Patrick can express himself without restrictions. I also found interesting that sometimes, there were language difficulties when we did our couching session. Fortunately, we could manage because we speak french and english so that helped for the whole comprehension of us.

 As a coach, I realized that we could learn of the opinions of the coachee and that helps me to complement my ideas and my vision of the definition of coaching. I found interesting his insights and his perception about this subject. I liked one insight about how coaching will improve ourselves awareness and that would help to take away the fear for change and be more confident of ourselves. Another insight was about how having a little bit of knowledge of the person is important because it will help the coach about the questioning part. Also, the coach can have more information and have more based opinions in the session.  As a coachee, I think it was very comfortable for me to talk and share my opinions of the subject; there was a good ambiance for expressing myself without a judging environment. Therefore, I feel I could talk without any restriction and be myself. I think that gave me the encouraged for continue talking and discover more ideas about the subject.

Finally, I think it was easier to be listened than listen. I found that Listening is a skill I need to work with the time if I want to be a better coach. Also, I discover that a good ambiance is necessary and how the trust for the coach and the coachee (the two parts) can help the session for being more comfortable and gives a free flow of information without a judging vision on it.

What coaching is ...

After reading the document of coaching, read the PPTs and do an Internet search on the web, I realize what coaching is . The term coaching refers to all the methods of helping others individuals, try to help them to discover and develop their skills. There is two players in this coaching experience: the coach (the person who will be the moderator) and the coachee (the person who is going to learn).  In all the coaching session will be present 5  important keys: Listening, Mirroring, Summarizing, Questioning and Catalyzing. By listening, I understand that it is necessary to focus completely on what the coachee is saying and is not saying, to understand what he tries to communicate and in what context. Also, the coach should support his self-expression. By mirroring, the coach helps the coachee to see his situation and help to his self-discovered. I also understood that the summarizing key is how the coach identifies de essence of what the coachee has talked. In this step, I think it will be useful to notice differences between the words, the tone of voice, and the body language. In addition, the questioning key will help to reveal the information needed for maximum benefit to the coaching relationship. In this step, I think is necessary to ask questions that move the coachee towards what he wants to accomplish or desire and to look deeper in the situation. And the catalyzing key will help the coachee to implement all the conclusions of the session. The result of the coaching will help the coachee to improve an aspect of him. I think is important to emphasized the fact that the role of the coach is helping the coachee to find his own solution, rather than giving possible answers to his problem from the coach's viewpoint.

Coaching is about enabling people to make conscious decisions and empowering them to become leaders in their own lives. This concept of coaching can be also focus to the professional environment. I think in this changing environment, Professional coaching is an important modality for managing change. Coaching sessions will help employees to look for current needs, opportunities, and challenges, all while maximizing the potential they already possess. Coaching is about developing a person’s skills and knowledge, so that their job performance improves, hopefully leading to the achievement of organizational objectives. It facilitates performance in the work teams for the purpose of ensuring the effective acquisition of skills.  Coaching will inspire people to discover their personal and professional potential, and this will contribute in increasing the productivity and effectiveness in an organization.

Finally, I realized the all meaning of what a good coach is. A good coach is able to analyze correctly the strengths and weaknesses of the coachee and to help him to discover how to act appropriately. I think also the coach helps to recognize the strengths and helps the coachee to improve his weaknesses. This analysis of ourselves will help our personal life and it will spread to our professional environment too.

What's coaching?

For me, coaching is a personalized support between a coach and a person who is coached, the coachee. The support needs to focus on the vision, the goals (personal or professional) and the desires of the person being coached. Indeed, the principal goal of the coaching is to help the coachee to reach concrete results on what she or he wants to achieve. It’s for that reason the three dimensions (that the vision, the goals and the desired) of the coachee are so important; because they help the coach to better know the person and can to adjust and manage the support. Without it, the coach can’t realy help. But, it’s not necessarily that the coachee knows with exactitude his or her vision and goals. Indeed, in the coaching, one of the roles of the coach is to help the coachee to define what it’s important for her or him. Without the coach, it could take longer and be more difficult for the coachee to do it. Also, in the first sentence, the adjective “personalized” is very important, because each coaching is different and need to be adapted to the person who is coached. The coach can’t have exactly the same approach with every person and the approach may be different for the same coachee in at different time as well. This difference can be explained by the fact that every person is different and don’t necessarily have the same vision, goals and desires.

So, with the previous explication, we can say that the coaching helps the coachee to deepen her/his knowledge about herself/himself. Indeed, it’s that knowledge that helps the person to achieve her or his goals. There is a lot of benefit in having a better knowledge about oneself. For example, it will be easier to improve the self-awareness and to have a better perception of oneself as well as the world around. It could also help the person to be more confident in her or his capacities and to decrease the fear about the responsibilities and the changes.  

In short, the coach supports the coachee in her or his path, but the coach is not there to directly show the direction or to do all the work. The coach is there to support the coachee, to “light” her or his road and to help to build a strategy. With the process of coaching, the coach will tool up the coachee and the new tools will help her or him to develop skills. But, the relationship and the communication between the coach and the coachee are really important if they want to have all the benefits mentioned above. Indeed, the coachee needs to feel confident in the professional support and to have the feeling that she or he could trust the coach. Honest feedbacks are very important in the communication and the coach needs to take a constructive approach. To finish, certain key processes need to be respected in a coaching conversation to obtain a better coaching. The key processes are listening, mirroring, summering, questioning and catalyzing. All the key processes are important, because they help to establish an effective communication and lead to better results.

Patrick St-Pierre