The Art of Coaching with Alisa Cohn
The Conversation Factory
The Art of Coaching Conversations
This chapter explores the evolution of coaching as a conversational craft, emphasizing the significance of understanding the client's context. The discussion highlights the balance between firmness and gentleness in questioning, fostering personal growth, and the importance of creating a safe space for effective communication.
In this episode, Alisa Cohn and I talk through Art of Coaching and also one of my favorite ways of looking at Leadership: The Art of Showing up on Purpose. A Coaching mindset is a transformative way to show up for others and yourself, so I’m excited to share these insights from Alisa, since she was named the Top Startup Coach in the World, and she has been coaching startup founders to grow into world-class CEOs for nearly 20 years. If you’re stepping up as a leader, or are thinking about coaching, this interview will help you know what to expect in a coaching relationship and why you might want to bring a coach into your work.
Everyday Coaching
A coaching mindset can be powerfully transformative, so even if you don’t have a startup, even if you’re not a coach... if your you’re not even an official leader, or even if you just want to be a good friend, you’ll find lessons in this conversation with Alisa that you can use in your work and life, everyday
Coaching is a conversational process that works with someone to help them improve, from the inside out. Alisa shares some of her most powerful coaching questions and all about how the most impactful coaching conversation she’s ever had was only 8 minutes long.
Alisa and I got right into the heart of coaching, with her sharing some essential, fundamental conversational approaches to the coaching process like:
>>firm and gentle inquiry>>moving from the presenting problem to the context>>Trusting your curiosity>>Staying Loose!>>Trust that they have an answer...that the work is in them.
As Alisa said:
“All my clients want me to tell them how to do it or what to do. They'll ask me a question and my answer is, "Well, listen, I wouldn't be any kind of a coach if I didn't get a chance to say, 'What do you think?"
>>Alisa will ask “What if you did know?” and push her clients to sit with the question. The act of reflecting is helpful no matter what springs up.
>>The ability to reflect will help with one of the absolute key executive skills: choosing a response versus having a reaction.
Alisa actually quotes Victor Frankl’s blockbuster thoughts on this capacity:
Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.
A coach isn’t all warm and fuzzy listening though…My coach calls his approach “tapping someone’s bottle”...pointing out the limits to someone’s thinking. When Alisa wants to push back I heard her use the phrase:
"Well, that's how I invite you to think about it."
Alisa will step in with her perspective but without force. A tap isn’t a shove!
Asking “How is this situation serving you?” is a gentle challenge.
What to Expect in a Coaching Relationship...and why you might need a coach
If you are thinking about coaching, this interview will help you know what to expect in a coaching relationship and why you might want to bring a coach into your work.
Alisa and I talked through one of my favorite ideas: The Art of Showing up on Purpose. One huge challenge of being a leader is that, as she says “You have to grow and learn to communicate differently and behave differently as your company grows.” Alisa and I talk about how to find new ways of tapping into your inner humanity and show up authentically, no matter the situation. Just because the board says “you need to have more conviction” doesn’t mean you have to become a jerk, or invert how you want to be. It’s about finding ways to be passionate and firm that work for you.
In my own experience, I’ve found that, as a coach and a coachee, a powerful conversation can help me find my own, authentic path forward, through having a conversation with my own inner parts. It’s hard to do that on your own...having a coach as part of the conversation can be transformative.
Alisa also points out that coaching has to be 3-Dimensional, because we are 3-Dimensional. As we grow as leaders, she thinks of three dimensions of growth: we have to grow in our self management, our skill in managing others, and, of course, in managing the business. A powerful coach is going to make you look at all three.
Alisa on Jeff Gothelf’s Forever Employable series
Check yourself before you Wreck yourself
Enjoy the conversation as much as I did. And make sure to head over to theconversationfactory.com/listen for full episode transcripts, links, show notes and more key quotes and ideas. You can also head over there and become a monthly supporter of the show for as little as $8 a month. You'll get complimentary access to exclusive workshops and resources that I only share with this circle of facilitators and leaders.
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