Global coaching for the whole being

Global coaching 

for the whole being

Your roadbook to successful coaching 

In the near future, the need for human relationship as a counterweight to the influence of algorithms and digitizationwill be growing apace, as well as all that sets us apart as human, such as creativity, imagination, intuition, emotions, our unconscious and our ethical values. 

Global coaching proves to be a very pertinentvehicule and answerto accompany this transformation of people and organizations, raising awareness levels and responsibility, provided that:

• the coaches comply with the strong belief that all individuals carry within themselves the most effective responses to the questions they ask and to the issues they face,

• the coaches are trained in the rules of the art by recognized coaching schools, they are supervised and make regular use of a therapist, and they are aware of the risks of individual or collective manipulation,

• the coachees are demanding towards themselves and towards their coach.

This roadbook provides guidance for both seasoned and beginner coaches, with insights into simplifying and deepening their professional practice, helping to focus on the most essential point, namely the quality and intensity of the relationship with their client. 

THE AUTHORS

Michel Giffard worksas Academic Director of certificate programmes in Executive Coaching and founded the HEC Paris School of Coaching in 2003.He has worked for 30 years in management, counselling and training. He has written several books on executive coaching and on the use of intuition in business, coaching and life.

Céline Géara Thomasis the founder of Oxygen Coaching. Boasting over 20 years’ experience in management, counselling and training, she works as an executive coach, supervisor and lecturer atHEC Paris School of Coaching.Her first book recounts her coaching experiences during 4 years in India.

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Prologue

If you want to choose the pleasure of growth, 

prepare yourself for some pain.

Irvin Yalom

In the near future, the need for human relationships as a counterweight to the influence of algorithms and artificial intelligence will be growing apace. Our needs to connect with others, with nature, with our true selves and spirituality are growing everyday, yet hampered by technology and robots. All that sets us apart as humans, such as creativity, imagination, intuition, emotions, our unconscious and ethics will gain in significance. The reason is both simple, and powerful: these core characteristics cannot be digitalised or automated. As we lose our powers to form genuine connections, coaching can be a very fitting answer to this issue, especially coaching with a focus on relationships.

Concurrently, the future is shaping itself around holistic models such as being liquid, learning just-in-time not just in case, moving from single improvements to complete transformations, and from individual systems to new organic, dynamic ecosystems. The skills that drive success are agility, speed and the ability to discern and accept complexity.

Why a new book on coaching? 

There are so many books on magic tools, on the best way to coach people with all kinds of peculiarities, or from a particular culture. You can already find the best coaching practices with methods adapted to coaching for performance or for enhancing your career, or for coaching to live happier if you follow the good advice dispended.

Yes, so many books. But Global coaching for the whole beingdoes not exist yet. Our benchmark did not succeed in finding any.

So, why write our book? 

Because we have some nice topics to share with you. 

Our intention is to share what we have learned from our personal and professional lives, enlightened by the wisdom of our Masters. To share the essentials we need to experience a coaching session in which both coach and coachee can feel safe and enjoy its effects, with as few as possible of limiting beliefs, dogmas and mental patterns, while being aware we are limited, fallible humans, and sometimes with troubled intentions.

Our book is therefore partial and biased, in that it draws on our beliefs, our filters and blind spots. Our purpose is to share with you how we coach and teach coaching. It may not please some people. It's their right and their freedom. We hope that others will find some nuggets helpful in their life and their coaching practice. This is not a coaching encyclopaedia, nor a scientific or academic thesis. It is just a roadbook to successful[1]coaching to accompany you on your personal path, remembering Buddha’s teaching that the path is the goal. 

Nor is it a book on performance, as it is usually defined and understood[2]. Fortunately, things are changing; humankind is improving and gaining in awareness. For us, performance is related to the intention and the meaning behind the action. When Bertrand Piccard and his team made the first solar-powered flight around the Earth with Solar Impulse 3, it was a genuine performance, and a very useful one for humanity. By synchronicity[3], we accompany our coachee on a journey to awareness of what is going on within them and their environment, and to the acceptance of their responsibility for what happens to them. This is why this book is called Global coaching for the whole being. 

Coaching can be a tool, an activity, a managerial style and a stance to better communicate with people, a way of life to connect deeply with oneself, with other people, and even with animals, trees etc. Coaching can also become a lifestyle and a life philosophy. It reconciles the most pragmatic approach to look for concrete operational results and the expression of the desire for harmony in human relationships. It helps us invest meaning into everyday mechanical actions, in our professional and personal lives. It encourages us to rekindle our interest in our inner life and that of others.

Coaching teaches us tolerance. The idea for this book first germinated in Andalusia, where Christian and Muslim civilizations have co-existed for centuries. We live together on the same planet, in the same spaceship, with no alternative solution, so far. Tolerance is vital for us.

As coaches, we must exercise tolerance in two directions: 

·     towards our coachee: during the session, can we accept our coachee without judging their words, beliefs and actions, and therefore come closer to unconditional acceptance of the coachee?

·      and towards ourselves: do we still have something to prove to ourselves or others? Do we feel free to simply be with our coachee, just listening to him and watching him? Asking questions to accompany our coachee in their quest for their identity? Or perhaps we cannot feel ontological security and legitimacy as a coach?

Coaching teaches us humility. The coach is not all-knowing. They are aware that little is known about people and life, that the coachee knows the questions he asks himself, that he knows the answers and what is good for him. Even if he is not yet aware of what is going on, that he is responsible for his life, not in the meaning of being guilty, but having the permission and the ability to build one’s life. The premise in coaching is clear:all individuals carry within themselves the most effective responses to the issues they face and try to move forward with meaning.

Humility helps us also to realize that humans are not on Earth to dominate it, to dominate animals and nature. The whole being does not only refer to the whole of the human being, but to life on Earth, to the animal, plant and mineral kingdom as ancestral traditions like shamanism teach us. We can learn a lot from humankind, but also from many other things on Earth.

It’s perfect timing for coaching!  

To keep it short and even if this statement is excessive, we might say that the neoliberal ideological system is deadly for humankind and our planet. But fortunately, islands of resistance are developing in many companies at all levels, actions are carried out to humanize human relationships and to choose sustainable development. With special thanks to Millennials[4]!

In this world– where the lack of a sense of purpose in the workplace constantly challenges job satisfaction and management effectiveness– coaching can make a significant difference. Coaching boosts the ability of individuals, teams and organizations to define, and successfully implement, their own strategies and solutions. With the support of a coach, people can develop increased awareness of the mindsets preventing them from identifying a clear path for a better future.

The major challenge in coaching is the encounter with a unique and specific human being – or with a team or an organization. Everyone is unique, at a special moment in their life and in relation with a specific environment. As we will see it, the coach only needs a general culture on cultural differences. Culture maps are not relevant to guide coaches. The cultural differences between Chinese and Japanese bosses are not more relevant than between Londoners and Glaswegians.Multicultural coaching doesn’t exist[5]. To coach is to accompany specific coachees wherever they live. You may be surprised. This could be a limiting belief. But, just think about it, and you will find it very relevant!

What is coaching?

The coach accompanies a person so that she can find the answers to her own questions by herself. The coach focuses on their client rather than being concerned with their own image, instead of speaking mostly about themselves, and providing advice, which is a commonly shared reflex.The word « client»here is not used in its commercial meaning but refers to the person being coached, aka the coachee.  After all, we all have a vocation to be coached at some point in our lives.  We could add this item to our New Year's resolutions list!

The method applied by coaches consists in listening deeply to their clients and not only through the auditory channel. Analogical language, non-verbal communication, tone of voice, speed of speech, verbal and body lapses are all useful information that the coaches listen to with all their senses, intuition and heart.

While keeping their full focus on the coachee, the coach tries to connect to what she is feeling and see the situation as she experiences it, with her frames of reference.  It is not about putting yourself in the clients’ shoes, but rather empathizing with them, being fully present, without judgement or bias. The purpose is to engage in a relationship that will support them as they find and appropriate their own answers.

Coaching methods and tools are fairly well identified and modelled so they can be used by a great number of people. Coaching helps us attain greater self-knowledge and learn about psychological dynamics. In fact, using coaching regularly helps our psychological limitations emerge, which so often prevent us from evolving according to our aspirations. Beyond the mere operational aspects, coaching also brings an extra dimension to relationships, a more accurate perception of reality and an empathetic presence that helps us look beyond appearances.

Does coaching work?Of course, it does!It is clear, judging on our practice and academic research studies, that coaching works. In a nutshell, it is about as effective as most other types of organizational interventions: specifically, it is very useful for enhancing wellbeing, developing self-regulation and more effective coping strategies or, if you dare to choose it, even for improving performance.

What this book is.

What are our strong beliefs gleaned from our professional learning and the time we have spent interacting with human beings? We believe that:

·      Coaching is a matter of sincerely accepting and loving our coachees – whether they are individuals, teams or organizations – and being confident in their potential. They carry within themselves the most effective answers to the issues they face, but often they don’t know they know.

·     Coaching islike fine lace created by a craftsman, drawing on general culture and specific techniques, provided we forget them during the coaching sessions.

·      When coaching uses mainly rational approaches and methods, it has little impact on change, until the individual and collective unconscious dynamics have been addressed.

·     Coaching is a political act, in the proper sense of organization of the city, at the service of the freedom, of the responsibility and of the discernment and awareness of each one.

·      Coaching is practiced everywhere, in every country and every culture and has its source in the wisdom of humanity for several millennia. Multicultural coaching does not exist, each culture finding in itself its own specific resources.

Our intention is to go back to basics, to facilitate reading by structuring and focusing on the essentials, in order to limit the number of pages and to respect the readers’ availability.

This is not just another book on coaching techniques. Our book is a roadbook to accompany both seasoned and beginner global coaches on their coaching path, to be read either from beginning to end, following the progression of our pedagogical and initiatory course fuelled by over 25 years of experience in training coaches. Or by going straight to the point, to the information that meets the reader’s current needs or desires.

This book will help coaches find out how to simplify and deepen their professional practice and to focus on the essential: the quality and the intensity of the relationship with their client. As for coachees, they can gain insight into the coaching framework and spirit, and how they can become « the master of their fate and the captain of their soul ». 

We have laid out all our cards on the table right at the beginning of this book, as in the first module of our training sessions. Readers can then progress at their own pace according to the evolution of their respective level of consciousness, at each stage of the initiatory training process.

First of all, we have to begin with deconstructing, decontaminating the introjections of our parents. Even if they gave us the best education and as much love as possible, they also transmitted their fears, limits and shadows to us. If we add those of our teachers, mentors, managers, spouses and friends, deconstruction proves to be an essential step in becoming a coach.

This is why we require people who train to become a coach to also engage in a personal work with a therapist to get to know themselves better and to cast light on their own shadows and blind spots.

Next, regular supervision is necessary to practice coaching in a reliable, respectful and effective way, in order to build your own philosophy of action and to deepen your abilities fostering greater awareness and responsibility.

Coaching cannot simply be taught like history or geography. Because coaching is far more about being than doing. Our coaching course can only suggest a path, a way to experiment to become aware of what is happening inside ourselves, others and their relationships. In order to help both coach and coachee focus on their sensations, feelings, intuitions and bodies, we organise silent coaching exercises, blind coaching, coaching without speaking the language of the coachee, walking coaching, horse coaching, sheep and goose coaching to name but a few.

The Self is the coach’s greatest asset, empowering a kind of bare-handed coaching using very few tools. Coaching is about accepting and deciding to make yourself available to the other. One of the coaches’ abilities is to totally embrace their clients as they are, and to support them without trying to replace them. The coaches aim to make deep, long-lasting changes and their work addresses attitudes, beliefs, potential, resources, vision, meaning and scope.

Going deeper, we believe that self-awareness is no longer sufficient: it’s about learning how we understand the world as an entirety, our humanity, animals, nature, trees, minerals, and all its beauty within. It requires an in-depth understanding of what life is, to enable us to move forward and connect within our environment. It’s about accepting our responsibility as human beings, and developing an increased awareness on what’s going on in our inner life as well as outside, in our interactions with others.

Human relationships are not a matter of statistics, but of connections, or a lack of connection between two unconsciousnesses, two desires and two personal stories built of emotion and fantasy. Repressed, ignored and sublimated feelings lead the dance and may bind us to others.

But at a time when everyone has the injunction to reign over their decisions, affects and destiny, relationships may be perceived as problematic. A true relationship puts an end to the reign of almighty power. It is not the relationship object that counts, with the risk of turning the other into a utilitarian object to be used to achieve your own goals. Each relationship reactivates our unconscious, all that has touched, moved or bound us in the first moments of our lives, then in our childhood. 

This new, unique book presents and describes our way of coaching, focussing specifically on: the coachee-coach relationship, interaction and rapport created during coaching, and the alliance between the coach and the coachee’s respective systems. Global coaching for the whole beingis a state of mind, a presence, a stance, and a set of fundamental tools, which all contribute to making this type of coaching so powerful. We focus simultaneously on what deem to be the two essential points:

·     Where can we practice coaching? Everywhere, in all corners of the world. Coaching is necessarily global.

·     What is the essence of coaching? The relationship with ourselves, others and the whole universe.

Your coaching journey includes four complementary stages: 

Stage 1 – First steps in coaching –this recaps everything a junior coach needs to master to coach in a safe, pertinent way. We focus on the coachee-coach relationship in order to enhance consciousness and responsibility in both of parties, the coach and the coachee.

Stage 2 – Global coaching for the whole being – this presents our commitment for a sustainable, whole life on earth, that of humans in the company of animals, trees and all that lives on earth, as well as inter-cultural coaching and inter-species communication. We will share what global coaching means for us and how it can contribute to a better life for every people.

Stage 3 – Advanced coaching stances and tools –here, we get to grips with the essence of coaching. We experiment with some advanced stances and tools, such as bare-handed coaching, intuitive coaching and coaching with animals. This stage caters to senior coaches. It could be read as well by other people to gain awareness of the human potential revealed through coaching.

Stage 4 – Collective coaching specifics –this stage applies to team coaching and organizational coaching. It shows that team and organizational coaching can still be classified as coaching and can even be a very powerful way to achieve change through teams and organizations. We present the main differences between these two types of coaching and the latest practical research on both. 

Appendices

To reduce reading time and get to the essence of coaching more quickly, we have withheld some topics to the end of this roadbook. These are either already well known, such as coaching with emotions, or need to be developed further, such as the coaching session framing and Jung’s fields of consciousness.

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Some chapters come with a set of exercises, to help you gain a deeper understanding of what we want to share with you. We really hope you’ll enjoy this book and we wish you a great journey.