What is your coach’s number 1 job? Surprise, it isn’t advice giving.

You’ve decided to work with a coach, but do you know what your coach’s number 1 job is? Often when a person reaches out to schedule a sample coaching session I find myself having to let them know that a coach’s number 1 job isn’t advice giving. That in fact they can get all of the advice they want from their friends and family for free. 

ADVICE GIVING

Advice giving does nothing to help you feel capable or powerful. What is does is try to solve the problem at hand. It tries to sooth the pain or discomfort that the person is experiencing. But one does not hire a coach to sooth their pain or discomfort.

Ever noticed that whenever you have a choice or decision to make in life you’ll often reach out to seek the opinions of others? Whether you are aware of it or not the purpose is often to have them confirm what you are already thinking. To help justify the belief or bias you already have. Advice giving is a quick fix. 

A coach’s work is to help their clients feel powerful, capable and whole. The number 1 job of your coach though is to create awareness. 

AWARENESS

For many life is about a series of repeated steps. We create that daily or weekly routine that gets us through, that gives us certainty and security. Life is not a conscious thing for many of us. It’s easier and takes less energy to work on autopilot.  And who can blame you! Life now moves at a breakneck pace, just trying to keep up is difficult at times. 

But for some they reach a stage where that autopilot begins to cause more concern than comfort. Perhaps like a small pebble in a shoe. 

This is the beginning of the awareness journey. A noticing that something doesn’t feel right anymore or keeps nudging you in odd ways. You begin to think, something needs to change. 

THE COACHING EXPERIENCE

With each coaching session a client attends the coach uses the skills of powerful questions, deep listening and curiosity. With these skills the coach begins to shine a light on the client by reflecting their behaviour patterns, beliefs, biases and feelings. 

Once you start to take a look in that metaphorical mirror you begin to see something you didn’t or couldn’t see about yourself before. And once you have that information about yourself, you can’t un-see it. With each session the coach observes patterns in the clients thoughts or ways of being. Then reflects back or acknowledges the client for how they are taking that new self knowledge and using it to guide them in their daily decisions. 

AWARENESS EXAMPLES

Here are a few examples of how self awareness can begin to change who you are. 

1. Want to lose weight: after reviewing daily routine with your coach realized that those 2 glasses of wine after work every day are not supporting your goal. 
2. Want to improve communication: learned in a coaching session that you often cut off others while they are speaking. Realized if you want to feel heard you have to stop this practice and allow others to be heard first. 
3. Want to change relationship with money: have a desire to travel in retirement but believe it’s not possible. Saw that you always avoided anything to do with finances. Once you obtained a little knowledge around the topic realized that with knowledge  came the power to feel more in control and thus see what was really possible financially. 

All in all a coach’s number 1 job is to help create awareness in their client. That is what helps them feel they are capable to achieve what they want in their lives. With awareness the blocks we put in front of ourselves begin to crumble. 

HOW TO GROW SELF AWARENESS

I recently read this article by Tasha Eurich, PhD. at The Harvard Review about self awareness. Additionally it speaks about two different types of awareness. What struck me was the section on introspection. Stating that when we are introspective the all too common approach of asking ourselves why we are the way we are. 

The problem, Tasha states, is that introspection can lead to negative answers because to often we ask ourselves why we did something. 

Her examples show the power of how coaching helps gently direct you from that perspective to one of curiosity with different questions. Ones that start with what or how versus the justification perspective of why questions.  Additionally from this perspective you’re not laying blame, but rather getting curious about how you could be or show up differently in order to get a better or different result. 

Growing self awareness takes practice, constant stumbling and getting back up again. Your coach knows this and is there with you every step of the way as you continue to work towards the best you you can be. With greater awareness of who we are being and how we show up in the world creating more of what we want becomes possible.