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Before we begin to glorify coaching, I would like to understand the objective reasons for its necessity and the advertising component of its popularity. Like any product, it is first promoted and then sold. First they hear about it, and only then they try it. Just like in coaching, we will explore his problem in his own way — questions.
Let’s start with a simple one: why did coaching appear now and why didn’t it exist before?
According to beliefs, coaching, as a self-formed phenomenon, arose in America in the 70s of the last century. Which already sounds historical and gives it a touch of classics.
But coaching will never become a classic, because it is about change, it explores change as an independent phenomenon, and therefore must change itself. He will never give rise to models by which he will be taught. Coaching is created in the present because it is focused on the future. All learning is learning from the past. That’s the way it’s set up.
Coaching adjusts the personality to the changing world. And since change always comes first, coaching is the first in learning. You can only learn the coaching of the past, so you need to teach in the style of coaching too.
Coaching is the science of change. Person, organization. A kind of differential calculus. Almost all of the science of the past dealt with final states, but it was silent about what happens to the electron at the moment of transition to another orbit. The quantum leap is a miracle beyond description because it cannot be tracked. We want stability and we think only in its categories.
In the modern world, along with the values of stability and sustainability, new values have appeared — changes, temporality, momentaryness, like a dawn that lasts seconds, but absorbs eternity.
It has become important to live differently, uniquely, to quickly break away, to be always different, elusive in your attachments, unpredictable and always new.
The river of life has become multicolored and the people who inhabit its banks have become multiple and changing in time with it. The concept of the mainstream is gone, breaking into many streams. Eternal values of movement were added to the eternal values of rest.
Both rest and work have changed. The period of work in one place has decreased significantly. Comparing the work books of generations, we will see that the old ones are almost pristine compared to the new ones. Dynasties remained only with the oligarchs, or in the professions of a continuous cycle. Those who used to be called jumpers became lucky, and those who called them that — well, you yourself know where they are now …
Those idly staggering began to look not staggering, but stable. Idleness has changed from condemned to desirable.
New rules emerge before old ones die. Changes in the specialization of employees within the company have become much more frequent. There was a techie, he became a marketer, he was the head of a department, he became a financial director. Good people are not scattered. It’s cheaper to teach your own than to pay headhunters a six-month salary for someone else’s. Everyone became a Swiss, and a reaper, and a player on the pipe. Although initially he had a Swedish education. How to become a reaper, let alone a piper?
In order not to go crazy from the monotony of the profession, it can be changed. You can learn a new profession in courses and trainings, but if you are not ready for it internally, it will not stick to you. Who will help? Can you do it yourself? Someone surely can.
The Internet is full of articles about hundreds saved by coaching, like Dr. Mayorov (a fictional advertising character) about saved gums and teeth. Is this true and why is this salvation so expensive and worth it? Can I help myself with this? Or is it better to trust the responsible procedures to a specialist? Faster on your own or with a coach?
The winner is not the one who became the first, but the one who continues to be the first. But how can they be when they have to do several things at once, to be in several roles. How can individuals accommodate so many changes and changes? How to match them, so as not to get schizophrenia, becoming a man-orchestra? Now is the era of elections (not to be confused with elections). There are so many possibilities and directions that it captures not only the spirit, but also other parts of our being. How do I know what this (this TV, this car, this person, this job, this goal, this path, etc.) is what I need? The era of lack of choice is over. But if we do not make a choice, then it will be made for us — advertising, relatives, friends. Mistakes are also unique and everyone will have a considerable collection of his personality. This was the short answer to the first question.
Question two: is coaching good for everyone?
Are there those lucky ones whom he can help and those unfortunates for whom he is not applicable?
Who wants more, wants change. Coaching is for those who need changes in themselves, for those who want to get more than they have. Anyone who does not want to lose more than he is losing now needs a consultation with a psychotherapist (do not touch Kurpatov — this genre is special).
Life requires new knowledge, skills and professions from us. And not always our personality traits coincide with the new case. And I don’t want to lose him. I want to adapt to it, to become a professional in it. How to change yourself for a new business, for something that was not given before, but now you cannot do without it, how to become more than you were in order to meet the new challenges of life? As you guessed, this is also coaching.
Who is not coached for?
On the one who either knows everything and knows how, or wants nothing. Adult children, brought by their mother by the hand, are lost for coaching. Coaching is fun for independent people.
Is coaching psychotherapy?
Everyone loses and gains at the same time. By acquiring one, he gives up the other. The speed of movement through life determines the ratio of gains and losses. The higher the speed, the greater the efficiency.
The coach teaches you to pump the muscles of the soul, and the therapist sews up the spiritual wound. Coaching explores what prevents you from pumping muscles — lifestyle, and the therapist explores what hinders the healing process — lifestyle. The procedures are similar, but with different meanings. Therapy helps to stop the “disease” and recover, coaching helps to become stronger and a master of sports. Naturally, in both cases it is necessary to understand the reasons and the methods may be similar. But in any case, coaching is not a therapist’s couch. Analysis of not painful problems and injuries, but the resources and capabilities of a person.
How does a coach work?
A coach is a mix of a journalist taking an interview and a commander in chief placing troops in positions. The first asks questions on the map hanging on the wall of the second. This is a map of a person, his history, goals and deeds. It is not easy, you need to be able to navigate in it. Not knowing the solution, everyone is blind. Other people’s eyes will not add sight to the blind. The art of asking questions means leading a person along his map to complete enlightenment. Coaching questions are an invitation to look at parts of yourself that are connected to the whole world. A proposal to recognize in oneself the driving forces and brakes, the familiar track and the opening paths. The coach directs the client’s eye to what is important that is involved in achieving his goal. He understands its structure, knows the conditions for the reality of changes and knows how to organize the process of acquiring novelty. A coach is like a spotlight: in the crosshairs of his questions, you can catch the ever-elusive meaning of every day and life in general. We do not always know how to think about our problem, how to see it so that it becomes «manual» and manageable. We often don’t know how to approach it. The coach teaches a person to think about the problem, reveals something for which it “can be touched” and transfer from the state of “I don’t know what to take on” to the state of “I understand everything”. Coaching is a kind of constructor of certainty and happiness. To write more specifically and non-metaphorically is not part of the purpose of the text. Huge manuals are devoted to this, with which, with considerable patience (here is the test for professional suitability!), You can try to familiarize yourself with it.
Who can be a coach?
Not everyone. In appearance, the work is not dusty — two people talk peacefully, then one pays money to the other and leaves elated. But inside — a complex live analysis. Here and now. Perspiration, in-depth look. Quiet discoveries, searching for a living soul. Maybe someone who does not like ready-made solutions, who likes to search for himself, being in conditions of uncertainty and not postponing for later. Who is interested in the phenomenon of man and his development. Someone who has long wanted to change the human race for the better. Someone who is closer to the achievers than the losers, because coaches work mostly with the former.
How to understand that you have a real coach in front of you?
A good coach is invisible at work. The more natural the conversation, the more relaxed the look, the more comfortable the client, the more professional he is. The client does not have painful reflections, problems open up one after another. Change happens organically. A good driver is invisible on the road. When there are no problems with the bank, the fin does not remember him. director. The surgeon performs the operation gently. Everything else is self-promotion to get noticed. There are coaches by vocation, there are coaches by education. To one queue of clients, to the other queue of magazines.
Possible coaching topics
“I can’t figure out my goals at work, there are many options, but I can’t understand which one is more important to me”
“I want to be a good leader. It’s hard for me to punish people. I feel like they don’t understand me. When I started the business, everyone was in the same team. When stability appeared, difficulties began with employees. It seems that we need to reorient ourselves to a new style of relationships. What to choose specifically — I do not know »
“I want to get into the national team. I can’t figure out what’s stopping me, the data is there, but something is missing every time.”
“I was a negotiator at work, was appointed with a promotion as the head of the sales department. I do not know how to manage people, I can only negotiate with them. How can I learn to lead?
“The company has suffered huge financial losses. There is a chance for a couple of months to restore the balance. I’m too depressed by the losses, which are part of my fault. I need to get ready for a dash.» “At work, I take it out on everyone. Because of this, the climate worsened, failures began. Important orders ahead. I want to work this year in peace.”
“I want to make a million and prove that I am worth something. There is everything for this, but sometimes apathy sets in. What to do?»
“I want to change jobs. I am a good professional. There are many offers, but it seems to me that I have exhausted myself in this profession, but I am not drawn to something specific. I want a new drive.»
Coaching is a useful thing, a kind of laboratory of achievements. It does not interfere with the natural development of man. It accelerates what can be accelerated without touching what is not yet ready for it.