In 2008, I had a moment of arrogance. I was starting a six-month-long coaching training and the first module was on contracting. Huffing silently to myself, muttering quietly that I knew how to contract, I settled down and waited to pass the time until they got onto something more interesting. Yes. You’ve probably guessed…
Delighted and discombobulated. Sometimes not really knowing what I was looking at. Curious and confused. More questions than answers. Swept up by the richness and the complexity. All senses engaged. Enriched and enlarged as a result. Over Christmas, I spent a month in India. It’s as different as a couple of weeks in…
Sometimes, I’m very lucky. I get the chance to design and run leadership programmes which are truly bespoke and where the client is willing to try something different. Last week, with a great team (see below), I launched a programme on behalf of London Business School for senior Partners…
Sometimes I’m asked by clients about what underpins my work, what approaches or beliefs my work is based on. I might say things about the principles of self managed learning, or the importance of intentional practice. Or about a humanistic philosophy. But often I find myself…
To my surprise, this week, I have been thinking about courage. About making a visible and public stand for what you think matters. About having a voice. That’s the thing, I think. Knowing what matters to you is one thing. Speaking it out is quite another. In the…
Twice this week, I have seen someone write that coaching and therapy are different. And that coaches must take great care not to drift into therapy. True, they are different. But in many ways, it’s a false distinction and there are many ways in which coaching…
‘Try as I might, I am unable to obscure, marginalise or shadow myself … like an annoying jack-in-the-box gone wrong, I do not disappear from sight, even momentarily’ . This wonderful quote from Venitha Pillay is often with me as I coach, facilitate and consult with…
Work as Love in Action 3: am I choosing to be generous? In leadership development, I often work with binaries, with different ends of a spectrum in order to explore something, maybe creating a false polarity to make a point. Are you a strategic or…
I’ve written in a previous blog how the need for space feels so pressing for leaders. And that a common coaching goal is to help leaders find where that space might be created. In some painful weeks of parallel process, I’ve been struggling with a similar issue….
