It was only 7 minutes but it felt like an eternity. I guess that was what it felt like to do my first coaching practicum in front of Coach Mel and 20 other aspiring coaches. We were paired up randomly and I got to coach Luisa, which was nice since we just got to know each other recently.
We were using the GROW coaching model, which was developed by Graham Alexander, Alan Fine and Sir John Whitmore. This model helps the coach bring the coachee through a journey where they first discuss the coachee’s goals, reality, options and their way forward. I love this model and I think it is really practical. In fact, after I read about this model, I started practicing it on myself!
I tried to practice all the core competencies that we had learnt so far in this 7 minute session. One of the key thoughts that I had was that I needed to truly listen to what was being said. Since we were doing the coaching over a Zoom call (without video), Luisa couldn’t see me nervously scribbling down notes so that I did not miss any of the details she talked about.
I gave myself a rating of 5 over 10 for this first coaching practicum, to which Coach Mel said that I should be giving myself a higher number. He said I was soothing in the way I talk, but I was a challenging coach, asking hard questions to the coachee. The questions I asked tried to nail down the problem (which was precisely the thought process in my head), but his feedback was that I had to learn how to ask more open ended questions.
After I asked the coachee her goal, I kind of deviated from her original goal after I thought I had identified a problem of hers. What would have been better would be to bring the topic back from time management to her marketing problem by asking…
“How is time management relevant to marketing your program?”
“How can you set a goal with regards to time management?”
“What are the 3 things that you will do differently?”
And then let the coachee summarize the session herself, by asking, “What have you learnt from this session” or “What is your biggest takeaway from today’s session?”
An interesting comment would be to notice how the coachee speaks in her language… she was using a lot of words like “try” or “hope”. Those words indicate a very low commitment to follow through an action, so I could then ask, “On a scale of 1-10, how willing are you in committing towards this goal?”
I look forward to getting better at coaching!
Cover image credit: Photo by Daria Shevtsova from Pexels
