Ch 2 - Coaching Skills

Question 1

Explain what is meant by “relationship is the heart of coaching”?

Answer 1

Coaching is a growth fostering relationship that enables clients to reach their goals and fulfill their visions.

Question 2

True or False: Coaching is about learning?

Answer 2

True.

But the coach is not a teacher and does not necessarily know how to do things better than the coachee.

Question 3

True or False: Coaching is more about asking the right questions than providing answers.

Answer 3

True.
Through various coaching techniques such as listening, reflecting, asking questions and providing information, coachees become self-correcting (they learn how to correct their behavior themselves) and self-generating (they generate their own questions and answers).

Question 4

List several dimensions of relationship building and give examples?

Answer 4

• Establishing trust and rapport
  
  • Hold unconditional positive regard
  • Show empathy
  • Be a humble role model (walk the talk)
  • Slow down
  • Pay full attention
  • Under promise and over deliver
  • Client finds the answers
  • Confidentiality is crucial
  • Be honest

Question 5

What is the definition of unconditional positive regard? Why is it important to the coaching relationship?

Answer 5

Unconditional positive regard: being completely accepting toward another person, without reservations.

It is key to establishing rapport and trust and the foundation for masterful coaching.

Question 6

What is the definition of empathy?

Answer 6

A respectful understanding of another person’s experience, including their feelings, needs, or desires.

Question 7

What is the difference between empathy and sympathy?

Answer 7

Sympathy is identifying with another’s experience

Empathy is understanding and appreciating another person’s experience.

Question 8

True or False: Personal disclosure is never appropriate on the part of the coach.

Answer 8

False

Personal disclosure on the part of the coach is appropriate and valuable when it serves the best interest of the client.

Coaches can serve as role models for their clients helping them gain insight and inspiration for the journey.

Question 9

What are the three core coaching skills?

Answer 9

Mindful listening
Open-ended inquiry
Perceptive Reflections

Question 10

What is mindfulness?

Answer 10

The non-judgmental awareness of what is happening in the present moment.

Question 11

What is an example of an exercise to increase mindfulness?

Answer 11

Starting coaching conversations with a minute of silence and breath-work.

Or

Mindful eating: Before eating ask yourself
Where am I?
What is my body position?
What is going on around me?
Am I really hungry?
What does the food look, smell, and taste like?
What am I thinking about?
What am I feeling?
What do I really want to eat?
How can I enhance my experience of eating?

Or

Take 3 deep breaths
Close your eyes for 5 seconds
Become aware of your breathing
Say to yourself
I am grateful for this opportunity to connect and make a difference
I have an opportunity to make a pivotal contribution
I am open and curious about all that will unfold

Question 12

Define “mindful listening”.

Answer 12

Listening with full, non-judgmental awareness to someone is saying in the present moment.

Mindful listening involves listening for the meaningful whole, including a client’s best experiences, core values, significant moments, feelings, current challenges, and future dreams.

Question 13

How can the coach let the client know that the coach is listening to what they say?

Answer 13

The coach can periodically summarize and restate (reflect) the client’s message which lets the client know they have been heard.

Question 14

What is cognitive listening?

Answer 14

Listening to the words or facts of what someone is saying.

Question 15

What is affective listening?

Answer 15

Listening to the needs and feelings behind someones words.

Client’s moods, emotions, tone, energy, body language, hesitation, and pacing provide important clues.

Question 16

What is the importance of mindful listening in building trust and rapport.

Answer 16

So the client feels heard and that they are important.
Multitasking (even just mentally) is damaging to trust and rapport.
Client’s can tell when coaches are not 100% present.

Question 17

What are some tips for mindful listening?

Answer 17

• Do not think about what you will say next until your client has spoken the last work of their though.
  
  • Pause after your client has spoken.
  • Weave the client’s words into the next step.
  • Weave the client’s story into later steps.
  • Listen for emotions as well as facts.
  • Do not interrupt
  • Reflect whenever possible.

Question 18

What does it mean for a coach to “listen until I don’t exist”?

Answer 18

Coaches must silence the voices in their own head so they can actively pay attention to the voice of the client.

Pay singular attention to the client’s agenda.

Question 19

What is open-ended inquiry?

Answer 19

A question that require long narrative answers. They can not be answered with just a yes or no.

Open ended questions start with “what” or “how”

Question 20

What are the best ways to begin open-ended questions?

Answer 20

What
Or
How
Because they encourage story telling

Question 21

Why do coaches avoid asking “why” questions?

Answer 21

• Why questions tend to provoke analysis instead of story telling.
  
  • They can also evoke resistance because they can suggest judgment. (Why did you eat the whole cake).

Question 22

When are “Why” questions powerful?

Answer 22

Why do your visions and goals deeply matter to you? Can help clients connect with their deepest motivators.

Question 23

Open- or closed-ended question?

When did you exercise last week?

Answer 23

Closed ended

Question 24

Open- or closed-ended question?

What have you heard about the nutritional value of fruits and vegetables?

Answer 24

Open ended

Question 25

True or False: Coaches should never used closed ended questions.

Answer 25

False
Coaches used more open ended than closed ended questions. Closed ended questions have a place: when the coach wants to find out if the client is ready to commit to a vision, strategy, or goals they can ask “Are you ready to move forward?”

Question 26

What are perceptive reflections in the context of a coaching conversation? Give an example?

Answer 26

A form of listening.
The purpose of perceptive reflections is to elicit change talk.
They enable clients to hear what they are saying from the vantage point of another person.
The process causes clients to connect more deeply to their emotions (the emotionally part of the brain, the limbic region is activated).

Question 27

What are the 12 types of responses that are not perceptive reflection?

Answer 27

1. Ordering, directing, commanding
   
   2. Warning, cautioning, threatening
   3. Giving advice, making suggestions, or providing solutions
   4. Persuading with logic, arguing or lecturing
   5. Telling people what they should do, moralizing
   6. Disagreeing, judging, criticizing, or blaming
   7. Agreeing, approving, or praising
   8. Shaming ridiculing, or labeling
   9. Interpreting or analyzing
   10. Reassuring, sympathizing, or consoling
   11. Questioning or probing
   12. Withdrawing, distracting, humoring, or chainging the subject

Question 28

True or False: A coach’s perceptive must be accurate?

Answer 28

False
Coaches should not be too concerned about the accuracy of their perceptive reflections. If the reflection is accurate the client will aggree. If it is not accurate, the client will disagree. Either way, the reflection moves the client forward.

Question 29

Discuss the importance of silence in a coaching conversation?

Answer 29

Silence can lead to to insights and directional shifts.

Silence sends the empowering message “I believe you can figure this out by going deeper.”

Question 30

What is reframing?

Answer 30

Framing a client’s experience in a positive light.

Question 31

How should a coach respond when their client is focused on what is not working?

Answer 31

With positive reframing.
NOT with problem analysis which can be demoralizing, overwhelming and counterproductive. Problem analysis can weigh people down with more reasons not to change.

Question 32

What can you do to reframe a coaching conversation in a positive light?

Answer 32

Ask
“What’s the silver lining in this situation?”
“Tell me about your best day”
“Tell me about the activities you enjoyed most this past week.”
“Tell me about the best thing you did for yourself, no matter how small”
“Tell me how you got through this and what’s possible now”

Question 33

What is the ratio of clients talking in a masterful coaching session?

Answer 33

In a masterful coaching session clients talk more than twice as much as coaches.

Remember the acronym WAIT: Why am I talking?

Question 34

What is meant by the phrase “My certainty is greater than your doubt”?

Answer 34

That the coach’s belief in the clients ability to make changes is stronger than the client’s doubt about their ability to change.

Question 35

Describe several qualities of a masterful coach.

Answer 35

Masterful coaches are
Authentic
Empathetic
Accepting / nonjudgmental
Good at identifying client strengths, values, desires
Enjoy client stories
Patient and allow clients to change in their own time
Celebrate client success
Take risks to challenge clients at the right moment

Question 36

Why do coaches avoid giving advice?

Answer 36

Allowing clients to research and figure out their own answers fosters lasting change.

Question 37

When and how is it appropriate for coaches to give clients advice?

Answer 37

When clients ask for advice or when it appears that advice would be helpful the coach should ask the client permission to give advice.

The advice should be framed as a possible solution in two to three alternatives rather than a single right answer.

Giving advice does not promote lasting behavioral change and it interferes with the development of self-efficacy.