A coach who tells someone what to do pushes the coach's best onto them instead of drawing out theirs. The better way: identify the real challenge, ask what they've already figured out, explore their ideas, then add your suggestions only after they've done the mental work.
Chapters
Your definition of coaching to bring out the best in someone. To me, the only way to bring out the best in someone is to ask them these questions. Because if you tell them what you think they should do, by definition, you are not bringing out the best in them. You're trying to push the best of you onto them. Right. The.
Other thing is there is a place for your advice and your suggestions and opinions. I'm not saying never give anybody an idea ever again in their life. Yeah. If when you've got a really stonkingly good idea, it's probably the best idea, it still might not be the thing to do to give it to them. At least not right at the start. Here's how it can sound. You go, all right, so what's the real challenge here for you? And they're like, oh, it's this. And you're like, God, that feels like the real challenge. And in your head you're like, and I know exactly what you should be doing, so resist that. Resist the advice monster. Here's what you can say instead. I've got some ideas around how you could deal with that, but I bet you've got some ideas, too. I'll tell you mine, but before I do, I'm really curious. What have you already figured out about this? Oh, I love that. What are your best ideas? Oh, cool. What else could you do? What other ideas do you have? I mean, these are terrific. This is really excellent. So I love all your ideas. Here's one idea that I'll throw into the mix that might be helpful for you. And so you're still following through on your promise that you've got their back. You're going to give them ideas, you're going to help them make the choice, but you're getting them to do the work.
