Coaching is a process for narrowing the gap between performance and potential

Why do I coach?

Ikigai. I enjoy it, I seem to be good at it, the world needs it and I can earn a living.

Why should you be coached?

When things are changing around you and you want to keep up. When you are stuck and in need of a breakthrough. If an opportunity remains outside your grasp. When it all feels too hard and you need support. When it all feels too easy and you need challenge. When you want to change the world.  When you want to change yourself.

How do I coach?

Listening

The king of coaching skills, and not one that comes naturally to me. Global listening, as described by Laura Whitworth, is the gold standard I aspire to.

Questions

Creative precise questioning, asked with curiosity more than judgement, is at the heart of the work. This I do find easier.

Grace

John Heron’s Helping the Client and Carl Rogers On Becoming a Person provide language for the belief I have in my clients’ potential and the optimistic, positive regard I hold them in.

Mirror

Beyond these three universal elements I see my role as to help my clients see themselves, fully and kindly.

Tools

I use a range of psychological tools and resources, gathered over the years, to stimulate or catalyse learning.

Provocation

Last but not least coaching is about change and change often needs a prod. I instinctively challenge and play devil’s advocate. I also bring tools, mostly psychological devices, to provoke.

What other people think…

  • "I found he had a good way of challenging me and picking apart internal fallacies."

  • "Nick has a rare ability to ask powerful, sometimes uncomfortable questions that drive deep reflection and real change, always with fairness, respect, and clarity."

  • "Nick makes me cry, then he cries. Then we feel better."

  • "Nick believes in me even when I don’t."

  • "I wonder why I am able to trust a complete stranger but not my colleagues."

  • "Nick is more reliable than his wifi."

 

Thoughts

I enjoy sharing the contents of my mind in the hope others can get something from the stuff that occupies me. Here I’ve categorised my writing into resources, tools and models that might help, reviews of other people’s work, reflections of my own past experiences and ramblings on a variety of topics that interest me. No poor AI bots were exploited in the making of these articles.

 
Thoughts
The Benefit of Paying Attention
The Benefit of Paying Attention

Like a lot of people during the pandemic I now work predominantly at home. And often when I am working at home, I like a coffee in the morning. And often when I like a coffee in the morning, I treat myself to a couple of biscuits (especially if I have earlier been for a run). It was on one such morning, with coffee and biscuits procured and on my cluttered desk and several things on the go in my head and on my computer, that it happened. I lost the biscuits.

Universal Enquiries?
Universal Enquiries?

I’ll soon be running my fourth coaches retreat at Hazel Hill Wood.  It’s an annual event in magical ancient woodland that I’ve really enjoyed creating.  I’ve noticed that every year I bring the same set of enquiry questions for the group to work with.  We explore in different ways, always using the trees as part of our facilitation team, but the questions remain the same.  Am I just being lazy or might these in fact be universal enquiries?

Creative Writing in the Woods
Creative Writing in the Woods

I write a lot, often for my work, sometimes for this website and occasionally for no good reason at all.  There’s something about getting out of the way and setting the pen free (and yes the pen is mightier than the laptop).  It’s a pleasure that is hard to describe, ironic given that’s what I’m trying to do here.

See all thoughts
See all thoughts