Overcoming
the
Blindspots
of Expert Coaches
Blindspots?
This short video gives an introduction by XLNC Founder, Dr. Matt Barney, about his work with experts at the International Coaching Federation that inspired this free guide and masterclass.
Dr. Matt Barney, award-winning Organizational Psychologist and serial entrepreneur
ICF Testimonial
Joel DiGirolamo is the VP of Research and Data Science for the International Coaching Federation. In this short video, he gives an account of his work with Dr. Barney
Joel DiGirolamo, VP of Research and Data Science, International Coaching Federation
Blindspot Overview by ICF Competency
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1) Demonstrates Ethical Practice
Coaches should be aware of the potential negative effects of coaching on clients, coaches and organizations, as well as their own limitations and potential biases. Without understanding these blindspots, coaches may unintentionally harm clients or fail to fully meet the ICF Ethical Guidelines. Subjective judgment can be inferior to actuarial or statistical assessments, and it is important for coaches to consider using valid psychometric assessments in order to reduce their potential biases and provide the best possible support for their clients.
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2) Embodies a Coaching Mindset
Only the most curious and conscientious coaches realize that some traditional views of coaching conflict with psychological science. For example, asking questions is a form of persuasion called "Pre-Suasion". Similarly, many coaches don’t know that observer views of openness (for coaches and clients) is 2x more predictive of real world behavior than self-perceptions.
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3) Establishes & Maintains Agreements
Expert coaches may have blind spots when it comes to accurately assessing the needs and goals of their clients, building trust and rapport, and helping clients follow through on their commitments. These limitations can hinder the effectiveness of the coaching process and relationship. To overcome these challenges, it is important for coaches to utilize methods that encourage critical thinking. New technologies now exist to help clients stay on track can also help coaches mitigate the risk of clients "falling off the wagon" and not following through on their commitments. By addressing these blind spots, coaches can improve their ability to provide effective coaching to their clients.
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4) Cultivates Trust and Safety
One blindspot of expert coaches is their understanding of how to maximize psychological safety in their coaching engagements. Personality traits and work design characteristics can impact psychological safety, and many coaches may not assess these factors systematically. Another blindspot is the understanding that creating trust has three components: credibility, conscientiousness, and benevolence. Expert coaches may not be aware of the importance of proactively communicating key pieces of information and being perceived as benevolent in order to secure a client's trust. Leveraging the science of relationship cultivation can help expert coaches overcome these blindspots.
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5) Maintains Presence
Coaching presence involves a combination of personality and cognitive factors. Mastering this skill in a coaching engagement involves shifting attention away from surface structure or content and towards deeper structures in the coaching relationship. However, if coaches are unaware of the latest scientific models of clients, their goals, and the coach-client relationship, their attention may not be as useful or trustworthy. The use of pseudoscience or invalid assessments in coaching can undermine the trust essential to the coach-client relationship and hinder the effectiveness of coaching. It is important for coaches to be well-versed in the latest scientific models and research to provide the most effective and trustworthy coaching. In addition, many expert coaches may not be aware of how to leverage emotions to facilitate goal pursuit with the client due to the newness of the scientific study of flexibility.
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6) Listens Actively
Expert coaches may not realize that their own personality can impact the effectiveness of their Active Empathic Listening skills. Coaches who lack certain traits, such as agreeableness, openness, adjustment, or conscientiousness, may need to work harder to improve their Active Empathic Listening abilities. The practice of active listening can have long-term benefits on relationships and professional interactions, as it can make the listener appear likable, trustworthy, and competent.
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7) Evokes Awareness
Many expert coaches may not be aware that most interventions addressing unconscious bias are ineffective, according to a 2019 meta-analysis of over 80,000 people. In fact, diversity interventions sometimes even backfire and make it less likely that black men and women will advance in organizations. To be aware of their own biases and help their clients become aware of theirs, coaches can use a variety of strategies such as empathy, "prejudice habit-breaking" and promoting ideological (viewpoint) diversity. Ongoing use of these strategies, possibly with the help of a coaching supervisor, is likely to be the most effective way for coaches to continuously improve their understanding of and ability to address biases and blindspots.
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8) Facilitates Client Growth
Expert coaches may underestimate the importance of encouraging clients to engage in deliberate practice in-between sessions and may not be aware of technology tools that can facilitate this. It is important for coaches to prime clients to normalize mistakes and to set goals that are both challenging and achievable, and to encourage clients to seek support from well-wishers. These approaches can help increase the chances of success for clients working towards their goals.
Free Guide
Overcoming Blindspots of Expert Coaches
Would you like more in-depth understanding of these blind spots, with peer-reviewed references? Feel free to download our free guide
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MasterClass
Overcoming the Blindspots of Expert Coaches
Audience: Conscientious expert (PCC and MCC) coaches who believe they have mastered nearly all that there is to know about coaching science
Who is this not for:
1. Early career coaches who are just learning the basics of coaching,
2. Coaches who are satisfied with their current level of proficiency, and sales
3. Expert coaches who are about ready to retire.
Faculty: Matt Barney, Ph.D., award-winning Organizational Psychologist and serial entrepreneur LinkedIn
Goals: The overarching objective of the masterclass is to help expert coaches learn to apply crucial scientific findings in order to better cultivate relationships, support clients, and improve the odds that clients realize transformational gains. Your instructor, Dr. Matt Barney wants to help expert coaches improve their results to such a degree that they inspire clients to refer and recommend them to others they know, thereby improving the coaches business prospects.
By the end of the class, the expert coach will be able to:
Appreciate the utility of new coaching science for exceptional outcomes and relationships.
Deepen your understanding of the interplay between science and ethics to promote client and coach well-being
Leverage the new 2023 ICF standards for coaching supervision that Dr. Barney is helping ICF’s VP of Coaching Science, Joel DiGirolamo, and MCCs create.
Reframe your personal approach to coaching using new insights from Organizational Psychology
Better leverage the relationship between organizational culture, climate, and structure to make a bigger impact with your coaching using the Cue See Model from Dr. Barney’s 2013 book “Leading Value Creation”.
Apply the Cue See Model to team and process effectiveness, to improve your team coaching
Apply the Cue See Model to individual differences in job and team effectiveness, to improve individual coaching
Reconsider the roles of cognition, affect, knowledge, skill, ability and traits on coaching in order to redesign your own personal approach to coaching
Deepen your appreciation for person-environment interactions and their impact on behavior within, and between coaching sessions in order to weave into your own style.
Reframe your personal approach to coaching using new insights from Counseling and Clinical Psychology that are relevant to normal populations
Deepen your understanding of the potential negative effects of coaching on both clients and coaches, and proactively make lemonade out of these lemons to improve your relationships with clients and customers.
Understand the phenomenon of “attentional blindness” that forms the basis for traditional clinical applications of supervision, and their implications for coaching.
Appreciate the science from Educational and Developmental Psychology that is relevant to coaching where the client wants to grow.
Use techniques that help clients deliberately, concertedly, purposefully apply coaching in-between sessions
Proactively help anticipate setbacks, speed-bumps and mistakes, and reframe them as “teachers”.
Overcome perhaps the biggest blind-spot with experts coaches about the nature of human relationship cultivation from Social Psychology
Appreciate Cialdini’s approach to ethics, and their role in human relationships with transformational implications on the nature of coaching
Apply Dr. Robert Cialdini’s seven ethical principles of persuasion and his contrast phenomenon to better cultivate relationships with clients, reduce uncertainty, and motivate action
Avoid common blindspots across the ICF Competency Models for Individuals, Teams, AI and Dr. Barney’s expectations for Coaching Supervision
Better use the three factors in the science of trust to deepen your relationships
Continuously improve your critical thinking to sort coaching innovation fact from fiction, to become self-sufficient in consuming coaching science to develop yourself
Reconsider the role of normal personality in coaching both in identifying client needs, and evaluating progress
Make your powerful questions more powerful using Cialdini’s pre-suasion insights
Reconsider the role that inspiration can and should play in your coaching engagements, by using Dr. John Antonakis’ seminal work on charisma
Revisit the role of formal assessment as part of ICF ethics, and ensuring that not only the client, but also the customer (buyer) relationships are cultivated.
Become a better consumer of assessments, asking the right questions to make sure those you use aren’t merely fun, liked by clients, and inexpensive but also deepening your relationships with your clients and customers. [Resource Development]
Begin to use new technologies, to both acquire new customers through cloud/mobile platforms (e.g. Coaching.com), and use AI to compliment and extend your relationships into your client’s life in-between coaching sessions. [Resource Development]
Consider new approaches to selling your coaching services to the newest industries such as Decentralized Autonomous Organizations on blockchains, and AI. [Resource Development]
Leverage new forms of Natural Language AI as a sort of synthetic Coaching Supervision, and coaching assistant to brainstorm powerful questions, and create content. [Resource Development]