What are the best techniques for overcoming obstacles in coaching sessions?

Overcome coaching obstacles by fostering open communication, building trust, and tailoring approaches to individual needs. Address resistance with empathy, encouraging self-reflection. Flexibility, active listening, and providing actionable feedback contribute to effective problem-solving and progress, ensuring coaching sessions navigate challenges successfully.

Understanding your coachee's expectations, needs, and motivations is important to ensuring alignment with coaching. It is also important to level set what their perception of coaching is and learn about past experiences. Past experiences (both positive and negative) with coaches can impact the coachee's receptiveness to feedback and the level of vulnerability as well as the trust they may have with a new coach.

The quality of a coach's questions, coupled with the rapport established, determines the course of the coaching relationship. Open-ended questions are essential and questions that challenge the status quo open up new doors to opportunities and the ability to address challenges directly. When asking questions as a coach, avoid asking leading questions that drive to a pre-determined outcome or bias you may have. Carefully ask objective questions to ensure that you uncover all of the impacts (social, emotional, behavioral, environmental/situational, etc.)

When coaching, I always ask permission to take notes and explain how the notes are used and who has access to them. This builds trust and allows me to listen intently, capturing key things we've discussed. I will always offer my notes in full transparency. For some, this helps them be more aware and demonstrate that I am listening, not only to the words they say, but how their body language and demeanor change throughout the conversation (particularly when discussing challenging topics). For executives, this helps them focus, and understand the impact of their presence when under pressure or during uncomfortable conversations. I often use their words, for example, "When you said...what does that mean or look like for you?"

When giving feedback, I like to use the SBIA model. S- Situation - Describing the scenario. B - Behavior - Explain the behavioral facts (not assumptions or opinions - what was observed) I - Impact - Describe the impact of the behavior or others to raise awareness beyond oneself. A - Ask/Action - Hear out their point of view and either ask for an action item to be taken or suggest one for agreement. Ensure agreement on outcomes and deliver the feedback timely (particularly if it is considered bad news). A colleague once told me, "Bad news doesn't get better with age." Address it swiftly.

Timing is everything when coaching. Some individuals aren't ready to be coached. A coaching candidate must be receptive to feedback and motivated to grow or change. In the absence of these things, there will likely be resistance. That doesn't mean that someone isn't coachable, they simply aren't ready for coaching as it can't be forced or imposed upon someone.