Spring 2024: Your "Best" Coaching or Coach Approach Moments by Brenda Booth

Student Sample 1: NU Coachee Lightbulb Moment

2023-11-27 16:49:19 UTC

With my NU coachee, my best moment was when I helped him unlock an insight and he paused and said, "I'd never thought of that before!"

Student Sample 3: Self Coaching

2023-11-27 16:50:59 UTC

I was feeling overwhelmed by my part-time internship so I had to take a step back and first show myself empathy. I also had to summarize and parrot back all the feedback I had received from different stakeholders. Then I utilized my time with a co-worker to ask questions and have an open mind about what I could do about my project. Through this, I was able to come up with an action plan for myself to make progress on my project in a way that didn't overwhelm me.

Student Sample 2: Coaching my wife

2023-11-27 16:52:49 UTC

My wife was dealing with a difficult peer at work and she appreciated that I gave her the space to talk about it. I also used the coach approach to challenge her to see the situation from the peer's perspective, which helped her come up with a better solution to work with him.

Your Name: Situation

bbooth31 — 2024-05-28 15:18:21 UTC

Shreya: Boss Opening Up

2024-05-28 23:09:55 UTC

I tried a “that sounds really hard” in a recent conversation with my boss, and it seemingly opened her up to share even more with me. It was nothing big or sophisticated, but it worked, and I felt as though I allowed her to share more because I wasn’t trying to solve anything in that moment (even though solving is literally my job!)

Anna: Coachee Continuation

2024-05-28 23:09:59 UTC

I was really surprised and happy that my coachee wants me to continue coaching them after the quarter! They said they had a great theater coach, but felt they needed a professional career coach and enjoyed our time together. They are a joy to coach and I have learned a lot from them as well. It made me feel like I can keep practicing my skills and feel more empowered as a coach!

Natalie: Coaching a Friend

2024-05-28 23:10:24 UTC

I have a friend that recently got laid off. In the past, I feel like I might have jumped to give advice or be overly positive. But I took a step back to listen to her and determine what she needed from me rather than jump to my own conclusion.

Jeff: Changing my approach with the wife

2024-05-28 23:10:24 UTC

Instead of telling my wife how she felt and being blunt, I asked if she wanted to hear my observation of the situations (dealing with challenges of life). She said yes.

I stated that she gets frustrated with all challenges thrown at her (and doesn't want to work through them).

SURPRISINGLY! She agreed.

Ananya: Aha moment with coachee

2024-05-28 23:10:31 UTC

There was an "aha" moment in my first coaching session with my mentee. She came into the conversation feeling demotivated with her internship, and wanting to find ways to improve it. Through coaching, she herself unlocked that the reason she felt demotivated was because in her previous job in the service industry, she was constantly getting real time feedback while this new desk job did not provide her with the same. She was so happy after coming to that insight and it shifted her attitude and the way in which she approached her internship!

Micah: Friend debating career decision

2024-05-28 23:11:37 UTC

I had a friend who was considering two different career paths, and he wasn't sure of which to choose. I used coaching to help him talk through his considerations. He said it was super helpful and that I'd "be good at being a coach"

Anupriya Nagarathnam: Coach Approach with a Friend

2024-05-28 23:12:00 UTC

In conversation, a friend of mine mentioned that she was interested in applying to the leadership position of a club, then immediately said "but I shouldn't apply because I won't get it anyway." I leveraged my coaching instincts to ask her a series of questions to unpack this, focusing on exploring her thought process rather than just whether she should or shouldn't apply. After our conversation, she ended up deciding it was worth it to apply relative to her personal goals. When she got the role she thanked me for encouraging her to apply, to which I got to point out, "I didn't recommend anything, I just asked questions and you decided to apply on your own!"

Jessica Qian: Coaching My Fiance

2024-05-28 23:12:33 UTC

My fiance was dealing with a challenging situation where he was deciding whether or not to attend his uncles funeral. He entered the conversation set on not going for various reasons but didn't feel completely settled with that decision. I used the coach approach to help him figure out the root cause of why he felt that way and helped him see the impact of his decisions from different individuals perspectives. In the end he changed his mind and decided to go and was really happy that he did. It was an eye opening moment in my coaching experience because he was able to come to his own satisfying conclusion about his challenge without me inputing any of my own opinions or giving direct advice.

Jovian: Coachee’s final session

2024-05-28 23:12:58 UTC

I had a coachee this quarter that felt challenging to work with due to us revisiting minor variations on the same issue that he raised every session throughout the quarter, without a clear resolution or change on his part. However, during our final session, I ultimately made a much broader observation across the sessions about his “problem” and that resulted in the first real deeper discussion about his real concerns and, I think, we made a little real progress towards a change for him.

Terry: Coaching new team member

2024-05-28 23:13:07 UTC

I had to onboard a new team member in the midst of an intense project. By asking questions to understand the person's strengths/weaknesses, goals for development, and areas of interest, I was able to create a good experience for the new member and leverage their abilities for the team.

Salima: PhD Coachee | Thesis Decision

2024-05-28 23:13:47 UTC

My PhD student was stuck deciding between two PhD final projects and almost felt a crippling anxiety about not being able to make the choice. I used a line of questioning that Professor Murphy used on me during our 1x1 session - asking the student to think about their values, why he chose the PhD route in the first place and what short and long term benefits he expected to derive from each of the two paths. We had spent about 15 minutes in one session taking this approach and then he kicked off the next session and just spoke for 40 minutes straight about the thought he had put into the questions and how much clarity he had on his path forward. I was so proud of him and proud of us for how far we had come in this process!

Neil: friend’s family conflict

2024-05-28 23:13:50 UTC

I’ve been leaning in more emphatically in my best friends family conflicts. That alone has been immensely helpful. I’ve also used the coach approach to evoke awareness by asking ‘what do you have control over in this situation?” That 1 question really helped him stop spinning his wheels and to help him not boil the ocean

Sergio Talamas: Successful reframing

2024-05-28 23:13:56 UTC

With my midterm partner I was able to understand the core issue and was able to reframe it in a way that allwed her to see the problem from a different perspective and approach the situation differently

Kshiteesh

2024-05-28 23:14:28 UTC

Coaching a new team member. Trying to walk him through process and making him understand our roles and responsibility in team. He became very comfortable and very involved after coaching.

Virginia: Coachee realization

2024-05-28 23:14:37 UTC

Through coaching, my NU coachee realized that he was unintentionally the middleman between the people participating in his program and his cofounders. He noticed his cofounders are struggling to stay as engaged in the programming and has suggested changes during their next planning meeting.

Jake: Coaching my Partner

2024-05-28 23:14:42 UTC

I've been using aspects of the coach approach all quarter with my partner. One that sticks out is that she has been having challenges finding a group to eat lunch with at work now that several of her closest friends have left the company, which is a problem she's never had before. Rather than give my opinion, I asked many questions to understand why it mattered so much to her to have a lunch group and to talk through options. I suspected that "the real challenge" was not about lunch, but more about feeling isolated at work, but I wanted her to come to that conclusion herself. We came to a decision for her to actively ask a few people to go to lunch rather than integrate into an existing group.

Jackie: Coach approach with direct report

2024-05-28 23:14:49 UTC

My direct report was super nervous about a client situation. Instead of giving him advice, I asked him if he could pinpoint what was making him feel most nervous. This led to a series of other questions that uncovered the root of his nerves actually wasn't related to the client at all. This allowed me to reassure him of the right things while calming his nerves and giving him more clarity to go into the client meeting.

Sean - Coaching myself

2024-05-28 23:15:20 UTC

Taking a step back and understanding the impact of being a better listener and avoiding jumping into a problem solving mentality to quickly. The moment that it clicked for me and made me a better coach was when I was chatting with my wife and I realized I had been very ineffective in coaching well, because I often jumped into a problem solving mode to soon.

Alice: Coaching to listen

2024-05-28 23:16:38 UTC

When my partner has a hard day at work and feels frustrated/tired/etc., I would try to help out by asking questions like "what if you tried ..." or "how about ...". Most recently, I started the conversation with asking him how he felt and what would be most helpful for us to talk about for him. I realized that I previously approached conversation to try to solve his problems my way, when in fact he needed a sounding board or someone to vent to. He walked away from the conversation actually feeling better, even though we didn't come up with a solution to his bad day because there was no solution.

Parag: Coaching session with a Kellogg friend

2024-05-28 23:18:42 UTC

My favourite moment was when a Kellogg friend was finding it difficult to select the right job role for her. While she was thinking linearly focusing just on pay, a 30 minute session where I asked her different question and helped her to find different aspects of job she cared about. At the end for her it was about somebone taking an effort and listening to her.