The reflection part of the coaching ARROW provides the person being coached - often called the coachee - with an opportunity to reflect on what's been discovered so far. Depending on the underlying issue and how much time is available for coaching in one session, Reflection may prove to be a major or minor piece of the whole process.
It is often in this part of the coaching process that true enlightenment happens; what some have described as 'lightbulb' moments.
Creating time is often auseful tectic here and some coaches have had great success in stopping a coaching session after Aims and Reality and leaving the coachee with certain Reflection questions to think about before they meet up again to explore Options and the Way forward.
It's important to realism that the coaching ARROW is simply a questioning framework, and it is not possible for us to coach effectively simply by reeling off the questions. The model must be used flexibly and at all times the needs and agenda of the person being coached must take priority.
We must use the Reflection stage with great care, as it may be that the coachee has been reflecting subconsciously as they have answer the questions under Aims and Reality. In truth, it is worth encouraging the people we coach to reflect continuously throughout the session and if necessary refine their aims or review the reality of the situation. Reflection is conveniently located between Reality and Options because it helps spell ARROW, but reflecting, revising, going back over and jumping forward are perfectly reasonable and indeed essential steps of working flexibly with ARROW or any other sequence.
Let's now consider the sorts of things coaches can encourage their coachees to reflect upon. When using Reflection as a defined step in the sequence I like to ask my coachee to consider how big a gap there is between their Aims and their Reality. It may be that on relflection the Aims now seem a little conservative or perhaps over optimistic. A new timeframe may need to be decided upon or some shorter term, milestone type aims generated. Similarly Reflection may expose a lack of detail in appreciating the current Reality. It is at this stage that awareness is most raised so it can be worthwhile to reflect and understand Reality more vividly.
I find the Reflection stage is a very good time to challenge any assumptions the coachee is making. Comments like "I'm just not able to do that", "senior management will never agree" or "I've tried that before and it didn't work" need challenging because they are not facts. Just because something was unsuccessful previously does not render it impossible for ever more. Senior management may not sign off the proposal but if we don't ask them the answer is already no. Nobody can know for certain that they are incapable of anything until they try. Remember the old saying; to assume makes an ASS of U and ME.
Coaches that allow their coachees time to reflect create an opportunity for a greater degree of honesty to emerge. If I ask you "Are you being totally honest with yourself?" I am not really accusing you of lying rather I'm encouraging you to go deeper. People who are unfamilair with answering coaching questions can sometimes give quite bland or lightweight answers in the first two stages (Aims and Reality). Here we can provide permission and encouragement to give more.
The Reflection question I like best is "What's really going on?" Many, many times I have asked this only to be met with a coy grin or a shake of the head. The answer that follows is invariably a more truthful, emphatic and revealing answer than what has come before.
My next article will build on this step by exploring how coachees can generate options.
The biggest danger here is to just settle for the first idea that comes to mind. It may well be that this proves to be absolutely appropriate but the good coach will encourage their people to be highly imaginative and creative in considering options and to be constantly alert for new insights.
'Stuck' thinking
Most days I walk into my office via the front door and take the same route to my desk. I have done this for years and it can be evidenced by the carpet between these two points being markedly more worn than elsewhere. Imagine I was being coached on how I might arrive at my desk more alert and stimulated for the day's work. It would be very difficult of me to think of any alternative to my tried and tested route of the straight line from the door to the desk. In fact if any one suggested a different route to me I would be likely to say "It would take to long" or "it's a waste of time" or "I've never done it that way before" or "that's just not how it's done here". All of which may or may not be true.
But if my coach encouraged me to think creatively I might consider walking round the edge of the office past the window. As I thought about it I might realize that this would give me an opportunity to look at the river which I always find stimulating. In other words I will have hit upon a novel approach to achieving my aim.
Similarly, because I'm enjoying the coaching session and feeling free to allow my thinking to run a little wild I might think about moving from the door to my desk in a figure of eight. As I thought about that option I might realism that this would take me right past the table where I keep the books and articles I keep meaning to read but forgetting about, past the kettle which I could switch on as I went and finally past the computer printer which I don't normally pass and end up having to get up again to switch on later in the day.
Put another way, I have developed fresh insights and found new benefits just by unsticking my existing thinking.
New thinking almost always leads to new benefits:
In the early 70's Art Fry a technician at 3M wanted a bookmark that would neither fall out nor damage his book. He knew that a colleague, Dr Spencer, had developed a glue that could stick to most surfaces but that left nothing behind after removal. Art applied a little of this glue to a piece of paper and the Post-it note was born.
Breaking assumptions
Similarly people labour under certain assumptions about what is actually possible within situations at work and we tell ourselves that "there isn't enough time" or "we haven't got the budget" or "I don't have the authority".
Again these thoughts may or may not be true but it is very useful in a coaching session to allow people to be free of these constraints to see what other options might become available. So we might ask "If you had more time, what could you try?" or "What if you had more money...?" and so on.
Of course we cannot pretend that there aren't any barriers or restrictions but what we're really trying to discover through coaching is whether these barriers are genuine or just assumptions. It's even possible that what was a restriction some time ago may not be the case any more - we just assume it is.
A distribution manager was keen to reorganize the routes his company used to supply dairy products to a number of grocery stores in their area.
He was told his revised routes would not work out because the stores furthest out wanted their deliveries on a Monday and would not be prepared to accept any other day.
However, the distribution manager spoke to the storekeepers and discovered that, although they wanted a fast reliable service, they were not concerned about which day of the week their deliveries took place.
A little while later, at a social event, a retired delivery man explained that deliveries to the farthest stores had always been made on a Monday because the horses were fresh after their Sunday rest!
In my next article I will examine how we decide which option to pursue as we map out the Way Forward.
Matt Somers has sinced written about articles on various topics from Power of Coaching, Career Change and Depression Cure. Matt Somers is a leading "manager as coach" specialist. He advises organizations across the world on how to achieve results through coaching and is the author of Coaching at Work (John Wiley, 2006). He promotes a range of resources via his website and hi. Matt Somers's top article generates over 8100 views. to your Favourites.