If Coaches Were More Like Therapists

In retrospect, back when I was an Agile Coach, my style was always towards the therapy end of the stance spectrum (see table, below):

This did tend to rile management, most of whom seemed to think that a coach should be directive, more like a manager or project manager than anything else.

I guess many experienced Agile coaches would recognise part of their roles as working with the organisation as a whole, rather than their immediate team(s) and people.

Nowadays, in the role of Organisational Psychotherapist, I monitor my interactions for any signs of non-therapeutic coaching, and nip such things in the bud. When I can.

It’s pretty obvious I believe there’s more value in therapy than coaching, both other for my clients and myself. Put another way, in working with tech people, tech teams and tech organisations, I find Organisational Psychotherapy attends to folks’ needs better than coaching.

So, if coaching were more like therapy, what differences might we see?

• Less advising and guidance, and creating more opportunities for people to discover their own answers.
• Increased belief and trust that people are capable of taking responsibility for their work.
• A shift of focus away from technical skills and processes, towards quality of interactions and interpersonal, interdepartmental relationships.
• A change in practitioner:player ratios (therapists can serve more folks concurrently) with concomitant reduction in costs.
• A more enjoyable experience at work.
• Increased initiative-taking and innovation.

What difference might you expect to see if coaching were more like therapy? And would you expect to see any advantages in that?

– Bob