Every now and then clients ask me for help on how to deal with intrusive comments about their health, or the health of a close family member. Typically the scenario is a very recent diagnosis of cancer. This is what works for people with cancer or other unpleasant conditions which invite unwanted sympathy and advice:… Read the rest >>
Author: luke JCR
That tricky question of ‘polish’ in career coaching
The BBC programme How to break into the elite https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m000772n/how-to-break-into-the-elite asks good questions about why it is that so many of the most senior jobs still go to people from fee-paying schools. In one of the most telling interviews, Dr Louise Ashley, an expert in how social exclusion happens, explains that many employers prefer candidates … Read the rest >>
Being merciful about Boris
So, it’s Boris as Prime Minister.
This is despite sustained campaigns of vilification by so many people, including the Guardian, which ran piece after piece about his alleged sins and Channel 4 which did a whole programme on the same themes. I cannot remember any other prime ministerial candidate who has been subjected to this … Read the rest >>
A compass point in the wilderness: coaching with personality type
The Myers Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) is a popular psychometric tool used in personal, professional and team development. Jenny Rogers demonstrates its effectiveness in coaching and argues that knowing our preferences can be a useful starting point for self-acceptance and transformational change in our personal and professional relationships.
To read the rest of this article, … Read the rest >>
Theresa May and the Perils of Introversion
When you ask people how they define introversion, the most probable reply is that an introvert is a neurotically shy person terrified of other people and at an enormous disadvantage compared with the audacious swagger of the natural extrovert. If you are familiar with the Jungian approach to personality, as exemplified for instance in the … Read the rest >>
Can coaches ‘make’ clients change?
When I opened the email – and I had certainly never heard of the sender – I saw that it promised me something amazing. If I signed up to a particular training course, I could learn ten questions which would guarantee that my clients would change! Really, truly, they would not be able to help … Read the rest >>
Dieting doesn’t work: here’s what does
At this time of year, the windows of my local bookshop are crowded with the latest books guaranteeing magical ways to lose weight. These books will have been written by an alleged ‘celebrity’ who is young, toned, slim and pretty, male or female. They will all claim that what they offer is not a ‘diet’ … Read the rest >>
Coach panic: ‘Don’t Know What To Say!’
My good friend and colleague Jane Cook of Linden Learning (www.lindenlearning.org) raises the question of how to prepare inexperienced and trainee coaches for life after our courses. She reminds me that on the courses we run together, one of the most frequent dreads expressed by our participants is of being struck dumb with their real … Read the rest >>
The Two Rules of Persuasion Every Coach knows but Remain didn’t
Sometimes we humans are remarkably simple-minded. It should be the easiest-peasiest thing in the world for politicians and media and evil-minded individuals to influence us, as well as the virtuous and high-minded who want us to change behaviour for our own good. When you work as a coach you draw on these principles every day.… Read the rest >>
Six Ways To Wreck your Career Move
Now that the recession really does seem to be over, there are more people on the move again. Previous reasons for staying stuck (fear, fear and fear essentially) have evaporated. But I work with many clients who have made moves for the wrong reasons, and often they have made all of these mistakes at once.… Read the rest >>
7 Things to Avoid Saying on your CV/Resume
Many of my career-coaching clients have never written a CV/Resume, or if they have it was many years ago. They are CV Virgins. And now they are being thrust into a world where the CV is their passport to a new role. The hiring organization or agency makes it worse by using clichéd phrases in … Read the rest >>
Saying Sorry is Not the Hardest Thing To Do
Before this client has even stepped over the threshold she is apologising.
‘Sorry for being late’, she says.
She has actually arrived two minutes after the appointed time so she is only ‘late’ by some super-high standard to which no one is ever held in a social engagement.
As I take her coat she does … Read the rest >>