We coaches are eager to be seen as a profession, even though we fail so many of the criteria, such as barriers to entry, a long apprenticeship and statutory controls. Jargon can be one unwelcome feature of professionalism and it’s creeping up on us in coaching.
Therapy is a parallel here where its vocabulary has entered popular discourse, bigging up trivial incidents into mental health crises. So often it seems that disappointment is a trauma, busyness is overwhelm, people we don’t like are toxic, stressful events are triggering. Instead of feeling sadness we are depressed. If someone disagrees with us, they are gaslighting; teasing is bullying.
There’s a difference between technical language and jargon. Technical language can offer helpful precision. For instance, cognitive dissonance describes exactly the disturbance it creates when our values and our behaviour don’t match. The phrase psychometric questionnaire describes one process for measuring the human mind. In my former career, TV production, everyday words are also specific technical terms: pan, tilt, mix, zoom, fade, cut, action, wrap.
Jargon is different. We use it when we are uncertain and want to sound important. It implies an inner circle of special people. Often it inflates a commonplace experience into something mysterious, known only to the priesthood of initiates. In coaching it is intensely alienating to those outside it, including our clients and beginner coaches. There is always a simpler alternative.
Here are my dozen favourite dislikes:
1. Coaching technologies. We don’t use technologies when we are introducing a well-liked activity such as the Wheel of Life. These are conversations, not technological experiences. Modalities is a popular substitute for technologies and I’m still waiting for someone to define it for me. Method is more direct
2. Reflexivity. Oh dear, this invented word is so pompous. Why not just say thinking, or reflecting?
3. Learnings. The word is learning. It doesn’t have a plural
4. Relational. This one has crept in from therapy. It’s another ugly made-up word. Emotional will do fine or just relationships
5. Ontological coaching. Many people have tried to explain this hideous phrase to me. Oh, it’s a whole-person perspective enabling coach and client to become self-generating expert observers of the learnings in the ontological space… Sorry, must have drifted off there. What was it, again?
6. Dancing in the moment. I have much respect for the Coaches Training Institute in California but I hold them responsible for this phrase, first encountered in their book Co-Active Coaching, about twenty-five
years ago. Whaddya mean exactly? I listen carefully and sometimes, unexpected and wonderful things happen. I have been a keen dancer in my time, but I don’t do any dancing, as such, in my sessions with clients
7. Breakthroughs, aka ah ha! moments. How often does this really happen? Change does not normally appear as a breakthrough and we mislead beginners if we suggest that they should expect this as a daily occurrence. Human change is slow and the more important the change, the more slowly it happens
8. Rich. For an innocent little adjective, this word can certainly be obnoxious. People who are part of a dominant culture sometimes discover to their amazement that members of some marginalised community actually have pride in their own customs. These naïve and patronising observers are inclined to describe this as a ‘rich culture’. This should not be taken to mean that they genuinely understand or admire it. In coaching, rich can be added to any of the other words on this list, hence, rich learnings, rich reflexivity where it gives pseudo-legitimacy to something already fake
9. Finding your true self. If I ever find my true self, I will let you know but I don’t expect this to happen. Noone has a ‘true self’. We all have many identities and selves, which is as it should be
10. Holding the space. Another incomer from therapy. If you mean that you create trust, why not say so?
11. Coaching mastery. Noone ever masters coaching. It’s a perpetual process of learning and improvement with quite a lot of backsliding en route. Coaching is not like carpentry or creating a couture garment. It’s like every other human-to-human role: mistakes and stumbles are inevitable. We should not promise what we can’t achieve
12. Working in partnership. Honestly, coaches, just think for a moment. Would you ever expect NOT to work in partnership? It’s like claiming that you’re ‘professional’. Clients are entitled to take it for granted.
Please: let’s keep it simple. Let’s talk in everyday language to each other and to our clients.
Ah well, I must attend to my continuous professional development now by doing some learnings and holding the space for myself in a busy day, coping with potential overwhelm and avoiding triggering incidents or toxic people with some rich reflexivity in the hope of finding my true relational self or getting a breakthrough towards coaching mastery. Wish me luck.