Therapy and Coaching - what's the difference?

I m writing this on my blog as there have been so many debates on this subject in the coaching and therapy worlds I wanted to take it a bit wider and see what HR and OD folk think too.

The text below is more or less what I have said on a recent posting to a coaching forum on yahoo groups.



I have have long held the view that coaching and therapy are on a continuum of supportive interventions at different points in people's lives. It's often the context and intention (of both the client and the practitioner) that differentiates them rather than the practise.

Equally, I see "therapy" as being on a continuum from simple supportive listening to complex intensive therapy. If we pathologize the term "therapy" it doesn't help. It's in mainstream use for both counselling and psychotherapy (as far as I am aware, there is still no compelling evidence to prove that counselling and psychotherapy are different activities and have different outcomes) and it can mean different things to people, from "talking about the issue" through to "seeing a shrink"!

So I do have some concern about the idea that some seem to have that therapy is for dysfunctional people. Many people find it invaluable during crises that we might all reasonably expect in or around own our lives and communities at some point: bereavement, divorce, infertility, being bullied, serious illness, disability, relationship problems etc. When people seek support to help them to understand, respond, manage or recover from these challenges, many are actually functioning pretty well. EAPs / workplace counselling services see people like this every day; clients have their session and go straight back to work.

Naturally there are individuals who have greater challenges in coping with distressing past and present life events, in achieving good emotional and mental health and who experience repeated or protracted difficulties, and thus who may need more in-depth work. Yet many of these clients at the right point can benefit from a coaching approach too.

I don't think it's useful either to assume that all therapy focuses on the past or that it's all going to be negative and painful, or that the therapist is expert and the client is not. There are many brief, future oriented and client empowering forms of therapy (for example Solution Focused Therapy and CBT) which have been embraced by the coaching world, and many highly generative ideas in coaching that have been embraced in client oriented therapy (for example, Clean Language and The Thinking Environment).

Many skilful and experienced coaches from non therapeutic backgrounds now do life enhancing and healing work with clients suffering from distressing symptoms such as severe anxiety, panic attacks and phobias, situations which would once have been the sole domain of therapists and hypnotherapists. Professional supervision is much better established as a supportive reflective learning place for coaches as well as therapists, and more coach training and CPD is available to support in addressing the needs of more complex clients; these have both helped to widen out the type of work that coaches do. Whether coach or therapist, their skills and experience will be on a continuum too, so ensuring that the needs of the client and the situation are matched with the skill and experience of the practitioner is key to professional and safe practise.

Our challenge is perhaps how to help clients to decide what they need and how practitioners, whether coach or therapist, we can explain how they work so  that clients can make informed choices.

Solution Focused Management

We’ve all said it – “If only people came to me with solutions not problems!” Yet when something goes wrong, sometimes it’s just human nature to focus on the negative.

So how can you do better thinking about problems, and encourage others to do the same? The Solution Focused Approach may be just the answer you need.

Think for a moment about when you last had a really tricky problem that just wouldn’t go away. What did you do? Did you talk it over with someone, or do a list of it pros and cons about it, or mull it over alone, or something else? Did you get anywhere? If you did, I’m guessing that you adopted a particular mindset - either deliberately or unconsciously – and you thought ahead to your goal or desired outcome. And if you didn’t get anywhere, I’m guessing that you just thought about the problem, over and over. And maybe came back to square one again.

Phlosophers and psychologists have long said that when we look at only the problem, we see only the problem. It sounds obvious, yet a shift in thinking is often all it takes to see something other than the problem.

This is how the Solution Focused approach (SF) came about. Originally pioneered in the 80s by family therapists Steve de Shazer and Insoo Kim Berg, they found that helping clients to shift from thinking about the problem to what the client’s life could be like without it, clients made better progress. They didn’t need to go into the problem in detail, they just helped clients to focus on what the “preferred outcome” looked like. They didn’t ignore problems entirely or rush to solutions, but with skilful questioning, they avoided getting bogged down in the negative.

In short, SF brings attention to:

• the positive rather than the negative
• the present and future rather than the past
• the solution rather than the problem.

SF has since been adapted for use across many fields of industry and education. It can be used in executive and team coaching, group facilitation, organisation development, stakeholder management, change management, project management .. the list is endless. 

Whether you want to make conversations with a usually negative person more productive, re-energise your team meetings, generate better appraisal discussions, or conduct great negotiations, you’ll find it useful. It’s fundamentally a questioning and conversational tool although you may find it equally helpful in your private thinking time. SF is built on a series of core principles: 

• Be respectfully curious – ask meaningful questions but don’t interrogate
• Look to the “preferred” future not the past
• Look for resources rather than deficits – what are the person’s (or organisation's) strengths?
• Build on successes – once you know what works, do more of it 
• Stop doing something if it’s not working. Do something different instead!
• There will nearly always be times when the problem is not happening – what’s different then?
• Find out what is already contributing to the preferred future that can be built upon
• Accept that people are the experts in all aspects of their own lives
• Believe that small steps can genuinely make a big difference
• Have genuine expectations of good outcomes

Like most coaching models, SF has numerous “tools” you can use; their effectiveness depends on the timing, tone and context, and all can be mastered with practise. Here are some of the most effective ones:

Best Hopes / Outcome

This establishes a goal, ensures that people set their own agenda, and generates a sense of optimism.

“What are your best hopes for our meeting today?”

The Preferred Future

Where people can envision a future that’s real for them, they are much more likely to take action, and the more detailed the picture, the more powerful it is. A series of questions can be used to help (as long as each answer is fully listened to before the next one is asked!)

“We’re agreed that going forward we’d all like this team to be working more effectively. “How would we know that was happening?” “What would we be seeing and doing?” “Who else would notice?” “What would they see?” “What else?”

Scaling

One of the most powerful tools in SF, scaling enables the person to articulate how close they are to the preferred future as well as stating the size of the problem as they see it. Often it’s easier to give a number than put our feelings into words. A low number e.g. 4 offers the opportunity to explore what’s happening that’s making it a 4 and not zero, and a high number offers the opportunity to spotlight strengths and resources being utilised.

“So if 10 represents us hitting budget and 0 the opposite, where would you score us currently?”

Resources

Everyone has resources – they just might not know it. It’s a powerful way of acknowledging that people are not helpless and that they are coping. Resources might be skills, past experience, people, or tools – anything that aids.

"You’ve said in the past that you find talking to Simon the CEO a bit daunting. Yet how did you manage to have that tough conversation with him yesterday?”

“What did we do to win this client in the first place, and how might our learning from that contribute in getting this new piece of work?”

The Miracle Question

This helps the person to articulate the preferred future – i.e. what life will be like when the problem has gone.

“Imagine for a moment that the problem disappeared overnight – what would you see / feel / how would you know / that would tell you the problem had gone? “

Exceptions

SF believes that there will always be exceptions when a problem is not occurring, but people often fail to notice because they’re looking for the problem. Once identified, exceptions can be used to do more of whatever it is that makes the difference.

"You said that Jake and Karen always argue when you put them to work together. Can you recall a time when they didn’t argue? ….. What was different?"

Small Steps
If goals are set too high or action plans too big, they have the potential to cause the human brain to go into fight or flight mode. If the brain chooses fight, that might be a temporary state, and the initial enthusiasm and motivation for the task can fade. If the brain chooses flight then the idea of a large goal can seem terrifying. By breaking down goals and improvements into small steps, they seem more attainable, and thus are more likely to be followed through.

"If 10 represents your goal of being on time all the time, and you've already got it from a 3 to a 5, what would be the first small steps you might take towards a 6?"

Asking “What else? “

The richer the detail, the more powerful the picture and the more resourceful the person will feel.

“You've said that if you were better prepared, you’d be feeling a lot more confident about giving the presentation. What else would you be noticing?”

Compliments

Compliments are a key part of SF. Validating what the person is already doing well and acknowledging their efforts encourages them to continue.

“You’ve clearly made considerable efforts to improve the relationship with this demanding customer, yet they’re still complaining. I think that’s required a lot of resilience from you; it can’t have been easy”.

Conclusion

Once people articulate things in positive future focused language, they start to make improvements almost immediately. Whilst learning from mistakes is useful, often knowing what to do next is more helpful than knowing what you did wrong before.

Like athletes visualising themselves first at the finishing post, taking a Solution Focused approach energises, motivates and makes the vision seem attainable. And as Henry Ford is credited with saying, “If you think you can, or think you can’t, you’re probably right!”.

If this approach is new to you and you decide to try it out, I would love to get your feedback. For further reading, visit http://www.sfwork.com/jsp/index.jsp?mnk=800 where you'll find an extensive book list.

Linda Aspey, March 2010.

http://www.aspey.com/
If you'd like to be notified about future blogs, just click on the "become a follower" button and you'll receive updates automatically.