Dynamics of Your Coaching System
Many agile coaches believe that the “system” they are coaching is the person or group they are, well…coaching. I hate to tell you this, but that’s potentially only a small part of your coaching system. This might be one of the reasons you struggle to achieve the growth and impact you desire from your coaching.
To be clear, your coaching system contains the following elements—
#1 - Your clients
Who you are coaching could be an individual, a pair or triad, a team, or a group. For example, a Scrum team or a Leadership team.
#2a - Your direct stakeholders
There are the folks who are paying you. If you’re an internal coach, the management team (your boss, your boss’ peers, your boss’s boss, etc.) surrounds you. If you’re an outside coach/consultant, it’s whoever initiated and managed the goals in your contract.
#2b - Your indirect stakeholders
Advocates, influence partners, supporters, and co-coaches who have joined you in your coaching vision and endeavors often coach with you in the periphery. Another way of thinking about it is that these are the coaches I coach who coach the system with me.
#3 - You
You can’t forget about yourself. Well, you often can, but you shouldn’t. This concerns what you seek in the coaching relationship from a business and personal growth perspective.
System Directional Insights
There are three gravity-directional pulls in a typical agile coaching system—
Meet your clients where you are told to meet them (Push) by your direct stakeholders and sponsors. Sponsor-goal-driven.
Meet your clients where they are (Pull) or where they ask for help. Client-goal-driven.
Meet the entire system where you and your indirect stakeholders think everyone needs to go from an “Agile” perspective. Personal and Agile-goal-driven.
#1 matters. It’s where you get measured and paid. It’s doing what the boss (customer) asked you to do. It’s delivering the ASK and not your perceived NEED.
#2 matters. It’s whoever you’re coaching, allowing you to coach, inviting you in, and participating with you. It’s ultimately where your client’s agenda and empathy, relationship, and partnership reside.
#3 matters. This is the arena you want to work in. For agile coaches, this is often a culture that is conducive to agile. For example, using Laloux’s Culture Model, you’re a Green coach working in a near-Green or Green culture with Green collaborators. It’s a place with slight tension between your and organizational goals. Nirvana, if you will.
The trick is to navigate through all of these systemically is to be in and stay in balance across all three gravitational pulls—
Lean too far into #1, and you’ll push away #2 and burnout #3.
Lean too far into #2, and you’ll disappoint #1, which impacts #3.
Lean too far into #3, and you’ll become too self-centered and lose your connections to #1 and #2.
A Bit More Laloux
Laloux’s cultural color designation is a beautiful way to view the dynamics of this system. For example, most Agile Coaches that I know are Green to Teal. Or, at least, they think they are 😉
So, the next question is what color your clients and stakeholders are. If your clients are Orange and your stakeholders are Amber, then you have a widely disparate system to navigate.
And, I might argue, there will be a fair amount of tension in the system that impacts you and your coaching.
Wrapping Up
My primary driver for writing this is because I have weekly coaching discussions with agile coaches who are…Frustrated. I hear things like—
The leaders who hired me aren’t supporting me.
The teams don’t want to be agile, nor do they listen to my advice.
My teams don’t know what “good Agile” looks like
I can’t do my job.
I can’t move the organization at all or fast enough.
They could be so much better, if only…
This isn’t what I signed up for!
In nearly 100% of these cases, the frustration results from being out of balance in their coaching systems. I hope this article has exposed you to some gravitational dynamics you might not have thought about and that you can now more effectively navigate.
Ultimately, we’re all simply a supporting cast member within much larger systems.
Stay agile, my friends,
Bob.