The one to one and confidential nature of the coaching relationship can often obscure the fact that coaching doesn’t occur in a vacuum. Especially when we are working as an executive coach, we will need to consider how the organisational context might be impacting on the work we do with our clients. For example how is coaching seen in their organisation – is it regarded as a remedial activity for poor performers as part of an exit strategy or is it reserved the cream of the talent pool? This is likely to engender a different quality of engagement in the client. Similarly, how was the coaching need determined – by the individual independently, by their manager or through a wider leadership programme? Again this is likely to shape the level of ownership the client has with the proposed focus of the coaching. The coach also needs to have a sense of the organisational culture – what does support, challenge and feedback look like in their client’s business? Once this is understood the coach can calibrate, or at least be transparent about how they work and how they might expect this to “land” with their client. All of these factors are likely to impact on how the client “shows up” for and experiences the coaching. In addition, for me there is also a “due diligence” that the coach needs to put in place when they are helping to effect change in their client. Whatever the client is choosing to change, this is likely to impact on the people around them. So whilst the client is the coach’s primary concern, it would be appropriate to consider what the ripple effect of the client’s change might be and how the client might need to manage any adverse reactions. Similarly, the wider system might be impacting on the client – for example it is hard to help a client develop their gravitas if their line manager isn’t opening doors for them to speak in forums which will raise their profile. In this way the coaching task may be much broader than what was set out as the coaching goal. Yet another overlay is how the coach won the work. If the work was won directly because the coach knows a senior stakeholder in the business – that could impact on how the coach is perceived. For example how objective can they be? How will they handle confidentiality? Importantly, this is a perception which would need to be managed regardless of how professional the coach actually is. If on the other hand, the work has been won through a 3rd party (like a Consultancy that assigns “Associates” to clients) the size and scope of the coaching programme will have probably been designed by someone other than the person delivering it. In which case the coach might have been given an impossible task, the budget might mean there are too few sessions to manage the issue in hand. At other times there might be too much time provided and the client is reluctant to draw it to an early close for fear of looking ungrateful in the eyes of the organisation. Finally whether we work as a life coach or an executive coach – rarely can we draw a wall between the different elements of people’s lives. In the context of the “whole person”, work life impacts on home life and vice versa. So no matter how we set our stall out as a coach it is likely that we will be drawn to take account of issues outside of our “brief”. As this short explanation starts to identify, there are many, many things which could be impacting on the client and coach. So whenever something in the 121 relationship doesn’t appear to be making sense, it is probably a good indication that there is something in the wider context which needs greater exploration in order to fully understand what is really going on. Example : As an Associate coach, I was asked to work with a senior technical specialist who had become a Head of Department in order to help her develop better EQ to manage her team more effectively. I remember being surprised when I found out that this was not a recent promotion, rather she had been in the position for some 3 years. I asked the MD in the tri-partite meeting “why now?” and was told that the company had recently been acquired and the new owners were looking for all senior managers to be “generalists” to improve talent management opportunities. This seemed “logical”. It was a tough coaching assignment, the individual concerned really did have a blind spot when it came to people ! Whilst we made some early progress we reached a bit of a plateau and so there was a request to extend his programme. In the meantime a new HR person joined the organisation - they approved the extension. Both the client and myself took this as an indication of their ongoing support of the individual. The coaching continued and from my perspective it appeared to be that my client was making progress. So, it came as quite a shock to the client (and in turn to me) when she was asked to leave the company. Interestingly the severance package honoured the conclusion of the coaching. The coaching assignment then moved into the territory of “job search” – not something that I particularly enjoy. It was a really dissatisfying end to a coaching programme. There have certainly been times when I have questioned “did I do enough” to help the client improve their performance? If only I’d been a better coach… if only I’d engaged the MD or the HR person more… if only I’d pressed harder at the tri-partite to know what prompted the coaching…. Perhaps then I would have been able to identify the real issue and at least been able to work with the client to exit the organisation in a much more planned and constructive manner. A little while later I heard that the new HR person had resigned on a “point of principle” and that a new Head of Department from the parent company had been recruited into my client’s old role. With this additional information things started to make more sense. As coaches I think we can often fantasize that we will be the catalyst that “turns things around”. However, in reality the organisational landscape in which we work often has much more influence than we do.