I was fortunate to be an assistant in the November Coaching Stance class… with Lyssa Adkins, Michael Spayd, and Cynthia Loy Darst, what a great learning experience. I highly recommend this class – this learning and practicing experience!
My big takeaway – Wow it is much harder to be an assistant rather than a student. Being a student I get to focus much more on me. On my learning. On what I am taking in. On what I am practicing. And when I am a student all of the other students are my peers, my fellow learners. We are connected with relationships. We see one another, we meet, we interact, we connect.
Being an assistant is all about helping the students and the “front of the room leaders” to be successful. It is a chance to practice a continuous level 3 focus. A soft focus – tuned into everyone else’s learning. Tuned in to the system of people in the room, the whole environment, the place. Lyssa explained that it is about both holding space energetically and also holding the space for B.O.D. Beauty, Order, and Design. I notice that this is often my role. When I am leading a meeting at work, I am responsible for both facilitating the meeting and for holding the space … how much nicer it would be to have an assistant – someone helping to “hold the space”… I will ask for that help now that I see the value and importance!
On the second day, I was a participant for part of the day – which I loved, now double valuing the chance to both build relationships and learn new ideas about coaching. One of my favorites was a game where you take turns coaching someone else – with a twist that the coach is given frequent prompts to try specific practices – like comment on Level 3. It made me very much more aware of where my questions and comments are coming from at any given moment. We laughed a lot!
I also loved the chance to meet and interact and learn from a great community of coaches. We are coaches now. Because we WANT to coach and help others. It doesn’t mean that I am a great coach, or the best coach. Still –all of us in the class, we are all coaches now!
As usual, I have posted my notes … here are the images.
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| CoachingStanceclass_Nov2011 |
Let me know what you think…
Tags: Agile, coaching, learning, practicing
Agile Dreamer 
November 28, 2011 at 6:28 pm |
Wow! Great notes, thanks so much for sharing them,
December 27, 2011 at 6:21 pm |
Great stuff, Margaret – thanks for the course review and all the extra work in sharing your creative notes. Good insights.
January 3, 2012 at 8:09 pm |
Thank you Nathan and Scott – it was a great experience. Another chance to learn!