Coaching Leadership

National Aspiring Principals Programme  (NAPP)

Today was our first professional learning group meeting (PLG)  for NAPP. 

Coaching Leadership

We were introduced to the idea of professional coaching partnerships, from Jan Robertson book  Coaching Leadership - Building Educational Leadership Capacity Through Coaching Partnerships.   

There are four parts to the coaching model:- active listening, reflective interviewing, setting professional objectives and goals, and giving feedback. A coaching partnerships is a reciprocal process. 

Our session focused on the first two parts of the coaching model; active listening and reflective interviewing.   

Active listening enables the person to talk unimpeded about an issue. 

Active listening means:-

• giving someone your full attention
• not breaking in to conversation
• not giving advice 
• not sharing your own stories
• taking careful notes
• not asking questions, unless it is a brief prompt
• listening to what is not said
• means suspending judgement

It took a lot of effort to 'actively listen' to my leadership partner and not offer suggestions, or fill in the moment of pause. By not breaking in to conversation, giving advice, or sharing stories, it allows the speaker time to formulate their ideas and clarify their thinking. It is often after a long pause that an 'aha' moment might arise.

I found it useful jotting down key words each time I wanted to ask a question, or to give advice.  These key words were helpful when it came to the reflective interviewing phase. They gave me a starting point to seek clarification about my leadership partners thinking eg: "Tell me more about........." , "You mentioned....... can you explain.....?"

The second part of the coaching model is 'Reflective Interviewing'.

Reflective Interviewing:- There are three levels of questions that leaders can use to encourage their partner to reflect critically on their practice.

• Level 1 - seeks clarification of events, situations, actions and feelings. 
• Level 2 - clarifies purpose, reasons and intended consequences. They are probing questions.
• Level 3 - Asks about outcomes. They are often the "so what....?" questions.

"Listen first to understand"  is a key phrase for me. At times I know I have been guilty of jumping in before someone has finished, so this is definitely an area that I can develop. I am looking forward to finding opportunities to put 'active listening' into practice this week. I think it is a skill that is going to need a lot of practise to perfect!