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Effective Conversations: Train the Trainer

By the end of this training you will be able to run a half or one day Effective Conversations course. The theory

content here needs to come in the order it needs to come in – that will not always be the same

All we ask is that you do it at no cost to your delegates.

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Philosophy:

This is about unlearning

We model the 3D Coaching

Simple

People don’t arrive until they have spoken

There will be new learning on the edges

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Authority, Presence, Impact1

1 Adapted from Hawkins, P and Smith, N (2007) Coaching, Mentoring and Organizational Consultancy: Supervision and Development McGraw Hill

Presence (now) – How I am in the moment, body

language, tone, pace, presentation, intention

Impact (Future related) – Potential - through

shifting agenda, mindset, creating

emotional shift

Authority (Past) -Experience, achievements, what people say about us,

training, qualifications, what we know, research.

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My Useful Stories

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Ethics - me in my role

Contract - us together

Presence - How I therefore a

Trust and Intimacy - how we

are together

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Kit List Postcards

Ribbons

Bell

Pens etc

Downloadable free from the website http://www.3dcoaching.com/developing-skills/develop/train-trainer-open-

programme/ Password: ballofresponsibility

Handouts

Flip Manager

Buy from our online shop http://www.3dcoaching.com/about-3d/shop/

STOKeRS Cards

Principles Cards

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ROOM SET UP

Cabaret style helps people talk and breaks the normal pattern of rows

2 chairs at the front so you can move between them when speaking about coach or thinker role

Tables – piles of cards for icebreaker

Prewrite flips

Welcome FLIP 1

Introduce facilitator(s)

Housekeeping - fire, loos, tea/coffee, lunch

What are we doing today?

Key skills in having better conversations at work

Some of the things we do may feel weird – coaching conversations are weird – very different to other conversations we have at work

Afternoon is for practice – need real stuff to talk/think about – will need a volunteer for the demo to think about a problem. After lunch all will need a SITUATION to think about - needs to be within your gift to move forwards on, rather than other people – and where you are not completely stuck (ideas in handout)

What’s my A?

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MODEL THE COACHING CONTAINER IN SET UP

What are we doing today? FLIP 2

Observe

Practice

Apply

How are we going to do it? FLIP 3

Mobiles off

Real stuff

Stay all day

All participate

They should add confidential – keep names in the room, take away learning

How will we know today has been useful? FLIP 3

Select a postcard that you’d like to be different in you tomorrow at work as a result of today

Intros at table. Then plenary: Around room – say your name, brief description of postcard, and one word to represent how you’d like to be different at the end of today WRITE ON BLANK FLIP

People don’t arrive until they have spoken (Nancy Kline) TO WHAT ARE WE NOTICING FLIP

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LISTENING EXERCISE: Please stand in 2 lines opposite each other - one row are speakers, other row are listeners

2 mins – speakers speak without interruption on topic of their choice eg what happened this weekend. Listeners listen to everything – will be repeating what heard

1 min – listeners repeat back what heard

Swap over and repeat with same partner

DEBRIEF Ask SPEAKERS - Did you feel heard? Do you know anything you didn’t know before?

1 row move down so each person is facing someone else

REPEAT this time provide headline of what heard. Explain headline is not a summary of what’s been said. It is THEMES – give example …2 mins – speakers speak without interruption on topic of their choice eg what happened this weekend. Listeners listen to headlines – will be repeating 3-4 themes

Listeners to think for a few seconds – then invite them to provide 3-4 headlines 30 SECONDS MAX

Swap over and repeat with same partner

DEBRIEF Ask SPEAKERS – Did you feel heard? Do you know something you didn’t know before?

Ask LISTENERS - How does it feel as a listener not to have to feed back everything?

1 row move by one person so that each person is facing someone else again

REPEAT talk about what passionate about – 90 secs – listen with eyes, emotions as well as ears and other senses - feedback one word to represent what saw or sensed

Speakers – did you feel heard? Even though they only said one word? Did anyone hear anything they hadn’t heard before about their stuff?

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LISTENING THEORY

When they speak normally people tell us a story

To feel heard we feel we need to repeat the story. Takes time and doesn’t tell us anything we didn’t know before. Coaching is a conversation in which someone feels heard and knows something at the end that they did not know at the beginning that will make a difference to what they see or hear or sense. That’s transformation

Listening to the story is exhausting

Talking to the story keeps people in it

Wavy people might go here

Headlines and the underbelly (emotions) Handout p6 FLIP

Short headlines lightly dropped make great questions

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AFTER COFFEE

Recontract - What are we noticing about good conversations?

Write on the WHAT ARE WE NOTICING flip delegates’ learning eg reflecting back briefly, no point in telling people things they already know

Theory Moment: THE COACHING CONTAINER (Handout p4&5)2

Flip with pre drawn lozenge

In Chemistry if you want change to happen put in test tube add chemicals and a catalyst and things happen

Conversations are more effective if we can create a container…. Gives potential for transformation

Write Hawkins and Smith – CLEAR across the lozenge – CONTRACT – LISTEN – EXPLORE – ACTION – REVIEW

Can be any conversation, not just coaching

2 Coaching Container and STOKeRS have been developed by 3D Coaching

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COACHING DEMO SET UP

Demo 15-20 min coaching session

Volunteer or 2nd facilitator as the thinker – ask a few people for headlines of what they might bring – choose one which is about lots of complexity and which you can shift to be about them and what they do

Both coach and thinker standing up

Groundrules

All to please be quiet, no interruptions, no joining in

Watching coach and what coach does and the in between space

Not about what Thinker is saying, don’t talk to thinker about their stuff, leave it in the room, confidentiality

Group Task

Watch the coach and listen for 3 things

1 how did it begin?

2 notice who did the work?

3 write down the questions that were asked?

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DEMO DEBRIEF

Keep the volunteer away from the group (once you have set the debrief discussion), thank them and ask

Was it supportive

Was it challenging

On tables

What did you notice

Who did the work

How did it begin

What were the questions?

All together

Thinker – how did you find it? Was it similar to normal conversations? What was different?

What did we notice about how the coach started?

Who did the work?

Who had responsibility for moving the problem forwards?

What questions were asked?

Write the beginning questions on the lozenge flip

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Theory Moment – STOKERS

Give out stokers card – this is about a GREAT BEGINNING

Reconnect with the beginning questions

Subject

Time

Outcome

Know

Role – how are we going to do this?

Start – where shall we start?

Stoker is the person on the back of a tandem – can’t start a tandem without their hard work and balance

We need to talk about time – positively

Ask time question second – give example of difference between what do you want to think about today? Work

And Given that we have 10 minutes which bit of that do you want to think about

Effectiveness increases in inverse proportion to my anxiety – the less anxious I am the more effective the conversation

Recontract every time we don’t know what to do

Why did we stand up? People do what they normally do when they sit like they normally do WHAT ARE WE LEARNING FLIP -> Move – sit somewhere different

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WAVY PEOPLE EXERCISE

Who is kept awake at night with other people’s problems?

Easy to take responsibility for others’ problems

Inflatable ball – is taking responsibility for others problems

Who is very busy at the moment? Feeling a bit grumpy with work? - Come and sit in chair

What are you grumpy about? When get answer ask a delegate to represent X and stand behind chair and wave arms

What else is on your mind? That’s really interesting. Other delegates stand up and wave

Tell me more… Repeat questions til got a group of wavy people

Facilitator - I’m really interested all these things – wavy people please come and stand between us

Can you hear me? Are you feeling listened to? Answer is no

If we’re talking to their stuff then we’re not listening to the thinker. Coach knows all about the problem and Thinker hasn’t learnt anything new

To cut through the wavy people…. right here right now what to we need to talk about?

When interested in the Thinkers problems then these start to become a barrier to the coaching - Inflatable ball

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PRACTICE CONVERSATIONS

Over lunch - Think about how to split into groups of 4 for practice

take off 3 from total delegates til get a number that is divisible by 4 – that’s how many 3s and how many 4s

If a group of 3 then remove the green ribbon to work out how many groups

Arrange chairs with ribbons on them Coach opposite observer, listener opposite thinker

SET UP (Prewritten Flip) WRITE THE TIME THEY NEED TO RETURN ON FLIP

Purpose is to help the Thinker to think

20min coaching + 10mins debrief then swap so everyone has a go at being the Thinker

– need Stokers card – ask the questions on card – when you get stuck try a question from the back - If thinker has lots in their head – give them paper and pens

– need pad and pens and a situation to think through - make it easy for the coach – talk

about something real -don’t know the answer to the problem – coach will help you to think

– focus on listening to the thinker, not trying to diagnose the problem, nothing else to do – will be surprised at what you notice – no kit!!

– need the book – in charge of the process - role is to check that everyone is doing what they’re meant to do

COACH for 20 mins – coach keeps time

10 mins debrief – observer/green manages feedback – one thing did well and 1 thing do differently – order of feedback is coach – thinker – observer – listener

Change roles – observer moves to coach, coach moves to listener, listener moved to thinker, thinker moves to observer

Repeat so everyone is (they will have a break when they finish)

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PLENARY AFTER COACHING PRACTICE

How did it go?

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Theory Moment: Drama Triangle3

Fill in pre-prepared flip with triangle

Based on transactional analysis

Persecutor – rescuer – victim

How many times have you heard ‘we’re being done to’? point to victim

How many times have you heard ‘I’m going to fix it’? point to rescuer

When get into drama triangle we start to go around it

We start of as rescuer them move to victim (annoyed) then persecutor (angry). We feel the problem is started by persecutor/ rescuer when in fact often started by victim

We need to try ensure the power/ responsibility is in the middle and don’t get stuck

THAT’S WHY A COACHING STYLE IS USEFUL – KEEPS RESPONSIBILITY IN THE MIDDLE

Explains why grievances often result in a counter grievance

If trust is low – sit in chair (as if colleague) – what do I want people to believe about me?

Move to other chair – what do I need to do to make sure I believe about them what I want people to believe about

me?

3 Karpman

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Theory Moment: Blakey and Day (also credited as Daloz)4

Support – challenge grid – prewritten flip Handout p7

What does each of these boxes feel like? Go through each one and flip

Low support - low challenge = inertia

Low support - high challenge = stress . What happens when trust is low and others challenge us? defensive

High support – low challenge = cosy

High support – high challenge – coach/lobbing boot. Need this for coaching to happen

When inertia – what needs to happen for us to have enough trust to do this work?

NB In Faith context, after initial explanation challenge can be replaced by truth and support by grace

4 Challenging Coaching

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CLOSING

Apply learning

When applying learning from today – start with someone you know and trust – not with a difficult person where trust is low

Practice with the card – it’s OK to use it as in support of other person

You could practice in the groups from today if you wish

We judge ourselves by our intentions and others judge us on our impact - Real play

practice difficult conversations with someone else.

You are not in role

Just let them talk to you as if you were the other person

STAND UP and if difficult – get them to start talking to you and then move your hand as a representative

Ask them how was that?

TRY THIS IN TRUSTING WORK RELATIONSHIPS

Let’s hear from 4/5 people – what’s the most important thing you’re taking away from today?

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