Monthly Archives: January 2012

Jan Georg Kristiansen

Coaching is a 100% client-focused conversation

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Jan Georg Kristiansen

Jan Georg Kristiansen explaining Professional Coaching

Opening the AgileCoachCamp Norway 2012, we had the pleasure of Jan Georg Kristiansen, ICF-certified Erickson coach MCC and leader of Erickson Coaching Nordic AS (an organisation training coaches and coach trainers in Norway), introduce us to the world of Professional Coaching.

What is Coaching?

He talked about the need for a definition of Coaching, or ICF Coaching as there are so many different uses of the word currently… (Agile Coaching being one of them, we worked on that later) His criteria for a good definition are:

  • It should be short
  • It should be positive
  • It should be respectful to older neighbours like consulting, mentoring, psychology…

He aims at a three-step definition, starting with a very short phrase that, depending on available space, can be elaborated a bit to make it more specific. Definition Jan Georg considered included:

  • Coaching is presence
  • Coaching is movement
  • Coaching is being positive
The definition he currently uses is:
(ICF) Coaching is a 100% client-focused conversation.
(ICF) Coaching is a 100% client-focused conversation 
with a lasting effect.
(ICF) Coaching is a 100% client-focused conversation 
with a lasting effect
because the focus-person has full control
of their goal, their steps towards that goal and their purpose.
Jan Georg's notes on Professional Coaching

Jan Georg's notes on Professional Coaching

One thing I need to elaborate into my thinking about balance is that he said, to stay balanced you need a keel to stay balanced in stormy waters,

Mapping Authority and Coaching

Jan Georg showed us a map (or scale) ranging from 100% authority (war, I don’t see the other person anymore) along various points in between towards the ideal of 0% authority for coaching (leading to the 100% client-focused conversation defined above).

Authority zone—I know more than you
50/50 zone—friends playing ping pong
Free zone—you have the authority

Discussion during and after the session will lead to multiple posts spinning off from his visit, I’ll try to cover some of it on this blog, and you could follow the #accn discussions on Twitter…

Jan also mentioned the 11 core competences of a coach, you can find them here.

And he gave us a very nice quote “All help is violation”. (I would add that this is only true if you haven’t been asked for help.) That’s why we currently run a session hosted by Johannes Brodwall about Non-Violent Communication…

AgileCoachCamp Norway

What is Agile Coaching?

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AgileCoachCamp Norway
AgileCoachCamp Norway

Professional Coaching

The AgileCoachCamp Norway 2012, which I’m currently attending, was opened by an inspiring session with an ICF coaching trainer, Jan Georg Kristiansen from Erickson Coaching Nordic AS in Norway.

He gave us a definition of ICF coaching as a 100% client-focused conversation, and we decided to have an Open Space session to take his definition as a starting point to define our shared understanding of Agile Coaching.

Engagement

Agile coaching is a 100% client-focused engagement which enables continuous improvement, because the client owns aligned goals and purpose across organisational levels and the people doing the work define the steps towards those.

Minimum Required Skills

An Agile Coach needs to have

  • a deep understanding of Agile & Lean, which includes Systems Thinking,
  • coaching skills, the awareness to know when to coach, mentor, and teach and how to switch hats,
  • servant leadership,
  • good facilitation skills.

Optional, but not mandatory skills include coding, training, management experience, … We collected this list in a session hosted by Rachel Davies:

Agile Coaching Skills 1/2
Agile Coaching Skills 1/2
Agile Coaching Skills 2/2
Agile Coaching Skills 2/2

Guiding Principles

An Agile Coach focuses on improving the client’s business, avoiding local suboptimisations and challenging assumptions on all levels.

An Agile Coach ensures congruence between Agile and Lean values and principles, the goals of the people she works with and the people who pay her.

An Agile Coach makes herself dispensable as quickly as possible.

An Agile Coach is committed to her own personal growth and continuous improvement of her skills. To guide her on that path, she should have a personal coach.

Thank you, Michael Leber and Andrea Chiou, for suggesting the second principle!

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