Coaching is about holding people capable!

As a Professional Certified Coach, I strongly believe that establishing trusting relationships with people is the most important part of coaching and being a coach.

One of the key coaching principles we explore in my coach training programs is centered around believing that the coachee is resourceful and has the necessary knowledge and experience.   This belief is fundamental to building a trusting relationship with the coachee and ‘creating the conditions’ for the coaching relationship to be successful.

The International Coach Federation (ICF) defines coaching as “partnering with clients in a thought-provoking and creative process” where “coaches honour the coachee as the expert in his or her life and work and believe every client is creative, resourceful and whole.”

When I heard the phrase "coaching is about holding people capable" for the first time, it just resonated so well with me and influenced my own coaching philosophy.  Today I share it with others in my coaching training.  

It is also a great way to make a distinction between coaching and managing:

• Coaching is about holding people capable!
• Mananging is about holding people accountable!

Asking open-ended discovery questions like “what are your ideas?” not only gets the coachee thinking, it also empowers and demonstrates that you believe in the coachee as capable of developing solutions, and transfers ownership to the coachee for action.

” … the true art of questioning is to discover what the (person) knows or is capable of knowing.”  Albert Einstein

Hold people capable!