The working alliance of coaching

A recent review of the available literature in coaching looking at what is known as the working alliance of coaching or what is important in coaching relationships has found that the quality of coaching relationships is vital to achieving outcomes, however this is hard to quantify. This new literary review and study looked at the quality of the relationship between coaches and coachees to see what impact, if any, the nature of the relationship has on the outcomes of the coaching.

Contents

• Therapeutic interventions v coaching
• Coaching and psychotherapy
• Interpersonal skills of the coach (and coachee)
• The 5 attributes for developing a positive coaching relationship
• Diversity
• Reference
• Summary

 

 

Therapeutic interventions v coaching 

Firstly, the study found that a coaching relationship should really be considered to be an alliance, the quality of which reflects the level of joint engagement in collaborative and purposeful work and that this is constantly being negotiated and renegotiated as the relationship develops. Coaching is an ameliorative relationship or alliance based on making things better and creating a more advantageous environment for the coachee as opposed to healing the coachee.

 

 

Coaching and psychotherapy

In the 1990s coaching was trying to assert itself as an industry and show its differences from psychotherapy. A piece of research was published at this time that showed that coaching was a lot more collegial, egalitarian and collaborative than the psychotherapeutic relationship. From that moment there has been a distinction between a ‘medical model’ of coaching and therapy towards a more partnership approach based more on examining the thinking and behaviour of the coachee in the present and towards some future goal rather than examining the individuals past to heal.

The separation between coaching and therapy, the study finds, is however can easily become blurred, and there is no hard and fast separation in practice like there is in theory, especially when issues revolve around intrapersonal issues, like confidence and anxiety for example.

 

Interpersonal skills of the coach (and coachee)

1. The study found that, for a positive relationship and developing an alliance, coaches with a slightly dominant disposition tend to do better. Described as a ‘dominant – friendly’ approach. Coaches who are prepared to lead tend to form more productive relationships with their coachees.
2. Further “reciprocal friendliness behaviours were positively linked to working alliance”. In effect, this idea of forming a working alliance between the coach and coachee, coupled with the slightly dominant disposition, is highly predictive of positive outcomes.
3. Additionally the study found that coach dominant-friendly behaviour is positively related to positive coachee ratings of the quality of the working alliance.
4. It was also found that the coach being in a pleasant mood prior to a coaching session predicted the amount of in-session dominant-friendly interpersonal behaviour.

 

The 5 attributes for developing a positive coaching relationship

 

It review discovered that found that there are five coach attributes that predict a positive working alliance or relationship:

 

1. Trust building
2. Understanding and managing coachees’ emotional difficulties and states
3. Instigating two-way communication – listening and talking
4. Facilitating and helping coachees’ learning and development
5. Putting into place a clear contract and transparent processes.

 

The primary characteristic however was found to be the ability to form a strong working relationship with the coachee.

 

 

Diversity

The study also found that coachees tend to report better outcomes if their coach is similar to themselves in terms of background and gender. Interestingly age differences between coaches and coachees tended not to make a difference either in terms of the strength of the working alliance or the outcome of the coaching;

 

Reference – available to members

 

 

The negative side effects of coaching and how to deal with them – new study