Research really only matters when we can learn something useful from it – and apply it to our lives. In this case, we’ve learned a little more about what works in those initial stages of coaching – whether it be in a comp session or a screening call. But how do we integrate it? How do we apply this knowledge to creating more effective coaching? Here’s what I’ve learned from research and practice:

First Coaching Sessions: Conclusions

1. Hard sell doesn’t work  Even the current sales literature is clear – selling is all about the quality of relationship, not manipulating the client into buying. And, given the nature of coaching, it’s not the role of the coach to manipulate a client.

2. Repeat the mantra: The less directive, the more effective.  While the research suggests that it isn’t selling per se that is undermining the effectiveness of the first session, it does indicate that directiveness plays a major role. As we’ve learned from other helping literature, when you ask rather than tell, the client owns the ideas, understands the rationale and is more motivated to follow through.

3. Directiveness isn’t always bad  It may kill me to say this, but sometimes directiveness is useful. It could be in clarifying tasks or building the alliance that provides a structure for the client to work effectively. Directiveness becomes detrimental when it limits the client’s choices.

4. The coach-client match is a myth  There is no evidence to support the need for coach-client match. Many short-course trained coaches don’t get taught enough about building rapport. The coach-client match won’t mask this lack of skills. Instead, coaches can be proactive about developing a strong working alliance with clear goals, tasks, and expectations and bond-forming activities.

5. Build a working alliance in your initial conversations  The first contact between coach and client is about gathering the information to determine whether they can work together. As such, important questions are:

1. Is the client’s issue suitable for coaching? (goal, tasks);
2. Is the client at a stage of change where coaching is a suitable intervention? (Or how could coaching be a suitable intervention for the client?) (goal, tasks);
3. What does the coach need to know to understand and convey that understanding of the client’s situation to the client, so a bond can develop? (goal, task, bond);
4. How does the client know the coach is competent and can help in their situation? (bond, tasks).

(This is derived from the working alliance literature and the “screening interview” developed by Williams and Menendez 2007)

6. Be aware of client expectations   Whether it is the assumptions clients bring about what coaching is or how it works (“you’re going to fix my problems”) or the more culturally imbued assumptions of gender role expectations (“women are nurturing”), an awareness of the different and often unspoken expectations will minimise disappointment (of unmet expectations) further down the track. It will also give you an entry point for some important conversations about cultural and social influence on communication and behaviour.

7. Acknowledge the tension  Clients come to coaching with a certain amount of tension – fears, uncertainty – which can be used a valuable source of insight by both coach and client.

8. Be transparent in your process  The complimentary session is a sales technique; either present it as such so the clients know what to expect, or use processes that are congruent with the principles of coaching.

What did I really learn from all this?

In the end, it’s all about the beginnings. Get them right and you’ll have fewer headaches further down the track. Of course, as we move along we come across new information that may make our original beginnings naïve, inappropriate, or obsolete. It’s in these moments that we have the opportunity to begin again.  And so, coaching becomes a series of beginnings. Navigating these is what it’s all about.

Related posts:

1. Rethinking the Complimentary Coaching Session. Part 3: The Research Study
2. Rethinking the Complimentary Coaching Session. Part 1: Feel the Pain
3. Rethinking the Complimentary Coaching Session. Part 2: The Selling of Coaching

In the first two parts of this Rethinking the Complimentary Coaching Session series, I introduced the possibility that the complimentary coaching session, as commonly offered by coaches, was not the client enrolment panacea that it was touted to be. I had a theory that the sales focus of the session was undermining its usefulness as a helping technique. So I went looking for evidence to support my theory…

What the study was about

I thought the use of a very directive sales process was incongruent with the helping processes that coaching is based on. Specifically, I thought it could be undermining the trust needed to build a solid working relationship (something that’s been linked with effectiveness in the counselling literature). I also wondered if it was undermining not only the effectiveness of coaching, but also its credibility. Surely, leaving a coaching session feeling that you have been pressured or hustled would not make you want to go out and rave about coaching.

So I designed a questionnaire that looked at this. The 164 participants in my study were asked to read eight vignettes (or scenarios) which described them going to a first, complimentary session with a coach. These scenarios varied, depending on whether the coach used sales strategies or helping strategies, and whether the coach used a low or high level of directiveness. The participants were asked questions about effectiveness, relationship building, and whether their expectations were met for each vignette. I also varied the gender of the coach to see if there were any differences in the perception of male and female coaches. Also, I wanted to find out if partipicants who were coaches had different perceptions from those who weren’t coaches, so my sample included participants with a range of experience with coaching.

What the study found

In a word, lots. But not necessarily what I expected.

For example, the most significant factor contributing to effectiveness, a strong working relationship and expectations being met was not, as I had guessed, whether the strategy was sales or helping. It was directiveness; low directiveness was rated higher in these three categories.

Also, gender role expectations of the coaches surfaced in surprising ways. Female coaches were rated as more effective when using a helping strategy with a low level of directiveness. But this strategy also scored highest on a composite variable that emerged that I called Negative Feelings. So female coaches were most effective when they were being supportive and non-directive, but it certainly made people feel uncomfortable. I also collected qualitative responses for each of the strategies (ie comments from participants). They suggested that, when a female coach was non-directive, it was interpreted as “she just didn’t care enough” to continue. This was very interesting considering that this wasn’t an issue for male coaches.

A summary of results is as follows:

Effectiveness of first-session coaching strategy

It wasn’t the selling process per se which reduced effectiveness ,but the coach using a high level of directiveness. The less directive the session, the more effective it’s rated. The low directive helping strategy worked better for female coaches, as did the low directive selling strategy for male coaches.

Individual preferences were still important to participants, though. Some said they would want time to think about whether they continued with the coach, and some wanted the pressure of being put on the spot. Others wanted a followup phone call to show that the coach cared. Also, some liked a loosely structured session, while others preferred the very structured approach of the sales process.

How well did the strategies meet expectations?

The low directive strategies matched expectations more. Male coaches matched expectations for non-coach participants, whereas coach participants rated opposite.

How well did the strategies build a strong working relationship?

The low directive selling strategy built the strongest relationship between the coach an client, and the low directive helping strategy received the lowest relationship rating. Coach clients rated female coaches higher for building working relationship when they used a directive helping strategy. Participants suggested that there needed to be more rapport and relationship building in the first session.

There are positives to the selling approach. When it’s used without high pressure techniques, the transparency, clear goals and tasks actually help build the coach-client relationship. What puts clients off is not asking for the sale but using aggressively manipulative tactics to overcome objections.

Studies on directiveness in the counselling/therapy literature suggest that it’s not directiveness itself that may negatively impact on the relationship, but mediating variables of context and client attributes (such as the severity of problem and trait resistance). So a low alliance can be balanced by perceived support.

What role did Negative Feelings play?

There was a very high rating of negative feelings for the female coach using the low directive helping strategy – especially from the coach participants – which was interpreted by some participants as the coach “not caring enough”. This contrasted with the high negative feelings produced by the hard sell strategy which participant responses indicate were to do with feeling pressured.

This suggests that tension can exist and yet not have a negative impact on effectiveness or relationship. If looked at in terms of the needs-satisfaction theories of sales literature, the tension resulting from client needs not being met may not be an issue in the low directive approaches, as clients feel they still have choices.

Whereas with the hard sell strategy, the timing of the confronting question was off – it was too soon with so little relationship building.

Person-centred literature suggests that the congruence and authenticity of the coach and a collaborative approach are more influential than negative feelings. This makes sense when considering that negative feelings may be an integral part of coaching about change and challenge.

Difference in perceptions between coaches and non-coach participants

Non-coach participants rated low directive strategies as more effective and, when it came to feedback, stuck to saying how they wanted to be treated.

In contrast, coaches who participated in the study still had their coach hats on, giving plenty of feedback on process and rapport. As the vignettes asked participants to put themselves in the role of client, these results raise the question of whether these perceptions are contributing to the complimentary session conundrum. Are coaches really starting where the client is at?

Emergence of gender role expectations for coaches

The gender of the coach in the scenarios was found to be highly influential. Even though coaches rated the non-directive helping strategy (the one participants thought wasn’t caring enough) low on relationship and high on negative feelings, they still thought it was the most effective approach for female coaches. They rated the low directive selling strategy as most effective for male coaches.

Coach gender differences were more pronounced for non-coach participants. Non-coach participants rated male coaches as meeting their expectation more, and as building stronger relationships.

Counselling literature suggests that there is a preference for male counsellors to be authoritative and female counsellors to be nurturing. So it seems that gender role stereotypes are also alive and well in the coaching industry.

Where to from here?

Coaching claims to meet client needs, build good relationship and be financially viable. Accepted coach training school wisdom says the complimentary session is the best way to achieve these aims. As my study has shown, though, coaches and their potential clients often interpret the same process in radically different – and sometimes surprising – ways. Coaches and coach training schools needs to rethink the purpose, structure, and desirability of the complimentary coaching session.

Yeah, but what does this mean for coaching?

In the fourth and final part of this series, I combine these results with psych theory and coaching practice to provide some recommendations for how to run effective first coaching sessions.

Part 4: Applications for Coaching Practice

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Related posts:

1. Rethinking the Complimentary Coaching Session: Part 4. Applications for Coaching Practice
2. Rethinking the Complimentary Coaching Session. Part 1: Feel the Pain
3. Rethinking the Complimentary Coaching Session. Part 2: The Selling of Coaching

In Part 1 of this series on Rethinking the Complimentary Coaching Session, I wrote about being introduced to the Comp Session as part of my coach training and how, at that early stage, something just didn’t sit right for me. I felt uneasy about using techniques that increase a client’s pain to tip them over a threshold into action. I thought coaching was a positive approach to change.

What I didn’t know in those early days was that the Comp Session was just a rejigged sales process, and letting clients “feel the pain” is a common old school sales technique. (I say “old school” because contemporary theories of selling are based on relationships and needs rather than manipulation.)

To understand how a Comp Session is a Sales Session in disguise, we need to look at the processes of each.

The Sales Process

While many techniques and methods are used in the selling activity, a five-step sales process underlies them all:

1) Prospecting for clients,

2) Qualifying clients,

3) Presentation of the product or service,

4) Overcoming objections, and

5) Closing the sale

(Pederson, Wright and Weitz, 1988).

Over the last 20 years, the selling process has evolved to focus on more consultative approaches and satisfying customer needs (Weitz, Castleberry and Tanner, 2001): the “soft sell” approach. The intention of this “partnership process” of selling is now concerned with “responding to objections” rather than overcoming objections, and “obtaining commitment” rather than closing the sale. There is also greater emphasis on building long-term partnerships after the sale.

There are hundreds of different methods for the salesperson to obtain commitment from a buyer. According to Weitz et al., no method should persuade a buyer to do what they do not want to do or buy something they do not need.

Commitment to buy can also take place outside of the salesperson’s actions by influence rather than directly obtaining commitment. Cialdini (1993) identified reciprocation as one of the most powerful and prevalent influence processes. The principle of reciprocation asserts that people are more likely to comply with requests from those who have already provided them with something.

So, even before the client meets the coach, the offer of a complimentary coaching session engages the potential client in a sales process. And the rest of the ‘sale’ is completed in the Comp Session.

The Complimentary Coaching Session Process

To understand the Comp Coaching Session process, let’s look at one used by one of the major international coach training organisations, CoachU / CoachInc.  It goes like this:

·       Welcome the prospect to the session

·       Briefly outline how the session will work

·       Listen as prospect shares the answer to the question you emailed him or her

·       State back to the prospect what you heard, making a point to identify his or her strengths

·       Allow the prospect to respond

·       Remember to listen for blocks and passions

·       Assign action steps for prospects to take immediately

·       Allow prospect to accept and end coaching part of session

·       Ask prospect what experience was like for him or her

·       Ask if the prospect sees how coaching could benefit him or her

·       Invite him or her to become your coachee

·       Allow him or her to answer; field questions and handle objections

(CoachU, 2005, p. 367)

It all sounds pretty good. The “prospect” (a sales term) is listened to and walked through a process that builds commitment to action. The close is a little awkward, but at least it’s presented as an invitation. It’s all fine until you get to the final phrase, “handle objections”, which gives away what this session is really about: getting the client to buy coaching.

How the Comp Session is a dressed-up Sales Call

If we look at the Comp Session in the context of the five stage sales process, we can see that inserting “Coaching” into stage three (presentation) gives you the process for client enrolment using the Complimentary Coaching Session. Stages one and two are taken care of by the coach’s marketing (find prospects and qualify - although the qualify stage can also be part of the comp session). Then, the Comp Session fulfils stages three, four and five with its coaching presentation, commitment/close and overcoming/responding to objections.

A Comp Session that follows this process can be on a continuum of soft sell (focusing on relationship and commitment) to hard sell (close the sale by any means). It is the recommendations for those final two steps of Closing the Sale and Overcoming Objections that take the Comp Session into “hard sell” territory.

The actual sales techniques used in the Comp Session depend on the potential client and what objections they may raise when the coach ‘closes the sale’ by asking them to be their client (or continue working together). The CoachU training manual presents three pages of potential objections (from “What are your qualifications?” to “I can’t afford it”) as part of the “Close the Sale” step.

The manual further advises the trainee coach that “objections are ‘buying’ signals. The prospective coachee is telling you ‘Yes but…’” (p. 367). CoachU (2005) also recommends that for self-employed coaches (which Grant and Zackon’s 2004 survey of coaches found was 73.7% of their sample) the complimentary coaching session is “one of the most important aspects of selling coaching. You want to allow the prospect to feel special.” (p. 365).

The manual rationalises the comp session as a way to evaluate whether there is a coach-client “match”, but doesn’t actually provide the criteria for assessing this “match”.  Instead, the coach is given two alternatives: the “puppy dog close” (i.e. “take the puppy dog home for the weekend…”) of the complimentary session, or the “assumptive close”, which continues the conversation on the assumption that the coachee has assented to continue.

CoachU anticipates the objections of its trainees with its own ‘Close the Sale’ conclusion:  “Although the idea of selling your services and closing a sale might seem removed from coaching, it is the only way to bring coachees into your practice.” (CoachU, 2005, p. 366)

CoachU’s training is not the only (nor the most overtly sales-focused) example of recommended complimentary session processes and strategies. I use this example because their training manual is a published document and easily verifiable.

Not all coaches advocate the use of the complimentary session, and not all coaches who do recommend the session advocate the use of the more persuasive sales strategies.

Writing about “how to give great sample sessions” in The Coaching Insider in 2006, Dianne Legro advises the coach to support the coachee’s decision to not continue and to “let go of the sale”. However, she also recommends that the coach needs to remind the coachee “the cost now of not living the life the client wants”. If a coach chooses to use stronger sales techniques, he or she is reminded to be “mindful that you don’t overly manipulate”.

Is a sales approach detrimental to coaching?

But when is the manipulation line crossed? When is the coach putting his/her interests (to get the sale) ahead of their clients (seeking a workable solution)? Does the client feel manipulated or pressured to sign up for coaching? And what effect does this having on the outcome?

If one of the first tasks of a coach is to build rapport and trust with their client, then would the sales-focus undermine this?  Also, if coaching is a client-centred, helping process then would using a coach-centred, sales process undermine this?

This is the tension I wanted to explore in my research: to pull apart what’s happening in the Comp Session. I wanted to find out if it really is effective or whether it creates a tension that is detrimental not only to the client and the coach, but perhaps the whole coaching industry.          

In Part 3 of Rethinking the Complimentary Coaching Session, I look at the research that addressed this question.

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Titles Referenced in this Post:

Cialdini, R. (1993) Influence: Science and practice. 3rd edition. New York: Harper Collins.

Coach U (2005) The Coach U Personal and Corporate Coach Training Handbook. New York: John Wiley & Sons.

Grant, A. & Zackon, R. (2004) Executive, workplace and life coaching: Findings from a large-scale survey of International Coach Federation members. International Journal of Evidence Based Coaching and Mentoring. 2 (2): 1-15.

Pederson, C., Wright, M., and Weitz, B. (1988) Selling: Principles and Methods. 9^th edition. Homewood, Il: Richard D. Irwin.

Weitz, B., Castleberry, S. and Tanner, J. (2001) Selling: Building Partnerships. 4^th edition. New York: McGraw-Hill/Irwin.

Related posts:

1. Rethinking the Complimentary Coaching Session. Part 1: Feel the Pain
2. Rethinking the Complimentary Coaching Session: Part 4. Applications for Coaching Practice
3. Rethinking the Complimentary Coaching Session. Part 3: The Research Study