YOU-WE-ME development dialogue

We invite you to develop in yourself the ability to take on partnership in development. It assumes that your interlocutor (Coachee) is an efficient and effective accomplisher of hos/her goals. Your role is to support him/her with your attention, availability, experience and, above all, faith in his or her abilities. You will be helped by 3 principles / ways of thinking about the person with whom you are conducting a development dialogue.

This is the principle of accepting both the state and competence of Coachee and the surrounding reality. As a Career Coach, you should build on the strengths and talents of your Coachee, building on its potential. In every situation, look for the real sphere of influence and motivate your interlocutor to look for options that will allow him or her to explore and expand this sphere of influence. Improvise, test, use all resources to support the process of change desired by your Coachee.

Career Coache’s two main tools: asking questions and listening

Asking questions

You know for sure that the most information is provided by open questions: what, who, how much, when? But the way you ask questions is just as important as what you ask. You can ask open-ended questions and they may still sound like questioning. Questions asked with a keen curiosity about the interlocutor and discovering his/her way of seeing are much more likely to trigger valuable discoveries and developments. Think about the purpose and ask questions intentionally, directing your Coachee’s attention to different aspects of the conversation.

Example of question sources:
Questions regarding the person: What is important for you in this? What does it mean for you?
Questions regarding the task: How much time do you have for this? What possibilities do you see?
Questions regarding the context: Who can support you in this situation? What influence does the organisation have on this?
Positive questions: What can you gain from this? What good can happen?
Questions about negatives: What are you afraid of? What can go wrong?
Questions about the future: What will it look like in 2 years from now? Who are you then?
Questions about reality: What do you have at your disposal today? What is the situation today?
Questions about commitments: What will you do after the meeting? What steps do you decide to take?

Questions that are particularly good for development talks are:|
Short: “What do you see?”
General and neutral: “What has happened?
Corresponding to what the Coachee said a moment ago. For example, if the Coachee said “It went great,” ask “What was great about it?
Open and curious: “What is important for you in this situation?
Towards creation: “What do you want to achieve?

Listening

The ability to listen is extremely important in conducting any dialogue, which is not only about exchanging information but also about meaningful interaction between people. True listening means a total focus on the reception of not only words but also what can be captured between words: emotions, values and beliefs. We encourage you to listen in the developmental dialogue to both what has been said and what has been overlooked. The quality of listening depends to a large extent on the openness of the listener to a different world of the interlocutor. This kind of openness is best expressed in silence and authentic curiosity. When listening, Career Coach first takes note of the interlocutor’s way of thinking, views and behaviour and only then starts to organize or analyze. But always without negative judgement.

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