Anticipation and Coaching
The fundamental question that we might pose to our coaching client concerns: Why? We all know that in “polite society” one should never ask “Why?” However, professional coaching is not about being “polite.” It is about being helpful to our client by asking them provocative and insight-inducing questions. These questions often concern the reasons why one’s client has taken certain actions regarding other people. The answer to the “Why?” question often takes one of three forms that relate to the matter of anticipation.
One form of anticipation concerns what is often called “the theory of mind.” When we are young or when we are older and in a stressful setting, we are inclined to assume that other people think and feel like we do. Our client might respond to our “Why?” question by indicating that they have acted in a particular way and responded to this person in this way because they anticipated that this other person is thinking and acting in a similar manner.
A second form of anticipation relates to feelings. Once again, the theory of mind can be applied. This theory now applies to our client’s psychosocial template. Our client’s psychosocial template includes an assumption that people are “hurt” by any critical comment made about them. The third common type of anticipatory assumption concerns past history. This person acted or reacted in a certain way in the past. They can be expected to act or react in a similar manner now and in the future.
This third assumption resides in something called the theory of attribution. We are inclined to attribute the behavior of other people (but not our own behavior) to some underlying and unchanging personality trait. “They have always behaved in this manner and always will. Their actions are firmly embedded in their fundamental character.”
Espoused Theory and Theory-In-Use
When engaged in professional coaching, we can make use of a powerful tool involving the identification of theories we actually use rather than just espouse. From the perspective of Polystasis, we can propose to our client that what they anticipate is NOT informed by some psychosocial template that we can readily articulate; rather, it is informed by (even governed by) a psychosocial template that is often not one we can easily identify—or perhaps not one we are comfortable acknowledging. Our espoused psychosocial template might contain stated beliefs in remaining open-minded about other people whom we don’t quite trust or even like. Our psychosocial template-in-use, on the other hand, might be filled with assumptions about how “this kind of person” operates on a different set of principles than we do or that anyone we don’t trust should never have access to our true feelings.
Chris Argyris and Don Schön provide an analytic tool that makes the process of reflective practice and action science fully accessible to us as we confront difficult challenges (especially those involving interpersonal relationships). They construct a table with a left and right column. In the left column, one places a segment of a set of behaviors that have taken place or are envisioned between oneself and the other person with whom one has a challenging relationship. In the right column, one places a statement regarding what each person is thinking and feeling while enacting their specific behavior. The left and right columns are subsequently filled with further anticipated statements being made (left column) and further thoughts and feelings in reaction to these statements (right column).
Download Article
