Reframing my road map for coaching supervision Elena Granelle
CSA Accredited Supervisor
After our second workshop in London during February, I really felt overwhelmed and a very urgent and deep need to make some kind of order in my mind (big picture) about all the concepts, models, perspectives and methodologies I was receiving. My need for a big picture was a result of my “cognitive dissonance” between many of the concepts I was receiving and my behavior patterns internalized and reinforced for such a long time. I was also out of my comfort zone and starting a process of reframing. The image that came to my mind was that of a puzzle. I felt as If I had so many pieces I wanted to put together. My first decision will be to see which pieces I will keep and then how to connect them with each other. So I started building my puzzle to create my own map as supervisor. (see the visual in the newsletter)
Why is this is an unfinished and borderless puzzle? Because learning never ends and I will keep it open for future learning. My starting point is that every model, perspective, tool… could be valuable and be applied as needed. I have understood that Full Spectrum Supervision is the most powerful way to support a supervision process. The wisdom is having it all as part of you, but leaving your intuition, knowledge and experience to guide your judgment in deciding what is going to be useful and relevant for each situation and each client.
The puzzle has five levels with a thin line between them.
The core (the centre of all the process) is being able to explore and to be guided by client’s needs and expectations, being able to identify, through the psychological contract, what the client really wants and is ready for. The concept of readiness is very important to me.
Essential elements are: being present, focussed, relaxed, alert to the energy in the field, aware of the context getting away from pressures, judgements, mental models, preferences and being with an open mind, open heart and open will, so you can entering into a generative listening mode and start going into the bottom of the “U”.
Creating awareness is the corner stone for reflection, learning from experience, exploring, discovering. And for that you might need to go to the past, to explore the ways we have learned to adapt and to survive (Ego states or previous experiences). We might find it useful to refer to the games we play, to the Drama, and to any other concept that would help our client for self-knowledge and self-awareness.
It was also learning to differentiate between “self-knowledge” and “self-awareness”. The first one is about learning about our selves, our triggers, our reactions, our limitations, fears, hidden potential, hidden treasures… It is learning with our heads giving meaning to our emotions. Our head can learn fast, but our body could be much slower and we might have developed and extraordinary ability for our heads to control our body. Awareness, seems to be a much more refined state, in which we have learned emotionally and with our whole body, to use the information our head has learned and apply it in the very moment we need it. Is like being able to react or anticipate on the right time, on the right place, with the right person and with the right tools.
I have increased tremendously my set of tools, concepts, models, research and perspectives from different disciplines. I struggled trying to combine psychoanalytic concepts with behavioural explanations. Eventually I learned that we might be talking about the same thing, but explaining it using different lenses. What really mattered was how useful any of these concepts or tools could be, and not whose school of thought they belong to. My only concern was not being guided by the tools, models and concepts, but just to have them available when needed. A quotation from Luc de Belloy, has helped me to understand this:
“Technique is for a coach what a text is for an actor.
They both have to forget it in order to be present.”
Co-creating is when the client is ready to benefit from awareness, reflection and discovery and open to finding new ways, possible solutions, changing, maybe developing new skills for being more effective and successful. I call this a co-creating circle (inspired on the “U Theory”), as the last part of the process. Letting come, reframing, understanding, make it happen, give the emotional support and help finding the resources needed.
Two more elements in the picture cross all the levels or circles: Overcoming Discounting (Hay, 2007) and Learning Partnership. Overcoming discounting crosses all the circles because it starts, as a sequence -Steps to success- with awareness about the situation, going to significance, solutions, skills, strategies and success. I have also understood that, when we interact and develop a good quality relationship with your supervisee or your supervisor, that relationship is like a learning partnership, in which both learn and grow as professionals and as persons. Enjoying that relationship, as a “Walk in the Garden” (Miriam) follows as a natural consequence.
After putting together this unfinished and borderless puzzle I realised how much learning I have been through and how being out of my comfort zone has driven me to search for clarity and meaning. Now, as a supervisor, I feel I have a route map, a framework to hold all my tools, concepts, perspectives, skills and methods. I would not dare to say that I found all the clarity I was looking for, but at least I can now say I am clearly confused! Thank you to CSA – particularly to my tutor Karyn Prentice and to my supervisor Monica Ross, for taking me out of my comfort zone and for creating the space and impulse I needed to find my own way to reframe my road map as a coaching supervisor.
Elena Granelle is a CSA Accredited Supervisor at the Leadership Solutions Associate Center for Creative Leadership
T +34 948 33 74 34 M +34 646 58 70 16
