Solution-Focused Coaching

solution-focused coaching

Although there are many good forms of coaching, solution-focused coaching, in my opinion, most clearly represents what coaching is about. Solution-focused coaching is applied within all forms of coaching and applies to almost all types of problems or improvements within the coach's field of work. In addition, it is also helpful for me as a coach to apply solution-focused coaching in my own life. After all, once you are used to thinking from a specific solution-oriented perspective, it is much easier to transfer that view to your coachees.

Around 1982, Steve de Shazer and Insoo Kim Berg founded the Brief Family Therapy Center in Milwaukee. They wanted to develop a new solution-focused approach to therapy because they had discovered that many problems had the same solutions. They thought it would be more convenient not to talk about issues but about solutions that people could come up with.

They offered their clients an unlimited number of conversations to test their suspicions with a solution-oriented approach. It was not their intention then to develop a short therapy. The number of sessions was determined by the client's needs. The results were astonishing:

26% of the clients felt sufficiently helped after only one meeting.
80% of the clients were satisfied with four or fewer conversations, and the average number of talks was 2.9.
Out of a total of 275 clients, only four wanted more than 9 sessions.

Solution-focused working officially comes from therapy, but coaches soon realized that they too could apply these techniques in various areas. In terms of the procedure, there are hardly any differences between solution-focused therapy and solution-focused coaching. Coaches use solution-oriented working for all situations in which improvement is possible, such as personal development, work, relationships, and problems.

The unexamined life may not be worth living, but the life too closely examined may not be lived at all.

– Mark Twain

Within solution-focused coaching, we start from several principles that lay the foundation for this form of treatment. I would therefore like to briefly share with you what these principles are and how I approach them.

Resistance is a normal part of the change process

We usually think of resistance in negative terms, but resistance always has value. The resistance wants to prevent the change envisaged by the coachee from leading to negative consequences.

Investigating resistance and the possible value it has for the coachee thus leads to a better answer to the coach question and a longer-lasting behavioral change.

The coachee cannot avoid cooperation

I don't want to prevent my clients from opting out of collaboration (that would be too much of a coercive approach for coaching.) Instead, I want to create a situation where collaboration is facilitated as much as possible. In other words: I will never force a coachee to cooperate. After all, it is the coachee who engages the coach's services.

There is always change

You never step into the same river twice. Nothing stays the same for long, and things constantly change spontaneously. The situation in which coachees find themselves will therefore vary. So, you and I don't have to worry about whether a change will occur. The only question is when this will happen and how.

Coachees who talk more about past and present successes and have high hopes for the future in terms of their desired improvement achieve their goals much more often than coachees who focus on problems.

People who see themselves as successful will behave like it. They no longer only focus on solutions but also perform better. For example, intelligence tests showed that people who had a few successful experiences scored better.

A small change leads to a significant result

A minimal change in behavior or thinking can lead to significant results. When coachees have an eye for small positive changes, they also have the opportunity to grow. After all, what you put energy into grows. The quick results achieved with solution-focused coaching usually consist of small changes in behavior or environment.

The resources for change are already there

Solution-focused coaching ties in with the insight that the most significant influence on change must come from the coachee's own life. Moreover, the relationship between the coach and coachee is more important than the method for achieving change. That is why the coach always works together with the coachee. The resources needed for change are already in the coachee's life. This means that the coach must adapt to the coachee and his situation.

Problems are unsuccessful attempts at a solution

The problem-oriented approach assumes that the coachee/client's complaints are maintained because coachees had once chosen the wrong solution strategy for their problem. And because they continued to apply that wrong solution, even though this solution didn't reduce the problems.

Coachees often avoid the steps that are really necessary to solve the problem. They regularly experience difficulty (or resistance) to face the problem. Fortunately, that is not always necessary! The coachee does not need to fully understand the problem. It is not required to know much about the problem to solve it. But at the very least, it's essential to face up to what the actual problem is.

Sometimes coachees strive for an unfeasible solution. We often live under the illusion that life has to be a certain way. The dream images we see on television and the glamor we encounter in everyday life do not help us get a realistic picture of what to expect from life. Coachees often opt for solutions that are not useful because they think they should.

Problems often persist because coachees opt for a solution that logically does not make sense. Logical reasoning is a subject in its own right, which unfortunately is not part of regular education. We quietly assume that anyone can do it just like that.

Choose a perspective, choose a solution

There are many different perspectives from which coachees can look at their own situation. Each perspective always leads to the corresponding conclusions.

Suppose you choose to always attribute adverse events to yourself. Your conclusion will be that you are a negative person, or at least someone who brings adverse events upon yourself. You have had enough negative feelings about yourself and therefore choose a different perspective. From now on, you only attribute negative events to others. Your conclusion will inevitably be that the world is evil or everyone is against you.

There is a perspective for every conclusion. If you, as a coachee, can learn to choose a view that leads to a solution-oriented conclusion, your problems will automatically become less.

We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when creating them. - Albert Einstein

Solution-focused coaching is only part of the coaching process, but it can achieve very positive results quickly. However, to ensure that the solutions found have a lasting effect, we also look at the underlying causes of your problems to prevent new problems from occurring in the future. The search for the core of your problems can sometimes be a painful road. We often go back to childhood through Inner Child Therapy to cope with old traumas and painful memories. Working together on these issues will eventually result in a better understanding of yourself and lead to a less troublesome life.