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The TrainingZONE LearningWIRE - Issue 51
31 May 1999
https://www.trainingzone.co.uk
The Learning Community
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Copyright (C) 1999 Sift plc. All rights reserved.
This material is distributed free to trainers, learners, managers
and coaches. It may be reproduced in any medium for non-commercial purposes as long as attribution is give,
From the Editor
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The past week has been the most successful yet for TrainingZone: the highest number of new member registrations, the largest number of page hits each day, and the greatest number of new story postings to the site. Thanks to all those who've contributed in any way. It's your news and contributions which provides the value on the site.
This week's issue of LearningWire is a special issue devoted to the subject of coaching. We are grateful to Graham Guest who has acted as editor for this feature. We're interested in hearing of your experience and insights about coaching. You can post (and respond) to questions in the CoachingWeb discussion forum at https://www.trainingzone.co.uk/discussionbut there is also a special page for users comments on this issue at
https://www.trainingzone.co.uk/cgi-bin/item.cgi?id=4260&d=1
Please do use it!
In the next few weeks, we shall be running a special issue about the Training Solutions and IT Training Show in Birmingham. Exhibitors and presenters and invited to submit details for inclusion in this issue. Please see the advertisment below
Tim Pickles
Editor
mailto:tpickles@trainingzone.co.uk
ADVERTISEMENT
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Training Solutions and IT Training Show
6 - 8 July 1999
http://www.training-shows.co.uk
EXHIBITORS and PRESENTERS
Please send short relevant details with a web address for
a forthcoming special issue of LearningWire to
mailto:tpickles@trainingzone.co.uk
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LearningWire currently reaches 1,700 organisations every week.
Why not put your message before this focused audience of people
engaged in training, learning and development.
https://www.trainingzone.co.uk/help/advertise.html
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Thought for the Week
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"What we cannot speak about we must pass over in silence.
- Ludwig Wittgenstein, Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus.
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Coaching - Special Feature
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Contributed by Graham Guest mailto:GrahamGuest@compuserve.com
Coaching is a way of understanding people in their wholeness, followed by conversations and actions consistent with that understanding; it is a process involving both coach and client. The essence of coaching requires the coach to:
1. Discover how the client interprets, or makes sense of, the world.
What do the client's mental models look like?
2. Help the client to see the structure of the mental models he or
she is employing and indeed recognise that they are models and not
reality.
3. Assist the client to detach himself or herself from the models for
long enough to see that there are possibilities for new choices.
In short it is the job of the coach to help the client see new
possibilities and provide a space in which the client can consider making different decisions based on a wider range of possibilities. By
accompanying the client to a new 'meta-position' the coach actively
participates in the client's learning process.
Coaching is not about teaching, supervising, instructing or managing.
Kendall Murphy says that "managing" people is a guarantee that one will never create a learning organisation. See Murphy, K. (1995) "Generative Coaching: A Surprising Learning Odyssey." In Chawla, S. and Renesch, J. (Eds.) Learning Organisations: Developing Cultures for Tomorrow's Workplace. Portland, Oregon: Productivity Press.
Eric Parsloe explains the differences between being a coach, a mentor and an assessor in Parsloe, E. (1995) Coaching, Mentoring and Assessing. London: Kogan Page.
David Clutterbuck also compares coaching with other helping and supporting roles, including those of guardian, counsellor and facilitator, in Clutterbuck, D. (1998) Learning Alliances: Tapping into Talent. London: Institute of Personnel and Development.
James Flaherty presents coaching as a way of working with people that
leaves them more competent and more fulfilled so that they are better able to contribute to their organisations and find meaning in what they are doing. He describes the products of coaching as:
- Long-term excellent performance
- Self-correction
- Self-generation
A genuinely effective coach avoids "techniques". This view is expressed particularly strongly by Flaherty, whose recommended reading includes works by the philosophers Heiddeger, Searle and Wittgenstein.
Anyone really serious about coaching should read Flaherty, J. (1999)
Coaching: Evoking Excellence in Others. Boston: Butterworth Heinemann.
A useful web site is that of the Coach University
http://www.coachu.com/
The well-established US-based Organisational Development Network runs an email-based mailing list on coaching matters which you can join for free at
http://www.odnet.org
One of the main organisations for coaches is the International Coaching Federation who provide a range of services for members
http://www.coachfederation.org
Recently brought to my attention and worth a look is the European Mentoring Centre which offers a range of pan-European services for those interested in workplace mentoring approaches.
http://www.mentoringcentre.org
The Centre is planning the sixth annual Mentoring Conference on 25-26 November in Cambridge which it is organising jointly with the Association for Management Education and Development
http://www.management.org.uk
If you would like to experiment with a form of online coaching, you can try the CoachingWEB facility offered by TrainingZone at
https://www.trainingzone.co.uk/discussion
Click on CoachingWEB to view a series of questions and suggestions posted by people like you who are seeking advice and coaching from others. If you can offer coaching (either one-to-one, or over the web) just click on Reply and post your response. This sort of service really enables trainers, learners and developers to network in a creative way in requesting and providing coaching to each others.
We also have a range of Topic Experts who are able to provide some coaching in their specialist fields. You can see our present Topic Experts at
https://www.trainingzone.co.uk/topic_experts.html
and post questions to the Editor who will redirect them for their attention.
To summarise on some of the main points about the coaching approach:
The coaching relationship
- involves mutual commitment, trust and respect
- encourages freedom of expression
- is pragmatic in employing useful models
- recognises differences between coach and client
- is process-oriented and avoids "techniques"
- is reciprocal, with both coach and client learning
The coach
- designs coaching conversations
- effectively assesses the client's structure of interpretation
- is non-judgemental
- speaks openly and honestly, allowing the client to act
- listens positively and actively
- is able to resolve breakdowns in communication
- acts with
rigour, upholding the standards of the discipline being coached
creativity, being inventive
flexibility, being experimental whilst staying tuned to the client
consistency, upholding standards
patience, persisting and waiting without complaint
I have produced a paper entitled 'ICT and SMEs: Coaching to address Mental Models', which is available in the TrainingZone Toolkit
https://www.trainingzone.co.uk/toolkit/resources.html#orgdev
Also published in the Toolkit area in the past week are two other useful resources about coaching
'Coaching staff' - A series of OHP slides which illustrate key aspects of the coaching role, relationship and methods.
'Coaching case Study' - A case study of managing change in a major manufacturing industry with substantial use of coaching as a change method. Contributed by Alan Clayton of Amadeus International.
https://www.trainingzone.co.uk/toolkit/resources.html#learning
Finally, you can comment, add your experience and share your ideas in response to any aspect of coaching issues raised by this Special Issue on the dedicated 'Coaching experiences page' at
https://www.trainingzone.co.uk/cgi-bin/item.cgi?id=4260&d=1
Internet Monitor
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There is pressure on space this week, so this is just a small selection of Internet sites and postings from the past week.
Are Learning Organisations out of date?
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An opinion piece in the current issue of 'People Management' magazine by Martyn Sloan, Director of Management Education and Training at Ernst and Young explores how trainers and others need to respond to the challenge of organisational learning
http://www.peoplemanagement.co.uk/Editorial/opinion/learn.asp
Facilitation Factory
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A highly useful website providing examples, tips, techniques and discussion around the facilitation process within organisations. There is a regularly-changed dilemmas area in which users are invited to consider how they would respond, and a free facilitation ezine for registered users with news and updates.
http://www.facilitationfactory.com
Lifelong Learning Partnerships
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New site hosted within the Lifelong Learning website reporting on the new lifelong learning partnerships being created throughout England and Wales. The partnerships are designed to enhance planning, coherence and delivery of post-16 learning and to set local learning targets linked to the national ones.
https://www.trainingzone.co.uk/cgi-bin/item.cgi?id=4255&d=1
Journey towards and understanding of learning
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Reflections from Janet Lawley, a former Bury headteacher on her understanding of the learning process, descibed in detail on the excellent 21st Century Learning Initiative website.
https://www.trainingzone.co.uk/cgi-bin/item.cgi?id=4258&d=1
Feedback and reflections on the ECLO conference in Glasgow
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A feedback, comment and reflection page available for use by anyone attending (or interested in) the workshops and discussions at the European Consortium for the Learning Organisation conference, held in Glasgow last month.
https://www.trainingzone.co.uk/cgi-bin/item.cgi?id=4242&d=1
Skills Task Force
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Newly established website for the DfEE established body charged with reviewing the skills needs of Britain into the future and coming up with some solutions. The site contains the Task Force remit, membership, objectives and current work programme.
https://www.trainingzone.co.uk/cgi-bin/item.cgi?id=4257&d=1
Towards a transnational Institute for Learning and Community Development
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Discussion paper from the 21st Century Learning Initiative on one way ahead in developing the initiative into a fully fledged Institute focused on global learning trends and processes.
https://www.trainingzone.co.uk/cgi-bin/item.cgi?id=4259&d=1
UK phone books now online
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With very little publicity BT has published the entire phone book
database on the Internet which means you can get telephone number
and address details without a 35p call to Directory Enquiries.
Searching is quick and very simple. As long as you know a name
and a town or region, you can conduct a search, with the option
of adding extra search terms, such as initials, if you know them.
http://www.bt.com/phonenetuk/
World's most explosive website?
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Launched just a week ago by the Church of Jesus Christ of the Latter Day Saints (the Mormons), the FamilySearch website has received over 100,000,000 hits every day - instantly propelling it into the seventh most visited site on the Internet. The site owners had prepared for up to 25 million hits and have had to restrict users to one 15-minute search to find historical family members and ancestors.
http://www.familysearch.org
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Latest News Stories
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Update on qualified suppliers to UfI
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Latest information about the number and range of responses to the University for Industry's call for organisations to register their interest in supplying materials and services. So far, more tha 600 companies have expressed interest.
https://www.trainingzone.co.uk/cgi-bin/item.cgi?id=4149&d=1
IPD to seek Royal Charter status
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The Institute of Personnel and Development is pursuing its plan of obtaining a Royal Charter and will be consulting members over the next few months. A submission may be made early next year.
https://www.trainingzone.co.uk/cgi-bin/item.cgi?id=4168&d=1
TECs - Meeting the challenge of the Millennium
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The Government's original consultation paper on the future of the Training and Enterprise Councils, plus a newly published summary of responses to the consultation are now available online.
https://www.trainingzone.co.uk/cgi-bin/item.cgi?id=4256&d=1
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Getting involved in TrainingZone
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The choice is yours!
You can SEND US YOUR NEWS and make the website and this digest even more informative for the regular and growing community of training, learning and development professionals who visit each week.
Or you can REACT TO THE NEWS by posting your thoughts and suggestions in the Comments area at the foot of every article posted on the TrainingZone website itself.
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From the PressZone
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Every week we carry news releases in our dedicated PressZone
https://www.trainingzone.co.uk/presszone
Here are a selection of recent press releases on the site:
Solstra plays central role in Suffolk online learning community
https://www.trainingzone.co.uk/cgi-bin/item.cgi?id=4211&d=1
Asymetrix announces immediate availability of Toolbook II Assistant.
An improved version of the online course authoring and support software has been release by Asymetrix, the company extensively involved in both tools development and in-house consultancy to provide online training solutions and systems integration.
https://www.trainingzone.co.uk/cgi-bin/item.cgi?id=4234&d=1
Significant growth for Training Solutions and IT Training Show with a increase in registrations and exhibitors at this year's July event
https://www.trainingzone.co.uk/cgi-bin/item.cgi?id=4235&d=1
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About Sift
==========
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Bristol, Sift has also developed AccountingWEB for the accounting sector,
BusinessZONE (for the SME market), TravelMole for the travel industry and
LawZONE for the legal profession.
http://www.sift.co.uk
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Editor: Tim Pickles mailto:tpickles@trainingzone.co.uk
Sift plc., The Mill House, Redcliff Backs, Bristol BS1 6LY
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