book review: coaching: evoking excellence in others by james flaherty

Coaching: Evoking Excellence In Others by James Flaherty

What are the main ideas?

• the outcomes of coaching for the person coached are: long-term excellent performance, self-correction, and self-generation. meaning someone who is coached well will:
  • be great at what they do (determined by the standards of that field),
  • know how to address their own mistakes, and
  • always find ways to improve
• coaching is about making visible the coachee’s system of interpreting the/their world and then supporting them to see differently which then allows them to act differently.

If I implemented one idea from this book right now, which one would it be? focus on the 3 outcomes of coaching that the author identifies. if my coach partners are leaving with at least two of the three, i will feel successful. if they’re leaving with all 3, i’ll feel amazing.

How would I describe the book to a friend? though i was trained in politicized coaching school, this book is still useful for all the tools, frameworks, and models it offers. i know my liberatory coaching will improve having read this book. and i know that knowing more about how corporate and executive coaches will allow me to bring and modulate what they bring to highly-paid executives to everyone. honestly, other than the lack of political and social analysis, i didn’t think the book was particularly harmful (in the way that sometimes books that are “neutral” can be). it actually didn’t out itself as targeted at executives or high-paid folks other than the examples and the appendices. if you’re a coach who is willing/able to read through classism/racism/etc without being triggered, there’s lots this book has to offer. it is sorely lacking in analysis, though, so i wouldn’t recommend this book as a first coaching book to anyone just getting into coaching.

reminder: book review structure

words / writing / post-processing
304w / 11min / 8min