We have all heard the expression "an image is worth one thousand words". Leaders often use powerful images to express compelling visions and most of us regularly use metaphors in our daily conversations with others. Chris Wahl, a professional coach and co-author of the book "Be Your Own Coach", gives us the opportunity to learn how coaches make use of metaphors in their work with clients. I invite you to see how you can apply this learning to your own work and even in your own life.

Paul Lefebvre - Coaching Connection

Summary

This paper explores the use of metaphor as a means of (a) assessing a client's situation, and (b) assisting the coach in designing practices for the client. In our experience, metaphors have been a wonderful addition to our coaching repertoire. They both expand and deepen our insight and offer us other useful capabilities:

• Symbolic yet precise expressions of essence related to a client's situation.
• A way of using imagination, intuition, and feeling to capture the essence of client dilemmas and potential.
• A way of making sense of random bits of intuitive and feeling data.
• A way of circumventing the logical mind and discovering meaning in symbol and image.

In this paper we share our rationale for using metaphors in coaching. We outline the process we use to create and develop metaphors that lead us to insights about our clients.

Introduction

Have you ever gotten so lost in a client's story that you didn't know where you were? Do you ever find that the more details you have about a client, the less you understand him or her? Do you ever feel like you need to be able to look at a client from a whole new angle, yet you have no idea how to do that? We think that metaphors can help. In this paper we explore some reasons that metaphors are useful in coaching.

Effective coaches use a broad range of approaches and modalities to understand and work with their clients. Since each client's experiences, outlook on life, and learning style are unique, effective coaches need to be able to draw upon a variety of ways to reach the client and make meaning. The rational mind-our culture's preferred mode of understanding--is not always the best source of wisdom for assessing our clients or guiding us in working with them. In fact, standard rational analysis, explanation, and feedback sometimes fail to bring about significant shifts because they may be the very modes of thinking that trapped the clients in their current dilemmas. When coaches fall prey to needing to make logical sense all the time, they are in danger of losing the essence of the client. The premise of this workshop is that the use of metaphor is an expansive and powerful alternative and complement to left brain logic. Metaphors open new paths of perception and possibility for both client and coach.

The word metaphor is from the Greek metapherein, which means to transfer or to change. For our purposes in coaching, we use the term metaphor as a symbol that captures or represents qualities of our client and of the journey he or she is making. Myths, archetypes, natural phenomena, animals, and common objects may all serve as metaphors. By way of distinction, metaphors are not are adjectives, literal descriptions, judgments, or assessments.

Metaphor is the language of archetypes, symbols, and essence. Because it is a language that is representative in nature, it simplifies and focuses perception. Our culture uses metaphors abundantly to capture an idea or essence. For example, we say things like: She has stars in her eyes; we are drowning in data; and, here's some food for thought.

As coaches, we have found that using metaphors can capture the essence of the client and the coaching issue in a way that descriptions cannot, because metaphors hold within them worlds of association and information. The pictures that metaphors paint are, indeed, worth a thousand words, because the images stay with us long after descriptions or data have faded from memory.

Application

Although there are countless ways to use metaphors in coaching, we share our experiences with clients using metaphors in two primary application areas: assessment and practice design.

First, an important distinction: we use metaphor to capture and explore the client's issue, not the client as a person. A metaphor is but a lens through which to see. Just as it focuses perception, it also limits it (Morgan, 1996). If we confuse the metaphor for the person, we obscure from sight the personas multidimensionality, the full mystery of who he or she is. When used as a lens on the coaching issue, the metaphor provides the coach with useful focus and depth.

Assessment

Metaphors have proven invaluable to us in gaining clarity about our clients and their coaching issues. For example, one of our clients had received feedback that she was seen as aggressive, arrogant, and prone to loss of control over her anger in her workplace. Underneath this behavior appeared to be an inability or unwillingness to yield, an orientation that she knew best and that her perspective was the right one. The metaphor we developed for the shift the client needed to make was to bring her from a dormant or dead oak tree to a weeping willow.

Another client came to us for leadership coaching. He seemed very together but had received feedback that he didn't play the game according to the rules of the culture and didn't connect well with peers and superiors. His superiors, however, thought he had the makings of a good leader. It was difficult at first to get any other impression besides how smooth and together this client seemed. Diagnostically, we used this "feeling data" to uncover a metaphor that initially guided the coaching: tarp was the metaphor that surfaced. The shift that this client needed to make was to move from tarp: protective, tightly woven, and invulnerable, to tapestry: permeable, colorful, warm, yet solid.

These images were useful to us diagnostically, because they crystallized and simplified our understanding of the clients' issues. Perhaps even more important about metaphors, however, is how much information they give back to us about the client issue. The oak to willow image was, first, a useful handle on our initial take. But what we found most amazing is how delving into the image itself could actually deepen our understanding significantly. For example, if one works with the image of oak, what else is true about an oak tree that might be true of this client? The oak holds onto many of its leaves in winter and even in death. What might this client need to let go of? The oak tree is associated with tremendous strength. Might this client be too strong, too forceful, for her own effectiveness? Then look at the weeping willow image. It sways in the wind. What might our client need to let move her? The willow weeps. Might grief be a component of the coaching journey?

Following the same brainstorming process, we began wondering about the tarp metaphor. What was this image telling us about what we were seeing in this client's dilemma? Tarp is efficient. This client was smooth, he did his job well, but he sensed that his superiors and colleagues were envious of him. How does that fit with tarp? That somehow they couldn't relate? Couldn't get through? Couldn't see vulnerability? What else about tarp? It is useful when it is raining, but not that interesting to behold. Its texture doesn't invite us in. What does tarps do that might relate to this client? It covers up, protects. Was this image pointing to the client's need to raise the cover, go through life with less protection? Was this client efficient at the expense of being engaged in relationships? What is opposite of tarp? Tapestry. What does tapestry have that tarp doesn't? Rich texture, color, a story, relief, warmth, weight. Can it still protect and cover? Yes, but in a different way.

As you can see, these simple images led us to many questions that vie might never have explored otherwise, for metaphor is the language of our intuition. At once, it both captures reality and reveals mystery. It mirrors back to us what we already know about our clients' issues and, yet, also shines a light on what else might be waiting to be discovered.

Practice Design

Metaphors have led us to ideas about practices that our left-brains might not have revealed. For the first client, the oak-willow metaphor itself was a very physical one and surfaced our intuition that the client herself might be very physically oriented. Therefore, we gave her the practice of learning aikido to give her a physical way to learn that meeting force with immovability was ineffective. In this case, we shared the metaphor with her and explored the word arrogance in the context the metaphor provided, since that was a major piece of the criticism she had received about herself at work. Arrogance comes from Latin, meaning absence of questioning. We asked her to look at the oak tree as more absolute in its stance and asked her to explore through the willow image where she might need to be more open to questioning her own assumptions or conclusions.

For the second client, the tarp metaphor led us to develop a practice to help the client shed some of the protection that had been so vital to staying invulnerable. His first practice was a simple one of looking at the world through the eyes of others with whom he had significant contact each day. He was to imagine what they were feeling and to notice how he gathered clues about their reactions to him. He was also instructed to notice when he had a feeling connection to someone and to be as specific as possible in writing about how he thought that happened. As time went on, the metaphors proved invaluable, as we learned how much this client actually feared being in relationships with others and had found strategic ways to manage within them without giving himself away. The outcome metaphor, tapestry, helped us see a way to move forward with this client to help him create and embrace his own tapestry with its own rich colors, warmth, permeability, and stability.

The Metaphor-making Process

Metaphor making is fundamentally an intuitive process and for more intuitive coaches (for example, high Ns on the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator), metaphors may come naturally and easily. However, we would like to make metaphors available to all coaches who would like greater access to their intuitive wisdom. We have developed the following five-step process for accessing and working with metaphors.

• Step 1: Be clear and open. The first step for any coach is to be clear and open when meeting your client. Listen, observe, notice your own internal reactions and external actions, and hear not only what the client is saying but also what the client is not saying.

• Step 2: Describe the client with regard to his or her issue. Bring the client to mind, and visualize him or her in the domain of life in which she or he is experiencing difficulty. (For simplicity's sake, we will henceforth refer to the client in the masculine, with no exclusive intention.) Think about what he looks like, sounds like, and feels like to you. Think about his gestures, his posture, the sound of his voice, what he evokes in you when he describes his issue or his word. What three or four adjectives or phrases come to mind? If an image comes to mind at this point, you've got your metaphor. But if not, just work on getting a short description. Try not to censor what comes out. You're done when you have three to four adjectives or phrases that feel like they really capture the client in his struggle.

• Step 3: Free associate images with the adjectives. When you picture the client and the adjectives you've described him with, what images come to mind? Free associate. Don't censor these. Note the first one(s) that come to mind. Try to work as little as possible in your rational mind. If nothing comes up, you can scan a few different areas: something from nature, characters from movies or books, myths from any culture, types of transportation, or household objects. Usually, your first images are good ones to work with. It often helps to come up with a 'from' image (one which captures the client as he currently relates to the world or his issue) and a 'to' image (one which captures the client operating as he would like).

• Step 4: Turn your focus away from the client and fully explore the metaphor. Now that you have your metaphor(s), forget about the client for a minute and simply delve into the images themselves. List all the attributes you can about them. What are the characteristics of your metaphors (for example, tarp and tapestry)? What characteristics distinguish the first image from the second? What would help something transform from the first state to the second? It is helpful to speak these associations out loud with a partner or write them down without worrying about making sense or expressing yourself eloquently.

• Step 5: Bring the client back into focus. What did following the metaphor tell you about your client? In what new ways do you see the client and how you might work with him? What are the metaphor's inplications for the self-observations and practices you will design?

Conclusion

In working with metaphors, we have found a rich way to assess situations and design practices to help our clients. We have also experienced some lessons learned that we want to share with you.

First, be aware that the metaphor helps you to create a hypothesis about the client's situation. It is not an absolute. As coaches we cannot claim to know what is best for our client. Our job is to offer possibilities to the client. Sometimes the client rejects the possibilities that we offer him or her, and there is data to be gained from that experience. More metaphors may surface for you. Follow your metaphors confidently but lightly.

Second, to share or not to share? We do not suggest that you always share your metaphors with your clients. We don't always share ours. In deciding to share, base your criteria on what will be useful for the client. In the oak-to-willow work, we shared the images and they were useful. In the tarp-to-tapestry work, we did not share the images.

We have shared metaphors in a few different ways. Once, we wrote a poem about a client. The metaphors surfaced in the writing. Sharing the poem with the client seemed a natural thing to do, for it opened possibilities for her. Sometimes we ask the client to watch a movie that has the metaphor embodied in a character or situation the movie depicts. We ask our clients to read books for the same reason. Sometimes we draw the images that show up for us. Sometimes we just talk about them.

Third, if you use and share metaphors that are within your client's current world, you may run into trouble. Why? Because the client may make it more literal than is useful. Also, you run the risk of swirling in the loop that had them stuck in the first place.

Fourth, the metaphor does not have to work completely to be useful. For example, when we think of a weeping willow, we think of grace, flexibility, air, and movement. That was as far as we needed to go with that metaphor as it related to that client. There are other properties of the willow, however, that may not lend themselves to understanding this client's movement.

Fifth, it helps to talk through your metaphor with a coaching colleague. We have found that our understanding of our clients and our own approaches deepens with each metaphor conversation we have. We make time to do this and it has proven to be incredibly productive.

We would like to acknowledge the contribution of our teachers, James Flaherty of New Ventures West, and Julio Olalla of the Newfield Network, for their wisdom, which has expanded our thinking about coaching. Our facility with metaphors increases with practice and feedback. We would appreciate your feedback on how you are integrating metaphors into your coaching practice, and we invite you to contact us.

References

Morgan, G. (1996). Images of organization. Beverly Hills, CA: Sage Publications.

Resources

• Lakoff, G., & Johnson, M. (1983). Metaphors we live by. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
• Morgan, G. (1997). Imagin-I-Zation: New mindsets for seeing, organizing, and managing. San Francisco, CA: Berrett-Koehler Publishing.
• Schulz, M. L. (1998). Awakening intuition. New York: Harmony Books.
• Wauters, A. (1997). Chakras and their archetypes. Freedom, CA: The Crossing Press.