How to manage a time-constrained coaching session

Last week, I faced quite a challenge. I had just 30 minutes each to coach 4 Senior Leaders. They were part of a week-long Leadership Program at the National University of Singapore.

They had never experienced professional coaching before and I really did not have the luxury of time to explain, without eating into their coaching. It's also the kind of scenario where sessions derail quickly, when new clients overshare history, context etc.

So I decided to sit down and develop a simple 2-minute intro to make this easier.

I ended up calling it the '4Cs of Coaching' and the effect was fabulous.

It helped us set the tone and it gave them a sense of what's coming and expected, without going into a longer 'lecture' moment.

Here's exactly what I said:

"I am glad we have these spacious 30 minutes together. Here's how I propose we give this session a structure together. I call it the 4Cs:

1️⃣ CONFIDENTIALITY: I commit to this (unless there's harm to you or someone else involved).

2️⃣ CLARIFY: For the first few minutes, we will work to clarify your goals for this session.

3️⃣ CONSIDER: Next, we will explore and consider options, opportunities, ideas towards your goal. My role as a coach will be to help you access all your resources and even build new ones.

4️⃣ COMMIT: Finally, we may agree on what's next for you (i.e. thinking, actions, reflections, etc). We will also reflect to what degree we achieved our session goal.

How does this sound?"

The effect of this intro was that

⚈ my clients had a basic frame of reference for how this session will go. It allowed them to focus.

⚈ it gave me a pretext and permission to gently interrupt if the client gives way too much context, especially at the beginning, so we can keep the session moving forward.

It worked so well, that I thought I'd share this here. Please feel free to steal! 😀

It was so simple and effective that I decided to also include it in our Professional Coaching Skills course for Leaders that starts its next cohort in October!

How would you introduce and frame a coaching session if you had only a one-time 30min time slot with a person unfamiliar with coaching?