coachNotes
Lynn Schoener 
August 7th, 2014  
Lynn Schoener
As a coach and consultant to organizations in transition, I work with leaders to develop coaching cultures and  improve employee satisfaction, team performance, and engagement.  My coaching work with individuals is designed to help them through...Read More 
 

Being "Helpable" is Helpful

   

My blog is up, and it is a hot mess. For now, you are the only people I am sharing the link with, and only because I committed to doing so in the July coachNote. In doing so, I am fearfully facing down the most senior members of the committee in my head, those impossibly perfectionistic and pro-procrastination voices who shout, "It's not right! It's not ready! Go do something you know how to do, and put this off until you can produce something worthy of our approval."

I'm also going to move against my habit of pointing out every single detail I don't like before you have a chance to critique it yourself. There's plenty I don't like, and I will change it over time--beginning with the headless photo of me on the home page! Whoops--there I go, dissing myself. I am in the blogosphere, and I wasn't a month ago. I celebrate that.

The most uncomfortable thing about the process was accepting help. My writer friend Sandy offered to sit with me as I slogged through the set-up. I hesitated, as she is a doer, not a delayer. I knew she'd expect decisions from me more quickly than I would want to make them. My bigger concern, I told myself, was sweet Sandy wasting an entire day of her life to babysit me through the tech maze. She is so incredibly busy, she's just being nice. She secretly hopes that I'll say "No, thanks, but no. I'm good."

It is so much more enjoyable for me to be helpful than helpable--a coachable issue for me, actually. I don't want to frustrate Sandy, waste her time, or risk our continued friendship, but that's not the true root of my resistance. My truth is that she had successfully set up her own blog the week before, and is, therefore, a much more patient, resourceful, determined and intelligent human being than I am. More deserving of a blog than I am. She will discover for herself what a clueless loser I am, and "We absolutely can't have that." I ignored that directive from my committee, however, and said "yes" to Sandy.

After lunch on my deck and a delicious chat, we made our way to my office and leaned into the learning curve together. It was not easy, despite what seasoned bloggers had promised. It was not my idea of fun, or hers. Mistakes were made. Small breakthroughs were followed by befuddling frustrations and desperate calls to the mostly unmanned help desks. But three hours later, voila:

I share this story because your coachees may resist help from you. Be with them as they make their way to being helpable.

Savor Summer! 
Lynn

 

 

Copyright � 2014 by Lynn Schoener

 

 

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