Coaching understood as a Co-Active coaching RELATIONSHIP between Coach and Coachee is the most powerful and gratifying method I have experienced so far to move people to new levels of happiness and success.

Why?

Because it works, it is straightforward and produces INDIVIDUAL, UNIQUE AND REAL RESULTS = VALUE.

It is what many people are looking for:

Find their Hidden Treasure!

The Co-Active Coaching Model = The good Coaching model

Co-Active coaching is chiefly about DISCOVERY, AWARENESS and CHOICE

It is a way of effectively empowering people to find their own answers, encouraging and supporting them on the path as they continue to make important choices.

The underlying principles are:

• Respect
• Openness
• Compassion
• Empathy
• A rigorous commitment to speaking the truth

Regarding the COACHEE the model assumes:

1. Strength and capability as opposed to weakness, helplessness or dependence
2. Deep desire to give the best and achieve potential
3. Every situation has possibilities and people really have the power of choice

There a four cornerstones in the model:

1. PEOPLE are naturally CREATIVE, RESOURCEFUL and WHOLE
2. FOCUS on the WHOLE PERSON (Heart, body, mind and spirit)
3. DANCE in THIS MOMENT (Coach and coachee dance together; they both smoothly adapt to the situation)
4. EVOKE TRANSFORMATION of the coachee. This is the result.

There are three principles at the heart of the model that constitute the deeper motivation behind the coaching for the coachee:

1. Fulfillment: It is the answer or - are the answers - to the question "What is your vision of a really fulfilling life? What would that be? Who would be part of this life? This question takes you much deeper than just asking "What do you want"? And this is not a "One size fits all" menu like set of answers. One of the most valuable things a coach does for a coachee is to help them get clear about that very personal shape of fulfillment.
2. Balance: Balance is fundamental to the quality of life. People are often looking for more balance in their lives. They are looking for being more empowered and less at the mercy of circumstances and other people's expectations and demands. They want to feel that they are choosing their life. Balance is not about making everything even as life per definition is dynamic and ever changing. Keeping the balance is about being aware about what is going on and what decisions to make, saying "yes" to some things and "no" to others in certain situations of the persons life.
3. Process: Process means to help people to be aware where they are in this moment, what their feelings are, what their beliefs or limitations are and to help them to experience, describe and to name it. This drives the individual to an augmented capacity of self awareness, self assessment and self description and finally enables the person to transform into something different, to make a shift and grow into the direction he really wants to move.

And what the Coach brings to the model are the 5 contexts:

1. Listening: Everything in coaching hinges on listening - especially listening with the coachee's plan and purpose in mind. We use three levels of listening. Listening at level 1 (Internal listening) is when our awareness is on ourselves. Listening at level 2 (Focused listening) means that there is a sharp focus on the other person and listening at level 3 (Global listening) is as though coach and coachee were at the center of the universe receiving information from everywhere at once. It includes the action, inaction and interaction. The awareness we use here is sometimes described as "environmental listening". As listening is the entry point for all of the coaching all other 4 contexts depend on listening at level 2 and 3.
2. Intuition: Reading between the lines based on deep listening.
3. Curiosity: REAL interest in understanding EVERYTHING.
4. Forward (Action) and Deepen (Learning): Support and control to assure that the coachee transforms and advances.
5. Self management: Understood as self awareness and self control of the coach. The coach is secondary. The coach disappears. No ego. No advice. No judgements.

This is a huge difference to the so called "Great Coaches" that in fact most of the time teach, tell and advise in mass group meetings. These people are Trainers, Counselors, Consultants or Mentors. They tell people what they should do based on their own experience and receipts or copied form others. "One size fits all". They ignore the knowledge, power and talents that lie in every individual.

I call this inner talent and power of each and every person "The Hidden Treasure". A good coach helps the individual to find his hidden treasure using powerful questions and deep listening but the answers are only given by the individual.

Applying and executing the co-active coaching method delivers results.

Image: My modified representation of the Co-Active Coaching model

You may want to read more in my blog post about the Co-Active Coaching model.

Seeing the measurable results often after only a few sessions with my clients reinforces me in my endeavor to move forward with my recently launched coaching company TopCoach4You.

One of the key differences comparing with great Coaches like Tony Robbins are the unique, exclusive and personalized coaching tools such as CoachingLogbook (c) and Top3Planner(c) we are co-developing and continuously improving closely together with our clients to assure that Coaching results are always achieved and measured, session by session.

We simply help you find Your Hidden Treasure with focus and therefore faster.

The Global Coaching Community we have launched creating groups both here on LinkedIn and facebook are thought to pro-actively and publicly share the coaching method and serve as a meeting point for Coaching professionals and clients to foster the global coaching movement and contribute to the building of global high quality standards of the Coaching profession.

We want Co-Active Coaching become a fundamental method and cornerstone for building strong people with positive values and principles in all kind of organizations and for people of any age.

A little proof: My 8 year old daughter comes every week or so and asks "Papa, can we have a coaching?".

I must say that she read "The 7 habits of happy Kids" written by Sean Covey, son of Stephen R. Covey, author of the best seller "The 7 habits of highly effective people".

We are an important example and our kids see and imitate what we do, so try to be a good example!

Have a great day!

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I really appreciate that you are reading my post. I am regularly writing about management, leadership, coaching and technology on Linkedin. If you would like to read these posts please just click 'Follow' and send me a Linkedin invite and also feel free to connect via Twitter.

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About Andreas Jaffke: Andreas is a recognized coach, entrepreneur, executive and an expert in Organizational Digital Transformation.

He is Founder and CEO of TopCoach4You. You can follow the company on Linkedin here.

He is a strong believer, practitioner and evangelist of Stephen Covey's "7 habits of highly effective people". Andreas coaches and trains executives and entrepreneurs in his specialties Sales & Marketing and Strategic Business Planning.

Date originally published: December, 29, 2015
Published: LinkedIn Pulse
Link to the original post: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/digital-r-evolution-net-40-era-andreas-jaffke

Authors note: I updated the stats at the end of the article.

The leader facebook moved from last year 1.550 to now 1.712 million users!
Instagram jumped from 400 million users to 500 million users (+25%) in just one year.

Introduction

I hate creating confusion using new terms. So why am I introducing the buzz word "net 4.0 Era"?

The truth is, in order to make it easier to describe and understand how the use of Internet technology of companies and the society has evolved and changed since its inception back in the early 90's.

In order to understand the net 4.0 Era, I suggest to look back on the predecessors that were the PC Era, Web 1.0, 2.0 and 3.0 Era's.


The web 1.0 Era

Together with my university colleagues Eckhard Biehl, Jochem Kranz and Ralf Heid we co-founded back in 1996 one of the first 100% Web Agencies in Germany, ICTeam. The company still exists today and will celebrate its 20 anniversary next year. The company transformed over the years into a Content Management Software manufacturer and IT service provider.

What we initially did back in 1996 was calling the companies of that rather poor, agricultural region of Trier to offer very basic Internet and Web services. There were only a few larger corporations such as Bitburger beer brewery  - today Germany's number 1 draft beer -  a large manufacturing unit of Reynolds Tobacco and many SME's.

Trier is the oldest city of Germany and please alow me to proudly say one of the most beautiful ones, full of roman monuments as well as many buildings in good shape and visitable from the middle ages. It is the region of the excellent white "Riesling" wine embedded in the beautiful valley of the river Mosel. Many don't know that Karl Marx was born in Trier too.

So most of our potential clients were SME's and it was difficult to find someone willing to invest in a simple static corporate Website being Internet still in its very inception. At that time we were not smart enough to look abroad to the very close financial centre of Luxembourg a much more interesting, innovative and dynamic market just half an hour drive from our offices but "abroad" where the official language is French and Luxembourgian.

Those days we offered simple static websites to our customers and told them that the website with some product and service information plus an email address and a "Contact us" form would be their extensive, full coloured and interactive new online business card and product catalogue. The highlight was adding an interactive guestbook which was a basic forum. We offered even the webhosting in packages and SEO.

 That was the Web 1.0 Era, where the Internet was used for email communication and basic marketing such as product and service information, company news and a simple text form to contact with the companies. Altavista was the number 1 search engine those days and Google had to wait another 2 years to be invented by Larry Page and  Sergey Brin. [Back in 2008 I published a presentation on slideshare about Google's 10 year anniversary and the things to come.]

The Web 2.0 Era

Then in the late nineties the first dynamic Websites appeared and the customers wanted to update their content on their own and without the need of HTML programming skills. The first blogs and blog service providers emerge, Content Management Systems are sold to the larger corporations and Intranets and Extranets are popping up in all large organizations.

Our early and innovative customers such as the German Wine Institute wanted to offer a forum and a guest book to make the engagement with the wine fans more interactive.

Webistes became more interactive, content was updated dynamically and the customers, fans and users are getting more involved and are more listened to.

Welcome to the Web 2.0 era where companies develop their online engagement and online presence still 100% around their Websites, now more dynamic and more interactive both for employees (Intranets), partners and clients (Extranets) and prospects (Website + SEO).

Then, after the Internet or "dotcom" bubble created during the late 90's finally bursts in 2001, the Internet, the World Wide Web and the underlying technology further evolves and new companies are created.

The Web 3.0 Era

The collapse of the bubble took place during 1999–2001. Some companies, such as pets.com, failed completely. Others lost a large portion of their market capitalization but remained stable and profitable, e.g., Cisco, whose stock declined by 86%. Some later recovered and surpassed their dot-com-bubble peaks, e.g., eBay.com, Amazon.com whose stock went from 107 to 7 dollars per share, but a decade later exceeded 500.
This shake out takes us to the Web 3.0 era, the Social Network era.

Social networks are from a technological point of view Intranets as they require registration and authentication providing a username and password in order to be able to get the full [social] functionality.
What makes them different from a blog, forum and a guestbook? Well bascially five things:

1. They are not anonymous: Registration and authentication is required.
2. Total Democracy of Information: Every user is able to act like a broadcaster, a TV or Radio Station: Anyone can reach any user with his post, image, video or audio in seconds.
3. All kind of rich content (Text, images, audio and Video) can be shared with other users.
4. Content is "Liked" and groups and company/product pages can be created by the users > Snowball or viral effect.
5. They work with notifications and include today messaging and instant messaging capacities > Instant communication.
   
6. 
   

In a blog, guestbook or forum your contribution is rather limited to the contribution of text (Posts and comments), maybe images and links and opening new threads. No sharing, no viral effect and no instant communication.

The first movers in the Social Networks space and todays leaders in different segments - here in chronological order - were:

AOL Instant Messenger and SixDegrees.com launched in 1997. Instant messaging was born, giving users the freedom to chat with friends, and create a profile. AOL was probably the true precursor to today’s social networking sites. The member profiles allowed its users to write a biography and share details about themselves. The profiles were searchable so people could look your profile up. It was the most innovative feature at that time. Six Degrees was launched in 1997 and was the first modern social network. It allowed users to create a profile and to become friends with other users. While the site is no longer functional, at one time it was actually quite popular and had around a million members at its peak.

Other sites followed suit, creating social networking sites such as Classmates, Friendzy, Hi-5, Bebo, Orkut just to name a few.

LinkedIn, was launched on May 5, 2003 by Reid Hoffman: Biggest Social Network for professionals. Expexted to have 400 million registered users by the end of 2015.

facebook was founded February 4th 2004, when Mark Zuckerberg with his Harvard College roommates and fellow students Eduardo Saverin, Andrew McCollum, Dustin Moskovitz and Chris Hughes launched their first Website. Biggest friends&family Social Network in the world attracting more and more companies to build their company pages inside Facebook.

Twitter was created in March 2006 by Jack Dorsey, Evan Williams, Biz Stone and Noah Glass and launched by July 2006.

Google+ got late to the party. Launched in June 2011 Google+ could not really convince the users that were already using other Social Networks.

But that was only the beginning of the Social Networks and as the use of smartphones and tablets evolved thanks to the launch of apple's first iPhone announced January 7th 2007 by Steve Jobs and the Android OS launched by Google a year later September 23 2008, new pure mobile social networks were created.
Apple then launched the iPad in April 2010. Hundreds of different tablets with Android OS have entered since then a very competitive and fast growing smartphone and tablets market.

Video: Steve Jobs presenting the first iPhone

The net 4.0 Era

Millions of mobile Apps and thousands of new cloud based Software as a Service (SaaS) providers have revolutionized since then the entire software market, the social networks ecosystem, the economy and society as a whole.

This new App driven world and economy also pushed the emerging cloud business transforming and disrupting the software manufacturing industry as their business models have to quickly transition from perpetual licenses over to subscription based Software as a Service ( SaaS), Platform as a Service (PaaS) and Infrastruture as a Service (IaaS) models.

This means a temporary cut of revenue streams for the big traditional software firms. December 16th 2015 for instance we could witness this impact in the FY 2016 Q2 results of Oracle. Total Revenues were $9.0 billion, down 6% in U.S. dollars and unchanged in constant currency. Cloud plus On-Premise Software Revenues were $7.0 billion, down 4% in U.S. dollars and up 2% in constant currency.

Incumbents IBM, Microsoft, Oracle, and SAP have ruled the Gartner Magic Quadrant for operational database management systems for years. But with the rise of open source and cloud, new competition has gained ground.

A new batch of companies has made its way into the Leadership quadrant of this Gartner report this year. Among the contenders are companies like AWS, DataStax, and MongoDB.  In a nutshell, the market is changing to encompass new kinds of players. That means more organizations will be moving to NoSQL technologies for particular use-cases and will be embracing open source solutions.

Source: www.informationweek.com

But it is in the applications and solutions market where thousands of small, fast and high quality cloud software providers entered the market place and are entering the software market while I am writing this post such as Salesforce.com, Servicenow.com, Buffer.com, Billin.com - to name just a few - taking away marketshare from the traditional software makers such as IBM, Microsoft and Oracle and beeing incredibly competitive in price and quality.

This is a major shift and has only begun.

As Klaus Schwab, Founder and Executive Chairman of the World Economic Forum put it:

Welcome to the digital age, the age of disruption of the economy as we know it!

Only facebook can be found in the Top 5 of most used Social Networks in November 2015. Mobile messaging platforms that allow instant messaging and instant sharing of rich media are en vogue. We can find WhatsApp, QQ (Tencent QQ, popularly known as QQ, is an instant messaging software service developed by Chinese company Tencent Holdings Limited; QZone is a Chinese Social Network and WeChat an instant messaging platform also created by Tencent Holdings) , and facebook messenger in the top 5. The three together count for an amount of 2.5 billion active users!

The Chinese Tencent Holding Limited alone ( QQ, QZone and WeChat) sums more active users than facebook: 2.16 billion!

Instagram - the example of the small, young and fast fish - only founded in October 2010 as a free Mobile App, outperforms with 400 million active users the 316 million of Twitter; and Snapchat - launched in July 2011 - reached already 200 million active users. Pinterest has with 100 million active users already more active users than LinkedIn with 97 million.

Note: Chinese Social Networks and messaging platforms are: QQ, QZone, WeChat, Baidu Tieba (Baidu.com), Sina Weibo (Weibo.com), YY (Major Chinese video-based social network). BBM is Blackberry Messenger.

Source: www.statista.com

Things are changing in our world that is becoming more and more software and mobile device driven where real time context and communication seems to add the value to the connected world.
It is a connected world of billions of people and things and even the World Wide Web is under a deep transformation. Websites are visited less and less.

Corporate news are published on Industry specific news Apps, Social Network page profile updates (LinkedIn, facebook, Google+) that are already optimized for consumption on any device and for Search Engines.

Products and services are sold on online "Buy from any device" superstores such as amazon, alibaba, eBay and many others to come.

Here a nice image that illustrates the Internet evolution from 1.0 to what i call the net 4.0 era.

Looking forward to your comments and guesses about "what's next"!

My guess: All the big boys are in big trouble - The digital revolution is THE game changer giving birth to thousands of small, fast and competitive "fish".

At full speed, at full power.

And it is just beginning.

It is probably one of the biggest threats and one of the biggest opportunities at the same time.
You decide!

I wish you and your beloved ones a great Thanksgiving and weekend loaded with fun and energy!

Andreas

I originally posted this article on Pulse August 30th 2015. After the acquisition of LinkedIn by Mircosoft I decided to move my articles into my personal blog. The article is exactly the same as last year, so please feel free to share and comment on it here.

If we think about people with an admirable and strong character, leaders that defend the fundamental principles and values they believe in and are willing to die for, people that were able to pardon their enemies and even collaborate with them, one person comes to my mind: Nelson Mandela - Madiba (https://www.nelsonmandela.org/landing/life-and-times).

Nelson Mandela was an admirable, emphatic and outstanding person and friend of the ones that were lucky enough to know him in person.

So he is for people like me, that want to understand his life and his leadership, his values, habits and character in order to learn and improve for their own lifes.

Very much was written about Nelson Mandela's heritage and the lessons he taught us in terms of leadership, true thought leadership.

Fortune Insider Network authors Paul J.H. Schoenmaker and Steven Krupp wrote an article 5th of December 2014 on the first anniversary of Madiba's death. [Link to the full article: http://fortune.com/2014/12/05/6-principles-that-made-nelson-mandela-a-renowned-leader]

They titled the article "6 principles that made Nelson Mandela a renowned leader" but failed - from my point of view - to clearly highlight the true underlying values and principles that created over decades Madiba's extraordinary and strong leadership.

In the article they limit themselves to explain what Mandela did and appeared to be rather than highlighting the values and underlying principles of this exceptional and outstanding leader. They did not explain what he actually was.

In the introductory paragraph they state: “He exercised a full range of cognitive, emotional and behavioral abilities to bring about profound change in South Africa. All leaders who aspire to be more strategic can learn from Mandela’s six key behaviors that distinguish him as a true strategic leader.” So they talk about behavioral abilities, behaviors, but not about principles.

They then list the following 6 behaviors “principles” that made Madiba from their point of view the renowned leader he was:

1. He anticipated
2. He challenged
3. He interpreted
4. He decided
5. He aligned
6. He learned

Rather than looking at Mandela’s behavior - I call it to look at what Madiba did and how he did it: His personality - I would like to highlight the underlying attributes of Mandelas’ outstanding strong character ethic.

Nelson Mandela became the leader he was because he was trustworthy. He earned the trust of millions of black and white South African people due to his character we can describe with the attributes of strongest commitment, responsibility, integrity and fidelity and the determination to give the entire South African people the possibility to live in freedom and peace together.

He showed tremendous courage and willpower when he announced in his public speech April 20, 1964, aged 46, from the dock in the Rivonia Trial that he was prepared to die for this cause. He said:

“During my lifetime I have dedicated myself to this struggle of the African people. I have fought against white domination, and I have fought against black domination. I have cherished the ideal of a democratic and free society in which all persons live together in harmony and with equal opportunities. It is an ideal which I hope to live for and to achieve. But if needs be, it is an ideal for which I am prepared to die.”

He finished the speech with the following paragraph and signed it dated “April 1964”:

“The invincibility of our cause and the certainty of our final victory are the impenetrable armour of those who consistently uphold their faith in freedom and justice in spite of political persecution”

And it was not strategy or political calculation that 466/64 – Mandiba’s prisoner number when he was sent to Robben Island in June 1964 - could forgive the people that did put him innocent behind bars for more than 25 years.

It was strong conviction and part of his principles that hate and revenge would not help to make his dream of a democratic and free South African society come true and that this could only be achieved leaving bitterness and hatred behind.

His decisions were also result of his values, ideals, convictions and principles and not simply political cleverness, manipulation or brilliant strategy.

Mandela remained solid as rock true to his beliefs and listened to them when he had to make decisions such as in the 1992 Olympics. Mandela ultimately decided to support the mostly white athletes where only eight of the 95-person delegation were black. It was the correct decision he said.

I would like to finish with citing 15 quotes of Madiba - the first six illustrated with some of Nelson Mandela's images  - that specially impressed me because they reflect the values and character of the exceptional leader he was.

7 - Real leaders must be ready to sacrifice all for the freedom of their people.

8 - Resentment is like drinking poison and then hoping it will kill your enemies.

9 - Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world.

10 - The brave man is not he who does not feel afraid, but he who conquers that fear.

11 - Do not judge me by my successes, judge me by how many times I fell down and got back up again.

12 - When a man has done what he considers to be his duty to his people and his country, he can rest in peace.

13 - For to be free is not merely to cast off one’s chains, but to live in a way that respects and enhances the freedom of others.

14  - No axe is sharp enough to cut the soul of a sinner who keeps on trying, one armed with the hope that he will rise even in the end.

15 - I am fundamentally an optimist. Whether that comes from nature or nurture, I cannot say. Part of being optimistic is keeping one’s head pointed toward the sun, one’s feet moving forward. There were many dark moments when my faith in humanity was sorely tested, but I would not and could not give myself up to despair. That way lays defeat and death.

About the Character Ethic, Personality Ethic and Stephen R. Covey

If you are familiar with Stephen R. Covey's Character Ethic, meaning the foundation of his timeless "The 7 habits of highly effective people" school, you may know that he used a great quote to define the difference between the importance and strength of personality (Leaves) versus character (Roots):

Covey explained with the iceberg metaphor what the main difference between character and personality is.

What you are – your character - is the biggest part which lies invisible under water where the visible smaller part is what you do and appear to be – your personality.

I invite you to start today working on the revision and reflection of your own values, principles and the mastery and the shaping of your habits to make sure you build and maintain a strong character.

This will enable you to make your best possible decisions responding to the challenges of change you are faced with every day.

Like that you will establish the trustworthiness and you will earn the trust of the people, which is finally the way to achieve true and enduring effectiveness in your life.

 But don't forget:

Trustworthiness and trust are built on both character and competency.

 Have a great day!

Authors personal note: I really appreciate that you are reading my post.
I am regularly writing about coaching, mentoring, leadership and technology. 

Please feel also free to follow TopCoach4You on your favorite Social Network:

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Related posts, STILL ON LINKEDIN (will be moved here soon ;)

• What do you see, the trees or the forest? [https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/what-do-you-see-trees-forest-andreas-jaffke?trk=mp-reader-card]
• Remembering Stephen R. Covey who passed away July 16th 2012 [https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/remembering-stephen-r-covey-who-passed-away-july-16th-andreas-jaffke?trk=mp-reader-card] 
• Values, principles, habits and skills of great people [https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/values-principles-habits-skills-great-people-andreas-jaffke?trk=pulse_spock-articles]

All the posts I have written on Linkedin can be found here:
Andreas Jaffke's posts on Linkedin

I recently enrolled with Noble Manhattan Coaching whose founder and CEO is Gerard O'Donovan. You may not know him but after meeting him in person last year in October when he visited Madrid to start Noble Manhattans' operations as Coaching Institute in Spain, I was so impressed and inspired that I decided to sign up for the Noble Manhattan Coaching  Practitioner Coach Diploma (DipNMC) course.

One of the exercises of the 350 hour course is to write a personal book critique about the course book "Co-Active Coaching", written by Karen and Henry Kimsey-House, Phillip Sandahl and Laura Whitworth , being the four exceptional and experienced coaches and true pioneers of the coaching profession. Karen, Henry and Laura were co-founders of the Coaches Training Institute in 1992. Phillip is co-founder and principal of Team Coaching International and a former senior faculty member of CTI.

I wanted to include here the special dedication for Laura Whitworth, who passed away February 28, 2007 written by Karen, Henry and Phillip.

"Laura was the co-creator of the Co-Active model together with Karen and Henry, a recognized leader in the development of the coaching profession, and co-author of the first two editions of the book.

Laura Whitworth died February 28, 2007, after a courageous battle with cancer. You could not find two words in English language more appropriate for her: courageous battle. What she believed in, she fought for. If you were ever her client, or participated in a program Laura led, you know. She was fighting for you.

She was a visionary and a pioneer; she was a compelling force. Her relentless commitment to life fully lived is a model and inspiration. That life force named Laura Whitworth created the seeds from which the coaching tree has grown; she didn't do it alone, of course, but her tenacity certainly made sure it grew.

Laura founded The Coaches Training Institute with Karen and Henry and created the Co-Active coaching model and training with them. Together they created an enormously powerful leadership program, a transformative life experience for participants. Just ask them. She was instrumental in the development and growth of the coaching profession and was one of the first to call the work she did "coaching".

We would say we miss her - and naturally we do. But her presence, her spirit, are so alive in the work today that we feel her with us still.

We dedicate this third edition to Laura and the courageous battle she stood for: a life fully lived. In every moment we are given. With every breathe we breathe."

I did read the third Edition (2011) and decided to publish my book critique here in my personal blog.  A personal critique is not an essay. It expresses what is good and what needs to be improved from my personal perspective. You can buy the book on Amazon and I pass you here the direct link for the ones that can't wait.

The objectives of the authors with this third edition are fourfold:

1. Explain the Co-Active Coaching model as fundamental for any coaching and for anyone who wants to be a coach
2. Provide fresh coaching examples selected from thousands of real life coaching experiences to show how the model is applied in all kind of coaching situations
3. Provide the latest Coaching terminology
4. Provide a web based "Coach's Toolkit" with more than 50 exercises, questionnaires, checklists and reproducible forms to help both coaches and coachees in their session preparation and execution. There are also two 15-20 min coaching session audios available.  Link to the toolkit - Note: In order to get access you have to provide some data.

The book is divided in three parts:

1. Explanation of the Co-Active Coaching model
2. Detailed description of the 5 contexts explained using sample coaching dialogues
3. The three Co-Active Coaching principles (Fulfillment, Balance and Process) and how to coach them

The Co-Active Coaching Model

Co-Active coaching is not about the results or the problems of the coaching conversation. It is chiefly about discovery, awareness and choice.

It is a way of effectively empowering people to find their own answers, encouraging and supporting them on the path as they continue to make important choices.

The underlying principles are:

• Respect
• Openness
• Compassion
• Empathy
• A rigorous commitment to speaking the truth

Regarding the coachee the model assumes:

1. Strength and capability as opposed to weakness, helplessness or dependence
2. Deep desire to give the best and achieve potential
3. Every situation has possibilities and people really have the power of choice

There a four cornerstones in the model:

1. PEOPLE are naturally CREATIVE, RESOURCEFUL and WHOLE
2. FOCUS on the WHOLE PERSON (Heart, body, mind and spirit)
3. DANCE in THIS MOMENT (Coach and coachee dance together))
4. EVOKE TRANSFORMATION of the coachee

As said before, there are three principles at the heart of the model that constitute the deeper motivation behind the coaching for the coachee:

1. Fulfillment: It is the answer or - are the answers - to the question "What is your vision of a really fulfilling life? What would that be? Who would be part of this life? This question takes you much deeper than just asking "What do you want"? And this is not a "One size fits all" menu like set of answers. One of the most valuable things a coach does for a coachee is to help them get clear about that very personal shape of fulfillment.
2. Balance: Balance is fundamental to the quality of life. People are often looking for more balance in their lives. Coachees are looking for being more empowered and less at the mercy of circumstances and other people's expectations and demands. They want to feel that they are choosing  their life. Balance is not about making everything even as life per definition is dynamic and ever changing. Keeping the balance is about beeing aware about what is going on and what decisions to make, saying "yes" to some things and "no" to others in certain situations of the coachees life.
3. Process: Process means to help coachees to be aware where they are in this moment, what their feelings are, what their beliefs or limitations are and to help them to experience, describe and to name it. This drives the coachee to an augmented capacity of self awareness, self assessment and self description and finally enables the coachee to transform into something different, to make a shift and  grow into the direction he really wants to move.

And what the coach brings to the model are the 5 contexts:

1. Listening: Everything in coaching hinges on listening - especially listening with the coachee's plan and purpose in mind. We use three levels of listening. Listening at level 1 (Internal listening) is when our awareness is on ourselves. Listening at level 2 (Focused listening) means that there is a sharp focus on the other person and listening at level 3 (Global listening) is as though coach and coachee were at the center of the universe receiving information from everywhere at once. It includes the action, inaction and interaction. The awareness we use here is sometimes described as "environmental listening". As listening is the entry point for all of the coaching all other 4 contexts depend on listening at level 2 and 3.
2. Intuition: Reading between the lines based on deep listening.
3. Curiosity: REAL interest in understanding EVERYTHING.
4. Forward (Action) and Deepen (Learning): Support and control to assure that the coachee transforms and advances.
5. Self management: Understood as self awareness and self control of the coach. The coach is secondary. The coach disappears. No ego. No advice. No judgements.

Now please have a look at the image below. You can see a blue circle named "Designed Alliance" that surrounds the Star that carries in its center the three principles and is surrounded itself by the 5 Contexts. It symbolizes the connection and the "Terms&Conditions" for the Co-Active relationship between the coach and the coachee.

I was also looking for some Youtube video explainers about the Co-Active Coaching model and found this one that I recommend. It was published in the channel of Federated Films. Here the official description of the video: "The San Francisco based Coaching Training Institute (CTI) commissioned Federated Films to produce an engaging animated explanation of their coaching model to help new and old students alike have an overview of the concepts built into the Co-Active model. "

Video 1: How to use The Co-Active Model by CTI

The Co-Active Relationship

This relationship - where both coach and coachee are active - is characterized by a deep respect for the uniqueness of the coachee.

Both coach and coachee are active in seeking to unfold the coachees full potential or solve the coachees problem where the coach focuses 100% on the coachee and the coachee focuses 100% on himself and his life.

Both are at the same level. There is no superiority.

The real power comes from this relationship, the interaction and the process. It does NOT come from the coach. The coach contributes his power to the relationship to make the relationship itself as powerful as possible to the full benefit of the coachee.

Some personal reflections

When I was reading chapter 8 about fulfillment, Stephen Covey's "The 7 habits of highly effective people" came immediately into my mind. Here a very nice video animation explaining the 7 habits.

Video 2: The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People - Animation

Specially the introduction of the big "A" agenda (What is your vision? Who are you becoming? What is present when life is most alive for you? and the little "a" agenda (Consists of goals, actions and accountability).

Many of the key aspects of the Co-Active coaching model are reflected in habits 1 (Be proactive), 2 (Begin with the end in mind), 3 (Put first things first), 4 (Think win-win) and habit 5 (seek first to understand, then to be understood), where habits 6 (Synergize) and 7 (Sharpen the saw) are not part of the Co-Active coaching model but are key to become a highly effective coach.

Please bear in mind that the 7 habits are built sequentially over a whole lifetime. Habits 1-3 (Including habit 7) once understood and mastered are called the "Private victory", while the mastery of habits 4-6 is called the "Public victory" and can only be achieved once you mastered habits 1-3 and 7. 

Image 2: The 7 habits and the Private and the Public Victory

The Co-Active coaching model implies as the very key aspect Listening at level 2 and 3 and intrinsically it assumes that a coach who uses the model thinks win-win (habit 4), otherwise he would not be a coach.

This further implies that a coach who wants to use the Co-Active coaching model needs quite some life experience and life time packed on his shoulders and very likely he will be working for the rest of his life on habits 5 and 6. To be honest, my biggest struggle since many years is habit 5 - Deep listening!

Here the full list of the 7 habits:

• Habit 1: Be proactive - It is all your decision - It's up to you to change things but you are fully accountable for the outcome of every single of your decisions!
• Habit 2: Begin with the end in mind - You need to know where to go - You need a vision, an objective a map!
• Habit 3: Put first things first - Plan the important things first, put them into your agenda and do them - Planning is an important starting point but only action changes things!
• Habit 4: Think win-win - If you want to sell something, think about what the person that wants your product or service will get in change - You win money and he gets value - That's thinking win win
• Habit 5: Seek first to understand, then to be understood - Listening is key - Do you remember? When do you learn more? Listening or talking? How can you help someone more? Though deep listening and understanding or explaining, advising and teaching?
  
• Habit 6: Synergize - The idea of synergies is based on the fact that often uniting forces produces results that are bigger than just the sum of the results of the individual parts - Players win games, teams win championships! - 1+1=3
• Habit 7: Sharpen the saw - Relax, take a breath and do things that you really like to do, things that make you feel happy!

Another interesting point brought up in the book was the relation between fulfillment and values where I liked very much the following statement: "The link between values and fulfillment is so obvious that it may be overlooked."

The authors of the book say that fulfillment is to picture a person who is living according to what she values most. So fulfillment is a personal, individual thing and should not be confused with moral character, ethical behavior or principles one follows. So what is to be admired is not the value itself but the coachee´s ability to live that value fully in his life which finally leads to fulfillment.

I do not fully agree with this statement. From my point of view, this could mean that if a coachee lived based on negative values, non ethical values and not based on character ethic towards a negative value based fulfillment, we as coaches would help to create a perfect monster.

There is a masterpiece of Stephen Covey on Youtube I want to share with you titled "Foundational principles - Character and personality" in order to differentiate the character ethic from the personality ethic.

Video 3: Stephen R. Covey - Foundational principles - Character and personality

I think if a coach lives trying to master "The 7 habits of highly effective people" and uses the Co-Active coaching model, he will become a Highly Effective Coach.

Positive aspects of the book

The book itself is easy to read and to understand. The book is well structured and full of coaching conversation examples where the 5 contexts and the cornerstones can be understood in a real coaching session context. It is a real practical book with great guidelines for the professional coach and I would call it the Professional Coach's Session Manual.

The tool-kit is very helpful to better understand, learn and apply the Co-Active coaching model to your own coaching. Here again the link so you can access and download the templates and audio files.

Aspects that could be improved

I missed more illustrations and graphical elements in the book itself as well as some videos to show how the different elements of Co-Active coaching work in a real coaching session. The tools are pdf's but we all know that the key is how you run the real session, how you manage the conversation and dance with the coachee.  You can't really dance looking at a sheet of paper with the guidelines. I suggest that the authors create a Youtube-Channel where they could show sessions and demonstrate key aspects and the application of the 5 contexts.

From a methodological point of view the model is well explained but to me the four cornerstones are a mixture of underlying assumptions, objectives and recommendations about what to do.

• The underlying assumption is that PEOPLE are naturally CREATIVE, RESOURCEFUL and WHOLE
• an objective is to EVOKE the TRANSFORMATION of the coachee
• and the two recommendations about what to do are to FOCUS on the WHOLE PERSON  and to DANCE in THIS MOMENT.

 
This makes it difficult to differentiate from the 5 contexts (Recommendations) as those should be rather 7 adding the two recommendations from the cornerstones to the existing 5.

Image 3: My adjusted version of the Co-Active coaching model

So now it is up to you. Please feel free to leave your comments here and I would be glad to openly discuss your points of view with the audience.

Yesterday 51,8% of UK voters (72% of participation) decided to back the exit from the European Union. Stock markets open this morning with huge losses, a new black Friday hits the financial markets.

The British Pound loses almost ten percent and crashes to its lowest levels in 31 years. The US dollar jumps 2,5% making US exports more expensive questioning like that the economic growth forecast of North America. Futures for the US stock markets show a 3-5% drop for today's session.

CNN Money states: "In the weeks after a vote in favor of Brexit, the S&P 500 would likely slump 5% and volatility would spike by 40%, according to a scenario analysis conducted by financial technology company FIS."

Image: Spanish Ibex this morning - Banco Santander losing 24% of its value

As many of us know, political decisions affect economies and our lives usually only on the short term. In this case I believe that the decision will have a serious mid and long term impact on the lives of the ones - like me and my family - that are living in the European Union.

As a political result of the Brexit Prime Minister David Cameron just resigned. "There will be a new Prime Minister in October". It was his decision to do this referendum and I am sure the result was not what he expected. He caused a tsunami difficult to control where damages are difficult to forecast while its ripples reach the rest of the world.

But this tsunami will not end today. It just started and its ripples will reach the coastlines of the affected countries worldwide with more or less impact during years.

First question that comes up: Who's next? Will Angela Merkel do the same in Germany a country that like UK is one of the biggest contributors to the EU? This morning voices in the Netherlands and France are asking for an exit referendum too and the UK is deeply divided as Scotland and Ireland voted to stay in the EU. Most likely they will organize a referendum lo leave the UK know and to stay in the EU.

That would definitely be the end of the EU as we know it. National currencies, the old frontiers and controls and the associated costs will come back.

Second question: What will happen to the free movement of European Citizens, people like me that moved from one european country into another and have their families? Will I have to change my nationality to stay in Spain? Will Spain - not the EU any more - allow me to do this?

Third and last question: What will happen to the economical weaker countries? How will these countries and people be able to finance its economies? Interest rates without the support from the ECB will very likely shoot through the roof.

I wish you a great day!

Andreas

Monday is the first day of the week and many people get back to work from the weekend with a "I don't like mondays" attitude, looking for ways to get as smooth and easy as possible through to the next Friday.

But there are a few out there that think different. "Another great week is waiting for me full of challenges, surprises and fun. Let's enjoy this week as it would be my first week on earth and get the most out of it!".
Different mindset - different week! I promise you!

It's Reactive versus Proactive. Be proactive is habit number 1 of Stephen Covey's "7 Habits of Highly Effective People".

So why is Monday Proactive-Day? The truth is, to be proactive is not something you are only on Mondays, it is a habit you can actually learn. But as Monday is the first day of the week there is something special I recommend you should do first thing in the morning:

Add a one hour meeting with yourself to your agenda called "Put first things first". Add a few categories as headlines into the meeting notes so you have a little template, a guideline. I do this in Outlook as a meeting with myself and like that it pops up every Monday morning at 9:30 when I arrive. Here you can see the template I use.

The tricky thing is - and here is where you will quickly see if you are really becoming proactive - is editing the list every Monday morning AND putting all planned meetings and activities that are important for you on your agenda. You need discipline to do this every single Monday. Try to do this for one month an let us know how that changed your week and if not tell us why id did not work.
Have a great (Mon) day!

Below: Playa de Bolonia, Atlantic Ocean, South of Spain, close to Tarifa (The North African Coast on the horizon)

If you are bored or just feel you are not happy or not satisfied, take a sheet of paper and write down these seven simple questions, go to a peaceful place, sit down, breathe, relax and honestly answer them:

1. PASSION: Do I have and feel passion for what I am doing?
2. PERSONALITY: Do I have personality and decide things on my own?
3. POWER: Do I feel at least mentally strong?
4. PLANNING: Do I plan what I will do on a regular basis?
5. PERSEVERANCE: Do I follow my plan and try to finish all tasks and do not give up if I get stuck?
6. PERFORMANCE: Do I obtain the desired results?
7. PAUSE: Do I take breaks on a regular basis to recharge energy and motivation?

If you answer on one or more of these questions with "No" you have probably found one or more reasons why you don't feel satisfied.

Once finished with the analysis you will say, well that's fine, but what can I do to change this?
Use the 8th P: PROACTIVITY and get it fixed ;)

AND!

Have a great day!

If you want to be successful AND happy I recommend you to play these three cards both in your personal and professional life:

1. Passion - Be passionate and enthusiastic with and about yourself and with and about what you do.

Show yourself and others your passion and motivation, display your enthusiasm and energy. Everything is possible if you believe its possible!

It is all in your mind and you are what you think you are. But you have to express what is in your mind trough emotion and actions.
Believe in your dreams with passion and nobody will be able to stop you! Believe in yourself and be yourself!
2. Vision - If you feel that strong and genuine power of your own enthusiasm and passion, then you have to move forward and start to envision what you want to achieve.

Write it down, draw a picture, associate a song or a video so that you can always see, feel and touch your vision and energize yourself during the tough and difficult moments and times, when you fail or are attacked by your fears to not succeed or when your doubts start hammering your mind. Keep your vision alive and present, its your bright shining pole star at your life's sky that guides you!

Have a great day!

Today I wanted to ask you to share with us which habits make you feel successful and happy, that make you feel confident that you are in the right place doing the right things. I will share mine so it will be easier to start for you.

A habit is something you do regularly and almost automatically but consciously. It can be as easy as having one glass of mineral water every morning as soon as you get up, reading a book 30 minutes a day, a one week vacation every year for skiing, a dinner with your wife or husband at every wedding anniversary.

My daily habits are:

1. Workout: After getting up, 15 minutes of gym: No weights, 7 easy exercises repeated twice. I do this at home and this includes some streching and a final meditation exercise of 3 minutes.
2. Shower
3. Prepare my kids breakfast and take them to shool
4. Have breakfast on my own, way to the office
5. Planning: Revise my daily agenda and get prepared for the day
6. Have a coffee with my team or other colleagues
7. Have lunch with my colleagues or customers
8. Drink some water and have a third coffee (Maybe too much coffee ;)
9. Go home and have dinner with my family, talk to my wife and my kids, relax (Some running), watch some TV and go to bed

There are also some daily "Habits in progress". Listen actively and speak less or 20 minutes reading for instance.

Caution: A habit that is not linked to survival needs can always be lost so don't think that if you have done something for three months every day that this habit will be there forever and will just pop up every day. You still have to decide every day to do it.

My weekly habits are:

1. Sunday evening at 7PM Familiy meeting where everybody has his speaking time he may use or give to another Family member. This meeting is to share important things for each of us with the other family members so everybody is aware. This meeting is used to discuss important family events such as vacactions, birthdays and any other important event. (This habit was just added a week ago and I am working on convincing everybody that it provides value :)
2. Monday morning: Weekly planning - personal and professional events - I put the "Big rocks" in my agenda and check for the ones I will have to prepare this week: Birthdays, anniversaries, customer meetings, meetings with my boss, events with friends and family, etc.
3. 1-3 times running between 30 and 60 min including an official 10k or 21k competition from time to time on a weekend
4. Saturdays: The organization&family day of the week - Groceries, things at home that have to be done, drive my kids to their events, assist to the soccer match of my son, play with my youngest kid. Saturday evening is usually booked for my wife and I. Dinner with friends, cinema and theatre are options we often choose.
5. Sunday is holy - Sharpen the saw: Sports (Tennis), activities with my family (I have a wife and three kids) and Friends - No exception! 

My only monthly habit is

"Stammtisch" (No clue how to translate this) every first Thursday with my German Expats here in Madrid - having a few beers and a nice conversation

My annual habits are
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1. A long 2-4 weeks summer holiday with my wife and my kids. This is usually August here in Spain
2. A one week easter holiday with my wife and my kids.
3. Celebration of all close family and friends birthdays and our wedding anniversary
4. A 3 day - Family-off ski trip with my friends. This one was skipped for the last five years but must go back into my habits ;) -  to disconnect from work&family
5. Take a weekend-day in December and ask myself if I still do the right things and if I am in the right company doing the job that challenges and satisfies me and share these thoughts with my wife. Then think about a plan and take action if necessary.

This is much more what I initially thought! And honestly: The last one of the annual habits just popped up as an idea ;)

Feel free to share your habits, the ones that make the difference for you.

I am looking forward to seeing them!

To write this post I was originally inspired by "6 skills of Extraordinary Entrepreneurs" written by Eilene Zimmermann on Inc.com.
Look, I even designed an image to understand better what those skills are about.Thank you Eilene for sharing!

Then I thought about what I really wanted to share with all of you and the first thing that came to my mind was what I would not like to do. I would not like to put a number in my headline such as "The 10 rules" or "7 ways" or whatsoever.

I did that before in other posts but I somehow learned that you can't really say that. Who am I to determine the number of rules, things, habits someone else has to follow to be successful for instance? Linkedin is full of posts fishing for reads, likes and followers trying to catch the readers attention using sound headlines with labels and numbers - usually small numbers between 1 and 10. Why? To make things appeal easy and fast. Fast to read, easy to understand and easy to apply or learn. The so called "quick read - quick win".

There is no truth and there is no objective evidence in the advices we give others writing them down on a sheet of paper, in a letter, as part of a presentation, in a post or in a book. We are simply and hopefully humbly expressing our very subjective, personal opinion - even if sometimes really appreciated by many - and we propose others to read what worked for us but often we just copy someone else and think that it could work for ourselves and for them.

I don't know the truth or the absolute truth so I will also try to avoid starting sentences with "It is evident", "The truth is", "Always" or "Never". Additionally I didn't want to use labels such as "Leadership", "Leader", "CEO" or "Entrepreneur".
​
I wanted to talk about what makes PEOPLE around us "Great people". Who are those great people? Seeing others as "Great people" is also subjective. My seven year old daughter for instance is one of those great people, because she is the person that makes me feel so good when she raises this simple question:

"Do you know daddy how much I do love you?"

Is she a leader? Peter Drucker would say "Yes of course she is, as she has followers!" - My wife, her brothers, grandma and granddad her friends and myself of course :)

Who do you think is a greater person for us, her followers: Warren Buffet, Bill Gates, Barack Obama or her?

Why do I write this post?
What motivates me?
Am I wasting my time?
I could to something else instead.
You know why I am writing here and today? Because It helps me to learn, because I feel that I am sharing something that may help others.

When you start writing you are processing your thoughts, you put them in sequence and often you find out that what you are finally writing down is then quite different from what you originally thought you would write. It is a learning process and a creative process at the same time. This is because if you write, most of the times you don't write only for yourself, you write to share your thoughts with others and most of the times you want your readers to understand your thoughts, your feelings, your values and principles.

Part of the writing process is also stopping to think. Reading what you were writing, reformulating, deleting, shaping, fine-tuning, adding some words here and there and take some time to set you mind to think it over again. Discuss with someone what you are writing and get some feedback.
​
I think that I am an average writer but it really helps me to understand myself to learn more about who I am, how I think, what I think and what is important to me. It helps me to understand others, how they think, how they feel, why they do some things and don't do others. It makes my brains work. I discuss with myself and clarify, turn arguments up and down and move things from left to right and back again. It helps me to question myself, look into the mirror and ask myself "Who are you?", "What is really important to you", "Who are the real important people in your life?", "Are you really happy? Why? Why not?", "What do you want to achieve?", "What are your personal and professional goals?"

Now lets talk about the values, principles, habits and skills that make those great people around us so great.

You know what? I think it is a much better idea that you go out and find them, talk to them instead of reading this post.

The most powerful weapon to find out something important about people is to raise a good question and then carefully listen to understand.

But don't try to copy them - be and stay yourself, just observe, listen and learn.

Here a great post titled "A manifesto against America's 'happiness' and 'resume' cultures" written by Dave Brooks, to make you think about yourself a little bit more.
​
Dave Brooks, The New York Times columnist argues in this post that we focus on accumulating power, material wealth, and professional achievements instead of cultivating the kinds of qualities that will be discussed at our funerals. As Brooks phrases it, we emphasize "resume virtues" over "eulogy virtues." Brooks's objective is to establish a "counterculture" to our happiness culture and our resume culture. It's to fashion a path to "inner depth."

​By the way, I am sure you can find great people very close to you. A hint: The greatest and most important person of your life is just in front of you - just take a look at the mirror ;)

Have a great day!
Andreas