Marie Quigley: Hello and welcome! Marie and Janine here together today, looking forward to having a great conversation, supporting coaches, leaders who coach, anyone who's interested in coaching, hopefully to deepen their awareness on different topics around coaching. Great to be with you, Janine.

Jeanine Bailey: And you, Marie, wonderful to be here. We're still in the same country, still separated by about an hour, and I think I've just been getting your weather over this way. Bit of thunder, bit of rain, but it's lovely to be here.

Marie Quigley: You're welcome. You can have that thunder and rain.

Jeanine Bailey: The garden needs it, so I'm grateful.

Marie Quigley: Great to be here. So, go ahead, what were we talking about before we first came on, Janine?

Jeanine Bailey: Thanks, Marie. Yes, we had a quick discussion about what we will focus on in our podcast today, and we're always searching for topics that we know are topical for coaches. One of the things that have been coming up recently for both of us in different but connected ways is the relationship with the sponsor of a client, a coaching partner, and how we set that up to support ourselves as coaches, also the client, the partner, of course importantly, and the sponsor who is paying for those coaching services. It's really important in that corporate environment, or in any environment-it could be, for example, families, parents requiring coaching of their children, so the parents are like the sponsor. In those kind of dynamic situations where there's more than one party, it is so important that we set that up as the foundation of success and fulfilment of the coaching program. It really is critical, and that's coming up often in our supervision sessions with coaches, in mentoring, in training. It's coming up more and more these days as organizations are getting much more familiar and attuned to coaching, and as parents are too. So that's what we wanted to discuss in our podcast today.

Marie Quigley: I think it might be useful, because I'm guessing we've got some coaches who are new to coaching, and some coaches who are established, so if we can get a little bit more specific-you've mentioned parents, and you've mentioned the word sponsor-but who might be a sponsor in an organization, Janine?

Jeanine Bailey: That's a really good point. So, we think about sponsors as the people who are essentially paying-I've put "paying" in inverted commas-but they're the ones that are instigating or approving or setting up the coaching for the individuals in an organization, if we're talking about the corporate side of things. As I said earlier, the parents might be the sponsors, so they're potentially the ones that are wanting it to happen. Of course, the clients have to be willing to be a party to this, but the sponsors are the ones that are prepared to invest on behalf of the individual or the group that is being coached and supported and developed.

Marie Quigley: Yeah, and that could look like, in an organization, more than one sponsor, because it could be the manager, or it could be the manager's manager who's instigating that through HR who is also going to search out for the coach to come in and have chemistry sessions. So there could be different layers to that sponsorship relationship before that even gets to the coach. In many cases, HR will reach out to me, but there have been steps that have gotten HR involved before it comes to me. And so, the three-way agreement that we think about with the sponsor, the person we're going to coach, and the coach, they may involve more than three people having conversations together.

Jeanine Bailey: It's so true, Marie. It can be very layered and potentially complex, too. We've got a number of corporate clients where our main contact person might be the HR individual, and then they are in contact with managers or leaders who want their individuals in their team to be coached. Those different layers, and of course HR have their line manager as well. So there are all these different parties who potentially want to contribute to the coaching program. We absolutely believe it's all in service of the person who's receiving the coaching, but it can get complex, particularly if the coaching client is perhaps nervous about many people, many layers being involved in their development. There will be some who will really love it and love all these different layers involved-feedback-some really embrace feedback, some perhaps not so much, some perhaps don't feel so safe to be in these courageous and vulnerable conversations. So it is complex. Sometimes it could be simple, and sometimes not. We've experienced both, haven't we?

Marie Quigley: Yeah. I'm just thinking about one conversation before I even got to talking to the client, to seeing if we were a good fit. There was a line manager, there was HR, and there was myself. As the conversation for thinking about coaching and what the line manager wanted the person I was going to be coaching ideally out of the coaching program progressed, it seemed to me that something was amiss. Actually, what I realized-it was a gut instinct-was that they wanted me to do their dirty work of giving feedback to the coaches. In that three-way meeting that we first started off with, it was clear to me that boundaries needed to be put in place about what my role was going to be, and that I was certainly not going to be the one delivering difficult feedback, because the line manager didn't have the courage to do that.

Jeanine Bailey: That is a wonderful example, Marie, of the need for us as coaches, when we're in those initial setting up contracting type of conversations, to identify, does this align with who I am, and my purpose, and my values, and what's important to me? Because if we align ourselves with things that are perhaps about avoiding responsibility, or performance management-trying to be part of the process of trying to get rid of someone instead of developing somebody-it's getting clear and trusting your gut, as you did, Marie, to ask those questions as to whether you are a scapegoat, for want of a better word, or whether you are there to really develop and bring out the best in people.

I have been asked to work with a client who received not-great feedback about them and their performance, and they really wanted her to be able to lift her game, so to speak. It felt like the organization was behind her, yet it was delicate because she was not performing. Because I believed in the organization, I did take on the client, and it was a real turnaround success story for her, and she was eventually promoted. But it doesn't always work out that way. So we really do need to either put in strong boundaries, or decide, is this work for me, or is it not? It's all part of who you are as a coach, and it's an opportunity for reflection, for supervision, to work out what are my values, who do I want to be as a coach, who do I want to work with, and so much more.

Marie Quigley: Standing in these meetings does not mean you have to take on work that doesn't fit for you. But it could fit for you; you just need to get curious about what the expectations are. So, no assumptions, go in with your curious head on, and find out what actually this process is going to be like for you, for the person you're working with, and for the organization, as well as any sponsors' involvement in it.

Jeanine Bailey: It comes back to what we were talking about earlier, Marie, in terms of that contracting. That curiosity, those questions about following your gut, following your intuition, really getting clear about the assignment, the coaching program, and that is setting up your ways of working. Part of those ways of working is also that education process in terms of how you work. What is your philosophy? What could happen that perhaps you weren't expecting? For example, coaching can sometimes support people to realize, "I am a square peg in a round hole," and "this is not what I'm meant to do." So coaching can sometimes support people to recognize they're not in the right place. I've had that experience, and the coaching sponsor actually celebrated that, because they understood that this person, as much as they loved them and really wanted them to succeed, was in the wrong role. It's having those conversations to really create that awareness and clarity of what could happen, what we are responsible for, what they are responsible for, and so much more.

Marie Quigley: Very wisely spoken, Janine. We've got to think about ourselves when we go into contracting-how comfortable we are in our role as a coach. We've got to listen to the different angles that the different sponsors might have in that conversation, and we've also got to name that when we start working with the person we're going to be coaching, our priority is with supporting them. Feedback can be offered and delivered, but feedback in terms of challenges in their relationship should not be coming through the line manager to you in that way. There needs to be boundaries around what you can and can't do. I know it's challenging when you're starting off in coaching, because you don't actually know what you're going to be facing. So I would definitely bring it up in supervision, ask your supervisor, talk to it if you've got group supervision, invite the thinking of other coaches around what their experience is, because it's wonderful to hear the different ways we can approach our way of contracting. There are some great lessons when we listen to those who are a step ahead of us.

Jeanine Bailey: Even those who might not be so experienced can still bring in some great wisdom or practices that they've learned from other coaching schools, or through other sources and means. I agree, taking these sorts of things to supervision, because when we work in this way where we're working with sponsor or sponsors, there's just so much to take into account. We want to work ethically, we want to be transparent, to really create the conditions for a successful coaching program. And as you mentioned, getting clear on our boundaries, particularly in terms of what we will do in terms of how we report in relation to the coaching program. Because we want to set up this program for the psychological safety of the coaching client, we do not share details with the sponsor or sponsors. So we want to contract with the group how we might do that-maybe it's requesting the client themselves to report back on the coaching progress, or maybe there are clear, quantifiable key performance indicators that can be useful. But it's so important that we don't share that information, because that then contravenes the psychological safety of the individual.

Marie Quigley: Absolutely. Think about if somebody approaches you for coaching, and you go and meet the sponsors, and find out about the project, and see if you have the capacity to take this on. Then you're meeting, perhaps in the same meeting, with the line manager, learning about the organization and the team or line manager's perspective of what they want to focus on. Then you might have to go and have a chemistry session with the person you're working with-it could come before or after, sometimes it comes before, sometimes it comes after. Then it's worth thinking about coming together again with the person you're going to be coaching, so you can have a frank conversation with everybody in the room.

I've just recently had a lovely 3-way, 4-way conversation. The line manager, HR, and my new client came into a meeting with me. Brave conversations, really laid things out from different perspectives on the table about what they wanted to get out of coaching. What the line manager wanted was something different than the leader I was working with. There were lots of discussions around it, and they were working their way through it. I, as a coach, had the ability to listen and invite questions, but not get involved in setting the goals at this stage-staying neutral so that they could work out what was most important. That was a wonderfully refreshing experience, hearing all parties being brave, and then allowing somebody to just ask some questions and support them in their thinking, so that we narrowed down the things that were most important for both the people who were paying and the person I was going to be working with.

Jeanine Bailey: That's such an ideal situation, isn't it, Marie, to have that ability to bring all the parties together to support courageous conversations, transparent conversations. I'm thinking of a client that I'm working with at the moment who holds a very high position-global position. So I suggested that we have this meeting with the HR, the CEO, themselves, and myself, but it wasn't taken up. So it's just knowing that what you've described is ideal, and if we can make that happen, fantastic, but not all organizations will be prepared to do that. You've got to work out what am I prepared to accept, not accept, in service of the client.

Marie Quigley: I think that's absolutely true, Janine. On the opposite end of the scale, I'm working with a brilliant client who has absolutely, in no uncertain terms, said, "I don't want my line manager involved in this. The company has given me this, they've said it's optional if my line manager is involved, and they have adamantly said they don't want them as part of this conversation." That's an agreement the organization has made with them. I'm not going to insist that the line manager is part of it, because you brought in psychological safety-that would break the trust of the client, it would put them, from their perspective, in a very unsafe space. For some reason, it just isn't the way they want to work, so you have to respect that too.

Jeanine Bailey: Absolutely. So, Marie, as we start to wrap up our conversation today, I'm trusting we've shared that there are many different facets and elements and layers to working with corporates, organizations, and families as well. If you are a coach working with families-recently I did have the opportunity to support somebody who is doing that, and when we looked at it in a supervision session, the challenges they were experiencing were around the contracting piece. So coaches, we trust and hope that this has given you food for thought, and that when you go into these types of situations, you are potentially really prepared to ask all sorts of different types of questions. Again, invite you to take this to coaching supervision, or speak to peers, colleagues who have experienced this, to support you to set up the coaching program, everything in it, everyone in it, for success.

Marie, what are your closing, parting, wise words?

Marie Quigley: I think, stay calm, stay confident in your role as a coach, know what you are in your role as a coach. If you are used to being a consultant, be mindful of moving into that role, or if you're used to being a mentor, be mindful of moving into that role. If you can stay in the coach's role and get curious, it's going to support you, I think, to do even braver contracting.

Jeanine Bailey: Absolutely. Thank you for listening. If you found this to be useful, please do let others know. Again, we always invite coaches, leaders who coach, to let us know of any topics that you'd like us to bring into the podcast, and we just thank you for your support.

Marie Quigley: Thank you, everyone.