Duo Coaching

It's amazing how things progress over time, especially new business ventures.

As many of you know I started to work in relationship coaching and counselling quite a while ago, building on the teamwork knowledge and experience I had from coaching high performance teams of just two people in sailing. These are truly compared to 'marriages without love' and have proved a valuable learning arena for what I now do for the general population.

Then I teamed up with Neil Wilkie to work with him on a new offering - that of two relationship counsellors working with a couple at the same time. We both knew that the service provided by traditional relationship therapists working with one counsellor to a couple, while good and certainly well-meaning, has its limitations when it comes to effectiveness. Our aim was (and still is) to provide couples counselling where the two of us honour both individuals as well as their relationship at the same time. It means we work 'live' with problems and issues as they occur in ways that give dedicated time and space to both parties - one person is not side-lined or left out just because the other is more verbal or more needy at that moment.

We've spent some time and research working things out - especially how to work at our best together so that our clients get to resolution quickly - and built up a good little business over a number of years.

Recently we decided to formalise things somewhat and dip our toes into making our presence known on the internet. Have a look at our new website - www.duocoaching.co.uk  We have a blog there too, focussing on relationship issues.

As you will see we leant on our mutual interest of of sailing to provide the metaphor for the site, and we like the effect - and I welcome feedback on your impressions too!

I still do sailing, sports, life and executive coaching, (because I enjoy them) and find that things I learn from these different arenas all feed into a better product - see www.cathyfoster.co.uk and of course, this is my major blog page for all things ecletic.

It's all rewarding stuff.

Buddies and Co-Coaching

I’ve just read the latest ‘Outside the lines’ newsletter which is on finding Buddies to be with and this has struck a chord with me, as I am enjoying working with seven other people in exactly this way. We have a company called ‘Resolve’, which provides relationship coaching, counselling and mediation to those with relationship problems and issues across the UK. Its all very exciting. Normally as a coach I work on my own, and now, with the values that we share, it is so much easier to work with others too.

Working with people to sort out their relationships has been a constant thread through my coaching career. In sailing and sport, its building teams and dealing with issues so that the performance of the team is not compromised. In life coaching, I often work with clients helping them to deal with their life partner relationships. The similarities and differences between sport and life help provide me with the insights needed to cut through to the basic issues in ways my clients then build on.

When dealing with two people, life or sport, its always been tricky to give each partner equal attention. So often, one person’s issues are more immediate, and resolving these will help move situations forward, which tends to be the expedient solution. However, finding time to listen to the concerns of the other partner is imperative to get a balanced resolution. Within Resolve we are promoting Co-Coaching as an optional service, where there are two coaches to two people, and boy, does this work well! A balanced outcome is so much more reliable at the end of a session, with the needs of both parties attended to by using of the complementary skills of the two coaches.

Its a real pleasure to be working with my Buddies.

For the active links to website mentioned in this articles, sign up to my blog on my website www.cathyfoster.co.uk