3D Coaching

3D Juggling 531: The importance of context

Claire writes: "After a recent coaching supervision where we had been exploring the power of saying very little, I said to the coach: 'Less is More'.  She responded: 'Even less is even more.'

I was so struck by the powerfulness of her comment that I put it on Twitter.  And received many strange responses including: I was puzzled because the logical extension was that nothing is everything. Either very profound or... :)

I still think 'Even less is even more' is profound in one to one conversations which are so often full of noise.  And it's also a great lesson of the importance of context! Think about it..."

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Less is More

In 'Techniques for Coaching and Mentoring ', Megginson and Clutterbuck suggest that "It takes approximately 4.5 seconds of silence on the car radio for the average person in western society to change channels.  Silence is a phenomenon we are ill equipped to handle; we attempt to fill it as quickly as possible.  Yet silence truly can be golden"

If you are a coach, and you know that you talk too much, contract with your client at the beginning of the conversation that you won't break the silence - it's up to your client to tell you when they are ready to speak again.