Clara in HR: “…and so, based on the results of our talk and
the results of your 360 Degree Feedback, I’d like to recommend you work with a coach to develop a stronger, more managerial communication style, Winston.”
Winston: “Okay. Well…great! I look forward to the development opportunity.”
Voice in
Winston’s
Head: “This can’t be good. They’re sending me off to get a personality transplant.”
Okay, so even if Clara has done a superlative job of positioning one-on-one coaching as a developmental piece, there is often the concern on the coachee’s part, that he or she is being asked to change who they are.
This can be worrisome for Winston as he steps into my rather unconventional space for the first time, making his way past the eclectic mix of Asian art and theatre props, to settle onto one of two wingback chairs in my office overlooking Lamma Island and the South China Sea beyond. The room is filled with an assortment of back stage mementos, antique top hats and books that range from a facilitator’s guide for accessing group wisdom in the workplace to the Oxford Companion to Shakespeare and a wonderful book on the art of theatrical direction.
The setting is probably not what Winston expected despite Clara’s having told him he would be working with a communication coach whose background is professional theatre. Something catches his eye. A mask hangs from one of the bookcases on the opposite wall.
This, I suspect, represents his greatest concern – that he will working with me to ‘mask’ his personality, creating some made up ‘character’ in order to meet others’ expectations of how a strong manager behaves.
Renowned acting teacher Sanford Meisner said that acting was ‘living truthfully under an imaginary set of circumstances’. You don’t leave the theatre going, “Wow, great pretending!” You are moved because it feels honest.
I took an acting workshop with a London based director who described her role like this, “I gather talent together and get them good in action, performing well with others”.
My work is pretty much based on these two philosophies. I aim to get the talent/coachee at their most effective in action (as opposed to in theory) building healthy, collaborative relationships with co-workers and customers.
To do this, Winston will need to be able to live as his best, truthful self under whatever challenging set of circumstances he is given in the workplace. Those ‘given’ circumstances may call upon him to share his opinions more confidently with his boss and colleagues, for example.
Winston doesn’t need a personality transplant for this. He needs to identify what he is doing when he is ‘in action’ that indicates to others that he is not confident in his opinions and then he needs a safe environment in which to explore alternative ways of expressing himself that are effective and feel truthful. In short, Winston needs a rehearsal space, an actor or two with whom to experiment and a director whose only objective is to help get him at his best when faced with a set of challenging circumstances.
The professional actors I hire are briefed by Winston so that they can replicate the sort of behaviours displayed by his bosses and he chooses a real scenario that has already happened or is likely to come up in the future. The rehearsal space is set up as it would be in his office and I sit, off to the side, stopping the action from time to time to ask what might be more useful or make suggestions about trying a different approach. If what I see is working well and feels truthful for Winston, we run it a few times so that he understands how it feels for him to be ‘good in action, performing well with others’.
With muscle memory in place, Winston is ready to step onto life’s stage.
“This above all: to thine own self be true,
And it must follow, as the night the day,
Thou can’st not then be false to any man.”
Hamlet Act 1 , scene 3
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