A large number of our clients are reverting to in person coaching. About 75% of our coaching is now delivered this way.
As humans, we are social creatures, and some people perhaps more so than others. Whilst a degree of extroversion means that people gain energy from mixing with others, introversion means that people draw energy from their own company. We are also seeing that coming out of the pandemic, clients are craving social interaction.
Does this make in person coaching the best method? In true academic style – it depends.
On the positive side, we know that person-to-person contact has a direct impact on our happiness. We understand that at a neurological level, dopamine floods the brain at a time of good social interaction. It has been suggested that this is a snowball effect – in that we seek out more pleasurable experiences when flooded with dopamine. We, therefore, see this type of interaction as a good type of interaction.
We work hard to build bodily rapport, something that is easy to gauge in the presence of another rather than interacting through phone coaching, Virtual Reality Coaching, or online coaching.
However, as with any system that has an abundance of stimuli, we need to actively choose which one to listen to. We know that sometimes we read things wrong as we approach sensory overload and if we consider a coaching situation, we can often be in a space where we are exploring the boundaries of sensory overload. Our emotions link to our vision – challenging us to remain involved in the coaching experience. We do understand that an estimated up to 90% of the information we receive in a face-to-face conversation is visual, not verbal.
To understand further, we need to ask ourselves the question, what is coaching?
Getting the right balance of coaching methods is therefore critical.
A hybrid approach often works and we will help in designing the best intervention for you.
