Models of Reflective Practice in Coaching

coaches zone podcast

July 19, 2024

Welcome to The Coaches Zone! In this episode Ramon David founder of BrainFirst, explores the neuroscience of learning and brain plasticity, and how these concepts can enhance coaching practices. Drawing from his new book, The Handbook of Professional Coaching Competencies, Ramon shares neuroscience and psychology insights, case studies, and practical takeaways.

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Key Topics Covered

The Benefits of Reflective Practice: Understanding the value of deep, meaningful reflection.
Schön’s Reflective Model: Learning from real-time and post-event reflection.
Kolb’s Experiential Learning Cycle: Applying a systematic approach to learning from experiences.

Case Study: Coach Samantha’s Improved Reflective Practice

Samantha, a dedicated health and wellness coach, felt her reflective practice lacked depth. To enhance her reflections and coaching effectiveness, she integrated mindfulness into her daily routine.

Key Techniques Used

Daily Meditation: Committing to a 20-minute morning meditation to enhance mental clarity and emotional balance.
Mindful Breathing Exercises: Practicing mindful breathing before sessions to ensure full presence.
Mindful Reflection: Combining traditional reflection with mindfulness after each session, focusing on thoughts, emotions, and bodily sensations.
Reflective Journal: Documenting mindful reflections to identify patterns and insights.

Results

Deeper Self-Awareness: Enhanced awareness of thoughts, emotions, and physical sensations, leading to better self-regulation.
Enhanced Reflective Depth: Uncovering underlying themes and insights to inform coaching strategies.
Improved Client Relationships: Stronger connections and increased trust with clients due to enhanced presence and attentiveness.
Personal Well-Being: Reduced stress and increased balance through regular mindfulness practices.

Samantha’s integration of mindfulness into her reflective practice led to profound improvements in her coaching and personal well-being. This case study highlights the power of deep, mindful reflection in enhancing coaching effectiveness.

Practical Takeaways for Coaches

Utilize Schön’s Model: Practice reflection-in-action during coaching sessions and engage in reflection-on-action post-session to review performance and identify areas for improvement.
Apply Kolb’s Cycle: Follow Kolb’s four-stage cycle (Concrete Experience, Reflective Observation, Abstract Conceptualization, Active Experimentation) to systematically learn from coaching experiences.
Structured Reflection Sessions: Schedule regular times for structured reflection, alone or with a peer/mentor, to ensure continuous learning and development.
Reflection Tools: Use tools like audio/video recordings, reflective journals, and feedback forms to enhance the reflection process with concrete data.

Conclusion

By integrating these models of reflective practice into your coaching, you can enhance your ability to learn from your experiences and continuously improve your effectiveness. Utilizing Schön’s model and Kolb’s cycle, scheduling regular reflection sessions, and employing reflection tools ensures that you not only respond to immediate needs but also foster long-term development and adaptability in your coaching career.

For more neuroscience-based resources and education for coaches, visit www.brainfirstinstitute.com. Subscribe and leave a review if you enjoyed this episode of The Coaches Zone.

Transcript

episode we’ll be talking about: Models of Reflective Practice in Coaching - from my new book - the handbook of professional coaching competencies, with neuroscience and psychology insights, case studies and practical takeaways.

Check it out at professionalcoachingcompetencies.com

We’ll also cover The Benefits of Reflective Practice, Schön’s Reflective Model, Kolb’s Experiential Learning Cycle.

So enjoy the episode, and let’s begin with the story of Coach Samantha’s Improved Reflective Practice.

Samantha, a dedicated health and wellness coach in her early forties, felt that her reflective practice lacked depth. While she consistently reviewed her coaching sessions, she often found her reflections to be surface-level, missing the profound insights she believed were necessary for meaningful growth. Samantha sought a way to deepen her reflective practice to enhance her coaching effectiveness and personal well-being.

Determined to enrich her reflective practice, Samantha decided to integrate mindfulness into her daily routine. She embarked on a structured mindfulness program that included daily meditation, mindful breathing exercises, and mindful reflection before and after coaching sessions. The specific steps she took were:

1. Daily Meditation: Samantha committed to a 20-minute meditation session each morning, focusing on breath awareness and present-moment mindfulness. This practice aimed to enhance her overall mental clarity and emotional balance.
2. Mindful Breathing Exercises: Before each coaching session, Samantha practiced five minutes of mindful breathing. This exercise helped her center herself, ensuring she was fully present and attentive during her sessions.
3. Mindful Reflection: After each coaching session, Samantha spent 10-15 minutes in mindful reflection. She combined traditional reflection techniques with mindfulness, focusing on her thoughts, emotions, and bodily sensations. She asked herself questions like:
What thoughts and emotions surfaced during the session?
How did my body respond to different aspects of the interaction?
What insights can I gain from these observations?

Samantha also maintained a reflective journal, documenting her mindful reflections and any patterns or insights that emerged over time. Integrating mindfulness into her reflective practice led to profound improvements in Samantha's coaching and personal well-being. Key outcomes included:

1. Deeper Self-Awareness: Mindfulness helped Samantha develop a heightened awareness of her thoughts, emotions, and physical sensations. This increased self-awareness allowed her to identify subtle patterns in her coaching interactions that she had previously overlooked. She became more attuned to her own biases, triggers, and emotional responses, which enhanced her ability to self-regulate and maintain objectivity during sessions.

2. Enhanced Reflective Depth: The combination of mindfulness and reflection enabled Samantha to delve deeper into her coaching experiences. She began to uncover underlying themes and insights that informed her coaching strategies. For example, she noticed that certain coaching techniques elicited strong emotional reactions from her, which prompted her to explore these reactions further and adjust her approach accordingly.

3. Improved Client Relationships: Samantha's enhanced presence and attentiveness during coaching sessions fostered stronger connections with her clients. They felt more heard and understood, leading to increased trust and engagement. Her ability to reflect mindfully on each session allowed her to tailor her coaching to better meet her clients' needs.

4. Personal Well-Being: The mindfulness practices also had a positive impact on Samantha's personal well-being. She reported feeling less stressed and more balanced, both in her professional and personal life. The daily meditation and mindful breathing exercises helped her manage stress and maintain a sense of calm and focus throughout the day.

Integrating mindfulness into reflective practice can significantly enhance self-awareness, reflective depth, and overall coaching effectiveness. By adopting mindfulness techniques, we can gain deeper insights into our coaching interactions, improve our client relationships, and foster our personal well-being.

Models of Reflective Practice in Coaching

To effectively incorporate reflective practice into our coaching, it is beneficial to understand and utilize established models that structure and guide our reflections. These models provide frameworks that help us, as coaches, analyze our experiences and extract valuable insights to improve our practice. Here, we explore two influential models: Donald Schön's reflective model and David Kolb's experiential learning cycle, both of which are particularly relevant to the coaching profession.

Donald Schön’s model of reflection is a cornerstone in understanding professional growth and learning. Schön distinguishes between two types of reflection: reflection-in-action and reflection-on-action. Reflection-in-action occurs during the activity or interaction, allowing us to make real-time adjustments and decisions. This type of reflection is dynamic and requires us to think on our feet, which is incredibly valuable in coaching sessions where immediate responses are often necessary.

Reflection-on-action, on the other hand, occurs after the event has taken place. It involves looking back at what we did, analyzing how we handled the situation, and considering what we could do differently in the future. This form of reflection is crucial for long-term development and is particularly useful in learning from complex client interactions or outcomes.

David Kolb's Experiential Learning Theory proposes a four-stage learning cycle: Concrete Experience, Reflective Observation, Abstract Conceptualization, and Active Experimentation. This model emphasizes the importance of experiencing and doing as a basis for learning. In the context of coaching, the cycle begins with a Concrete Experience (a coaching session, for instance), followed by Reflective Observation, where we critically assess and reflect on the session. Abstract Conceptualization involves forming theories or generalizations based on our reflections, and Active Experimentation is where we apply these new insights in future coaching sessions, completing the cycle of learning.

Practical Takeaways

1. Utilize Schön’s Model

During coaching sessions, practice reflection-in-action by staying mentally alert and flexible, ready to adapt your coaching techniques as needed. Post-session, engage in reflection-on-action by reviewing your performance and identifying areas for improvement.

Reflection-in-action engages the prefrontal cortex, enhancing real-time problem-solving and decision-making. Reflection-on-action activates memory and analytical regions, allowing for deeper learning and strategy development. This dual approach ensures continuous improvement and adaptability in your coaching practice.

By utilizing Schön’s model, you can remain agile and responsive during sessions while also fostering long-term growth through post-session analysis.

2. Apply Kolb’s Cycle

After each coaching session, take time to go through each stage of Kolb’s cycle. Start by recounting the session details (Concrete Experience), reflect on your interactions and outcomes (Reflective Observation), derive new theories or modify existing approaches (Abstract Conceptualization), and plan how to apply these lessons in future sessions (Active Experimentation).

Kolb’s cycle engages multiple brain regions involved in experience, reflection, and conceptualization. By systematically applying this cycle, you enhance cognitive flexibility and integrate new learning effectively, ensuring continuous personal and professional development.

Applying Kolb’s cycle ensures that each coaching experience contributes to a structured learning process, enhancing your overall coaching effectiveness.

3. Structured Reflection Sessions

Schedule regular times for structured reflection using these models. This could be done alone or with a peer or mentor. Using a structured approach ensures that reflection becomes an integral part of your practice rather than an afterthought.

Structured reflection sessions enhance self-awareness and cognitive processing. Regular, scheduled reflection engages the brain’s default mode network, fostering deeper insights and sustained professional growth.

By scheduling regular reflection sessions, you make reflection a consistent and valuable part of your coaching practice, ensuring continuous improvement.

4. Reflection Tools

Employ tools such as audio or video recordings of sessions, reflective journals, or feedback forms to aid in the reflection process. These tools can provide concrete data to reflect upon, making the reflective process more robust and insightful.

Using tools like recordings and journals enhances memory and detail retention, engaging the hippocampus and prefrontal cortex. These tools provide a tangible basis for reflection, making insights more accurate and actionable.

Incorporating reflection tools into your practice ensures that your reflections are based on concrete data, enhancing the accuracy and depth of your insights.

Conclusion

So thanks for tuning in to The Coaches Zone. If you like the show, drop a review and subscribe, because we have a other more to come - and if you want more neuroscience-based resources and education for coaches, head over to brainfirstinstitute.com - and I’ll catch you in the next episode. Bye for now.