self-awareness Supplemental

Supplemental coaching is a powerful tool for increasing self-awareness. An example is shared about a person who lacked self-awareness and was coached to improve. They observed and journaled interactions at Starbucks and read a book on emotional intelligence. After 60-90 days, others noticed positive changes in their behavior. Self-awareness requires reflection, and journaling helps slow down and absorb information. Controlled feedback progressions, like listening chats, can also improve self-awareness. It is recommended to make it a team game to encourage everyone's participation. Now, when it comes to Supplemental Coaching, there's a variety of things you can do. And I've shared this story many times, and I have permission to share this story, by the way. I'll never forget when I went out to lunch with our banker, and we met with a gentleman who wanted to have a networking meeting, but really the banker president, the banking president, wanted me to really observe and just experience this guy, and I'll never forget it. After having lunch, and he pointed to me, and literally said, I really want to work with you, and went on and said some very nice things, and actually touched my nose. I'll never forget it. And I started laughing and chuckling. The president of the bank kind of looked at me humorously, kind of knowing what was about to come, and I said, do you pick it too? He said, excuse me? I said, do you pick the nose? He had no awareness he even touched me. He was so wrapped up in what he was saying. And I remember later talking to the president, and he said, you know, I've got to spend more time with that guy. I've got to help him. And I said, you know what? I think he is so stimulated by people, the way he's going to get self-awareness is by not interacting with people. Now, I wouldn't recommend this for everybody, but it gives you the context of supplemental coaching and how powerful it can be. What we had him do is go to a Starbucks twice a week, sit with a journal, and just write down the observations of what the people behind the desk or behind the counter at Starbucks do in terms of how they help and communicate with each other. To be blunt, you know, I think Starbucks does a really nice job of training their people. And people knew everybody's names, they were laughing, they were attentive, they were helpful to each other, they listened to each other, they didn't interrupt, and he would journal those things. Then we got him Emotional Intelligence 2.0, a great book by Travis Bradbury, one of the most foremost experts in self-awareness and emotional intelligence. And we had him just review a chapter, maybe I think it was every two to three weeks, and just email what he learned. And after about 60 to 90 days, other people started to notice he was much more pulled back in their staff meetings. I noticed when I went into the bank, he didn't scream across the lobby, he got up from behind his desk and came over, shook my hand, and greeted me. That was a combination of observational coaching, using a journal, and then we were fueling his mind with self-directed learning by prescribing a book. Self-awareness is really tough, and I always love to use this analogy with supplemental coaching as it relates to self-awareness. Self-awareness is, you've got someone like on a treadmill, and they're going and they're picking up pace, and that's called the workday, right? We get more and more work, and we've got to keep up, and I've got phone calls, I've got this folder I've got to get to, I've got to call this client back, and we're running. We typically don't say, I'll get back to that client next week, I've got to do some self-awareness work. We typically don't do that, right? And so what you have to do is think about times that are carved out of reflection so people can take the time to start the process to be honest with themselves. So one of the things I love to do is prescribe a book, a video, observing other people, and I love to have people journal. Here's why. When people write down their observations, it slows them down. It gets them thinking. When they look down at what they're writing, they tend to absorb it a little bit more, if that makes sense. The other thing is, this is something called listening chat. Looking in the mirror is hard. Getting people to look in the mirror is hard. Getting people to buy a mirror so they can look is even harder. So one of the things that you can do is have controlled feedback progressions. A controlled feedback progression, there's a variety of things you can do. The most simplistic is something called a listening chat. As a leader, we would encourage you to do it. Call somebody and say, what are two areas that I could serve you better as a teammate? What's an area I need to be more aware of? And what's one major challenge that you think that you'd like to give me some real quick advice on? And all you say is thank you. The reason being is when somebody says, yeah, but, and we interrupt, what happens? They typically don't go back to that person again. So if you have people who are lacking self-awareness, make it a team game. Get everybody doing it. Here's why. It's a controlled environment, controlled feedback, and you can only say thank you. And then if you need greater clarification, we ask you to wait 48 hours to ask those questions. Time does a wonderful thing through reflection, and it gets people to start the process of being honest with themselves.