ABSTRACT
Individual coaching has largely grown out of counselling, psychology and psychotherapy where practitioners might try to understand a patient/client objectively and enable their development. Latest thinking, for example from quantum physics, has challenged us to recognize that we can never know someone objectively: each of us exists in a social and culturally defined context, we are affected daily by our differing emotions and we have a perceptive lens on the world that has a deep and rich subjectivity. The authors believe we need to move from bifocal vision (O’Neill, 2000) to varifocal vision to emphasize the many stakeholders that are relevant to systemic coaching, mentoring and supervision, not just the organization but beyond, from our family and friends to our sector, country and planet. We refer to many fellow travellers on this path, including Kahn (2014) who advocates treating individual and organization as equal clients to Goldsmith (2018) who argues success is determined by the people impacted by the coaching. The chapter outlines four levels of coaching: Individual centric, Relational (dialogic), Systemic and a new, fourth level, Eco-systemic and offers a definition of both individual and business systemic coaching. It then considers a number of approaches to ensure we operate systemically.
