Systemic Coaching: questions that carry further than advice.

Where the approach comes from

Systemic coaching has its roots in the family therapy of the 1950s and 1960s, with an important centre in Palo Alto; the solution-focused strand goes back to Steve de Shazer and Insoo Kim Berg. For leaders, the history matters less than the consequence: a company, a board, a leadership team is a system — change one element and the others respond. Ignore that and you are surprised by resistance. Use it and leading gets easier.

Solution, not problem

Most conversations about problems make the problem bigger. Causes are analysed, responsibility is assigned, the mistake is hunted down — and at the end you have learned a great deal about the problem and nothing about the way out. Solution-focused coaching reverses the order: What does it look like once it is solved? Which parts of that already exist today, in outline? What was different on the days when it worked?

This is not positive thinking. It is the decision to direct energy to where it moves something. Large goals are broken into small, verifiable steps — not least because large goals reliably frustrate.

Questions as instruments

A systemic coach works with questions, not answers. You will recognise some of these when we work together:

• Scaling questions: “On a scale of 1 to 10, where are you today? What makes the difference between a 4 and a 5?” They make progress measurable and show what is already working.
• Circular questions: “What would your CFO say if I asked her what is blocking you at board level?” They bring the perspectives of others into the room — without the others being present.
• The miracle question: “Suppose the issue were resolved overnight — what is the first thing you would notice tomorrow morning?” It reveals what you actually want, beyond the description of the problem.
• Reframing: seeing the same situation in a different frame — the “brake” on the team as the person who names the risks nobody else will voice.

You are the expert — I am the sparring partner

Systemic coaching assumes that you know your company, your team and your situation better than any outsider — and that the solution you develop yourself is the only one you will actually implement. That is why I do not give advice. My stance: multi-partial, curious, not-knowing, oriented to resources and to the brief. I work with hypotheses, not truths.

What sets me apart from a coach without leadership experience: I know what your situation feels like from the inside. That makes my questions more precise — and it lets you say things without first having to explain them. More on my background under About.

What a session actually looks like

• Opening: What has happened since last time, what worked? Which topic takes priority today?
• A brief for the session: What should be different at the end of the 50 to 90 minutes — a decision, a clarity, one more option?
• Working phase: questions, hypotheses, changes of perspective. Sometimes a sketch on paper of who stands where in the system. No exercises, no role-play, no flip-chart theatre.
• Close: What do you take with you, what will you try before the next session? One or two concrete steps, not ten.

Two to four weeks lie between sessions — enough time for something to change. That is how it works in executive coaching generally, and most tangibly in CEO coaching, where each session usually prepares one specific decision.