I don’t work with clients who are being forced into a coaching engagement against their will. In those situations coaching is usually viewed as a last-gasp desperation measure or as a way to mitigate legal risk, and in either case the odds of success are low. But it’s not uncommon for a new client to have sought coaching in response to a major setback that has jeopardized their professional future, or for a current client to unexpectedly encounter a similar situation. They haven’t yet lost their jobs, or their company, but they’re on thin ice. If you are, too, what should you do?
1. Slow Down
If you’re in this position you’ve likely experienced a great deal of success up until now. This may be your first serious professional setback. In these circumstances it’s common for events to speed up–or to just feel that way. You may sense an urgent need to take action in some form, to right a wrong or clear your name or do something. But as I’ve noted before, “The impulse to hurry should often be interpreted as a signal to slow down.” [1]
This is particularly true when you’re on thin ice, in part because you probably haven’t spent much time here during your career, and your past training may not serve you well. In my experience successful leaders and executives often have a high need for power and a low need to be liked [2], a desire for control [3], and a degree of comfort with conflict. [4] If you identify with any of these characteristics, it’s possible that the very factors that contributed to your previous success may have also fueled your recent setback. Rather than forge ahead, it may be most useful to pause and reflect on how you got here.
2. Get the Right Help
This is one of the primary benefits of coaching in these circumstances. Being on thin ice often involves a lot of stressful meetings with senior management, HR, attorneys and others who have a wide range of motives and obligations that may or may not align with yours. In contrast with these other events on your calendar, a coaching conversation will proceed at its own pace, leaving ample room for reflection.
And unlike these other figures, a coach is there to help you set your agenda, focus on what’s most significant to you, make sense of what’s happened, and learn from the experience. Note that this will also involve surfacing your assumptions and preconceptions, questioning your interpretation of events, and challenging you to take responsibility for your contributions to the situation. Coaching begins with empathetic listening, but it doesn’t stop there. [5]
All this said, it’s understandable if you have some skepticism or uncertainty about coaching, particularly if you’re being encouraged to pursue it as a result of this setback. It’s important that you feel sufficient autonomy in the selection of a coach, convinced of their competence, and a personal connection. While your organization may recommend that you choose from among a roster of coaches, you should expect to be able to have a discovery conversation with several to find the best fit, and come prepared with questions for them, just as you would with any other candidate for a mission-critical role. [6]
Specifically, be sure to discuss confidentiality with a prospective coach, and clarify under what circumstances, if any, they will be interacting with anyone else in your organization. [7] Without knowing this in advance, it will be hard for you to know what is safe to share with your coach, and it will be equally hard for them to know what is safe to share with anyone else, making it far more difficult for you both to build trust with each other.
3. Hope for the Best
Recovering from a serious setback doesn’t happen overnight. Making your way back from the thin ice will likely be a multi-stage process, and it’s helpful to set realistic expectations. In many situations your first goal is professional survival–retain your position, keep the company alive, avoid any catastrophic outcomes. And as someone who’s experienced a great deal of success, you may feel impatient or even desperate to put this episode behind you.
Here the sense of urgency and bias for action that may have served you well in the past are unlikely to be as useful. Your setback has probably put you, your performance, and even your behavior under a spotlight–or a microscope–and you’re now subject to careful and ongoing scrutiny. This is no doubt unpleasant, especially if you believe that you’re the subject of unjust accusations. [8] But in this situation taking forceful action can easily be labelled “defensiveness,” and note that you don’t get to make that determination–the people around you do. [9]
I’m not suggesting that you meekly accept what’s happening and seek to avoid giving offense. You may need to apologize, but that may also may be inadvisable. [10] Nor am I suggesting that mere survival is the best you can hope for. It may well be possible to find your way to solid footing and not merely survive, but thrive. And yet that will undoubtedly take time, just like any recovery from illness or accident. In particular, be prepared for some vestige of this episode to cling to your reputation, and to face repeated reminders, implied or explicit, that you were once on thin ice.
Some important skills to cultivate in this context include resilience and emotion regulation in the face of perceived threats [11], the ability to make the most of this experience as a learning opportunity [12], and a view of failure as a source of potential growth. That last point doesn’t mean you should passively tolerate failure, but, as I’ve written before, “Whenever we’re pursuing something ambitious–in the business model, the strategic plan, the investment, the hire, the career step–we will fail, repeatedly. But in the process we are also ruling out possibilities as we seek to understand what works.” [13]
4. Prepare for the Worst
Even as you work toward a recovery in concert with your colleagues and other stakeholders, you may also need to be prepared for the situation to take a turn for the worse. Assess the extent to which you can rely upon in-house or corporate counsel, who may have obligations that conflict with providing you with the best possible guidance. If there’s a risk of legal action directed against you, or if you may need to take action to protect your interests, you will want personal counsel to advise and represent you.
You may be reluctant to obtain counsel because it feels premature or unnecessary. But thin ice can break, and you don’t want to be researching your options when you’re in the water. At the very least, interview several prospective attorneys who specialize in representing individual executives and get a feel for their approach and communication style so you’ll know who to call if needed. Some attorneys are very comfortable with antagonistic litigation, while others prefer mediation. There’s no universal best practice, but it can be useful to consider who they’ll be facing should legal action be necessary.
Footnotes
[1] The Importance of Slowing Down
[2] McClelland and Burnham on Power and Management
[3] Authority and Control in Organizational Life
[5] Connect, Reflect, Direct…Then Ask (On Coaching)
[6] How to Find (and Choose) a Coach
[7] Duty of Confidentiality and Duty to Disclose
[8] Staying Sane When You’ve Been Falsely Accused
[9] Defensiveness Is in the Eye of the Beholder
[10] Should You Apologize? It Depends.
[11] Ignoring Bandits and Building Resilience
[13] The Ruling Out of Possibilities (On Failure)
Photo by Owwe.