Sometimes obtaining the right support is the first step in achieving your next goal. When you are neurodivergent asking for help can be hard due to imposter syndrome for example. The goal being sort could be improving personal strategies, or how to grow professionally. I offer bespoke coaching tailored to your needs in the Bristol and Bath area or online.
If you would like a free introductory session to see where I can help you please get in touch. The current rate after this first conversation is £50 per hour session.
A balanced approach
It is important, in my view that we tailor coaching to the individual, this is especially true with neurodiversity. We often think of neurodiversity as a minority BUT 15-40% of the population fall into this bracket. This makes tailoring approaches especially important!
“To achieve the best outcomes we MUST tailor our approach to the individual”
Over the last 20 years I came to realise that traditional coaching techniques are not always effective for me or others. This is due to the fact ‘how’ neurodivergent individuals think is hard wired, and cannot be simply reset or change. For example Acceptance commitment therapy ACT is typically more effective than cognitive behaviour therapy CBT for a neurodivergent mind. I use understanding gained over many years learning my own neurodiverse psychology and traditional techniques to tailor my approach to be more suited to someone who thinks in a unique way.
Why Chose Mark as a coach?
I have been leading teams and developing people for over twenty years, undergoing significant people management training over those years. Much of this was before discovering I was autistic which I think gave me a better understanding of there differences in neurotypical and neurodivergent ways of thinking. Particularly how to navigate challenges in social communication, social imagination and social interaction (also known as the triad of impairments).
When I learned and refined my coaching methods I utilised many standard coaching tools such as the ‘GROW’ model. Over the years I came to realise subtle changes to these tools worked better for me personally, and as a rule for many other neurodiverse people.
Adaptions to traditional coaching
With the GROW model the individual derives the options open to them to solve a problem. Perhaps with some prompting where there may be more obscure ones available. If the individual is autistic this can be challenging due to a natural deficiency in ‘social imagination’. This reduces the ability to put yourself into new situations, reducing the ability to service options. In this instance it can be helpful for the coach to take more of a mentor role and suggest options that may be possible. Once there are some initial options on the table the individual will then see the way forward and build with more options of their own. This allows a more effective transition onto the final stage ‘will/way forward’ and therefore the solution.
A similar modification is effective regarding emotional intelligence, or more specifically the state of mind theory. (PAC model developed by psychologist Eric Berne). Through the journey of self discovery I have undertaken I have come to embrace that my ‘inner self’ is indeed more a child, using masking to project the adult/ parent the world expects me to be.
The challenge is masking can be difficult to maintain when you are overwhelmed, potentially making the inner child more evident (uncertainty, fear, volatility etc). During these times traditional training would say the coach should maintain their ‘adult’ state of mind, is this correct however? Not always, as actually a better way of helping is to become the ‘reassuring’ parent while needed. This may help the individual regain their ‘centre’ allowing them to become less overwhelmed and re-establish their mask and thus return to ‘adult’, at which time the coach can also return to their ‘adult’ state of mind
