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Interview with Doug
The following interview was produced specifically for this page.
You can also listen to a June 2008 Interview on The Coaching Show , a national coaching-focused radio show hosted by Christopher McAuliffe, MCC. In this interview Doug discusses his new book, Presence-Based Coaching; he touches on self-generation for leaders, mindfulness, presence for coaches, and practical applications.
Q: Hi, Doug. Thanks for taking the time to talk!
Doug: My pleasure!
Q: You had a career, for many years, consulting to industry, non-profits and government. How did you end up as a coach?
Doug: Consulting worked great for me for many years. I enjoyed the work a lot, and at times it was deeply satisfying and we saw really significant change.
I began to feel, however, that my energy was often consumed working in systems that said that they wanted to change, but didn’t have the willingness to do what change requires. The phrase “rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic” comes to mind! While the possibilities were heady at times, it also became frustrating when good people were stymied by the politics of the system, or by top leaders that only wanted others to change, while retaining inordinate amounts of control.
I came to see that engaging leaders in transforming their own paradigms and behaviors needed to precede engaging the rest of the system. Or, at least, that’s where my contribution lay. I still do some organizational change work, but only when I’m working with the top executive.
By the way, I don’t believe in “ending up…” it’s not over for me. I could still become a jazz musician or live in New Zealand!
Q: You mentioned that your clients often struggle with life balance issues. Is your own life balanced? How do you work at achieving balance?
Doug: Balance has been an issue for me for most of my adult life. In part, the intensity and stress of the world is reflected in all of us. But, I also bring my own personal issues to the balance challenge. I’ve sometimes viewed myself as the sum of my achievements. Work became how I derived my sense of self. Also, my professional life felt validating in a way that the messiness of home life and kids often didn’t. My work, and that identity, was very compelling. At the same time, I could avoid tensions at home by working hard and doing business travel. It was a tough combination.
I’ve had to work hard at discovering what’s most important. And, at letting go of the illusion that fulfillment derives from achievement. Balanced? Yes, I feel more balanced than ever. And, I have an amazingly satisfying life… I call an extraordinary retreat center home, I have a wonderful wife and kids, my work is deeply satisfying. I wouldn’t trade with anyone. And, yet I still feel out of control at times. I’m definitely a work in progress!
Consistent daily practices, and framing my life as an opportunity for self-discovery, rather than a series of goals to be accomplished, really helps.
Q: What is most satisfying in your coaching work? What is difficult?
Doug: The most exciting times, for me, are those moments when a client reflects on her day and realizes that she has changed. A client will sometimes notice, after the fact, that she responded differently to some very tough situation that previously would have thrown her for a loop. And, she did it effortlessly and creatively. It seemed totally normal, but “normal” has shifted to something greater! There’s incontrovertible evidence that she has become a different person, with new competencies and capacities, than before. It happens frequently, and it’s startling and wonderful!
It’s difficult when clients struggle with follow-through, and feel stuck in the complexity and overwhelm of their situation. When we talk about an action or a practice, and there’s some breakdown and it doesn’t happen. Of course, the breakdown is the opening for the next piece of work… it shows us something valuable about their response to what’s out there. But, it’s still difficult! I want it to be easy and sometimes it just isn’t.
Q: What breakthroughs have you experienced as you’ve developed as a coach? How did they come about?
Doug: There have been lots. Here’s one… I’d been coaching for about 8 years, and was teaching my own coaching model, when I began my book. Part way into the book project, I began studying under James Flaherty and Sarita Chawla. In the Integral Coaching work that James developed, engaging the body is an essential part of a whole approach to coaching. I’d left the body out of my model completely! In my book, the words including “mind” appear 408 times. “Body” appears 16 times! It was a great wake-up call, and in the past few years, I’ve really discovered that the body often holds the key to real and sustainable change. That’s a big one.
Another is shifting my coaching arrangements away from an open-ended conversation that the client terminates when they want to. A lot of coaches work this way, and I think it breeds complacency and dependency. Now, I contract for very specific outcomes in a specific time frame. It’s crisp, and both of us are much more accountable.
Q: You talk about “mindfulness,” and in your book, you identify yourself as a practicing Buddhist. Do you consider yourself a Buddhist?
Doug: I do. I also consider myself a Quaker, a Christian and a skeptic! I’m interested in any perspective that broadens how I see, and experience, the world I live in. There are many frameworks for understanding life and our place in it, all of which help us see a bigger picture. And, none is complete in itself.
Q: Are you concerned that being “out of the closet” as a Buddhist might cause your work to be perceived in the corporate world as “spiritual” or “woo-woo?”
Doug: I used to be, but not any more. First, any client that would be scared off by the fact that I meditate is probably someone for whom I wouldn’t be a good fit anyway. So, it’s a screening method that saves us both time. Second, the ability to observe ourselves as we respond to life is absolutely essential to change. You can read Daniel Goleman’s work on emotional intelligence, or Peter Senge on presence, and discover that the corporate gurus are talking about exactly the same thing. The truth is that people in the business world desperately want authenticity, fulfillment, and meaning. Being mindful and present is the beginning point for all of these.
Q: What life experiences do you consider most relevant to your coaching?
Doug: All of it. I’ve been blessed with a hunger to live deeply for my 52 years and counting. As a consultant and coach, I’ve worked intimately with CEO’s, entrepreneurs, managers at all levels, and a head of state. I’ve been a geologist, a teacher, a builder, an adventurer, and an explorer of cultures. I’ve taught in eleven countries on four continents, and created four successful businesses. I’ve been married for 21 years to my lovely wife Walker, who is an astoundingly dynamic and creative force. Anytime I might have become complacent, she’d change the game! Together, we raised three children, built houses and businesses, and experienced both major successes and significant failures.
All this adds up to a huge amount of creation and change. I have paid close attention to the process, and learned something of the territory of change through direct experience. This gives me in depth knowledge of what others face. I try to understand the human condition, and what enables or blocks people in creating change in their lives.
Q: How has coaching benefited you personally through all this?
Doug: Where to begin? I wrote a 336 page book that I didn’t know was in me. I learned that the body is the key to change. I begin every day doing tai chi by the river with the dogs, and everything is easier because of it. My business model is completely different from even three years ago. I could go on and on, but that’s a taste.
Q: Say more about not knowing the book was in you.
Doug: It’s true. I had no idea that I knew a book’s worth of “stuff,” and had never really thought seriously about writing one. A good friend suggested that my coaching model should be a book, and a couple of days later I sat down and wrote out a table of contents in about ten minutes. At the end of the ten minutes, I knew it was going to happen. It’s a huge challenge to write a book. Still, once I saw the table of contents, I never questioned whether I would finish it.
Of course, if I were going to write it now, it would be different. As we develop, we transcend who we were previously, but that former self is included. I stand by the book. At the same time, I also see things now that I couldn’t have seen then. It’s an exciting process.
Q: What are your beliefs about human development?
Doug: Well, that’s a big question, especially when we’re almost out of time! Will you settle for the short answer?
Q: I suppose I’ll have to!
Doug: Developing ourselves is what everything else is for. Most busy professionals suffer because they confuse the ends and the means. Work, career, professional opportunities, conventionally defined success… those aren’t the end. But we live as if they were all-important. And, we suffer because there’s some hole inside us that we’re trying to fill with often senseless activity that can never fill it.
Here’s a different view. Work, career, and everything life dishes out are the means. They’re the practice field on which we learn to become competent, fulfilled, and free. Without the challenges of marriage and work and kids and all the messiness of life, we’d be bored, and we wouldn’t have nearly as many opportunities to do the work of waking up to our real possibilities. This isn’t woo-woo, it’s a simple shift in perspective. If you view all the complexity and chaos as a practice opportunity instead of as an adversary to overcome, it gets a lot lighter.
The long answer? Better read the book!
Q: OK, I promise I’ll finish it! Last question. Where do you see yourself going over the next few years?
Doug: I see myself continuing what I’m doing. Coaching a small number of leaders who are serious about looking at themselves and changing. Training coaches, both at my retreat center here in the North Carolina mountains, and several other locations in the Southeast and overseas. Writing and expanding my coaching model to be more inclusive and encompassing. Doing my practices and investing in my own learning. Being outdoors on our extraordinary land. Spending time with my wife and family, traveling to places in which I want to experience myself, and doing occasional outrageous wilderness adventures in search of my lost youth. It’s a pretty good recipe!
