Trees don't do growth plans. Neither should we.

As we feel our way back into business and ways of working post lockdown, I've noticed a transmitted sense of urgency amongst those keen for us to somehow make up for the lost time. Perhaps because coaching is an area that matters to me, I have noticed a trend towards scale and automation and efficiency, making my toes curl. This morning,  Dr Gerrit Pelzer captured it well in a post around an article in the Spectator. Putting aside the politics of the journal, it resonated. In the fifty years or so since it emerged as an area, coaching has become industrialised.

We each have a unique perspective on the world. We inherit the raw material which is processed through our upbringing, culture, and education to bring us where we are right now. Whatever we do, wherever we are, that perspective is invaluable. Nobody else has it, and we need it. 

Homogenising perspectives into a manufactured culture runs the risk of blandness at best and blindness at worst. Rather like having the instincts and pot…