DR SEBASTIAN FOX

Team Coach. Researcher .Author

Dr Sebastian Fox is a practising team coach and researcher who works with teams in the public, private and third sectors both in the UK and internationally. His work focuses on helping team members surface what is getting in their way of becoming more effective, but which is unrecognised or unacknowledged.

Seb holds a Doctorate in Coaching and Mentoring. His research demonstrated how emergent team coaching generates the greatest impact for teams. His research provides the first rigorous academic evidence for what experienced coaches have long known intuitively but not always been able to clearly explain to clients. He has a Diploma in Team Coaching from the Team Coaching Studio and is a Professional Certified Coach with the International Coach Federation. Seb is co-lead for the EMCC UK Team Coaching Special Interest Group and Head of Research at Team Coaching Studio. He has published several articles on coaching and team coaching, and is currently writing a book on Working Emergently with Teams. With 40 years of business experience across corporates and running his own business, Seb brings both credibility and real-world understanding to team coaching, bridging the gap between academic rigour and practical application.

Interview with Sebastian

What’s something you believed about coaching early on that you no longer believe?

Sebastian:

When I started out coaching, I was really excited by the possibilities of measuring ROI and being able to demonstrate the value of an intervention, particularly in team coaching. I have since come to believe that measurement of ROI, (assuming cause and effect) is not possible in any meaningful way, is misleading and probably unethical.

What do you find yourself returning to again and again in a coaching conversation: a question, a stance?

That’s a tricky one, since no two sessions are the same! Having said that, when working with teams, I always return to the mantra that it’s ok not knowing, and trust the process! Team coaching is very rarely predictable and it’s common not to be sure where the coaching is going next. Being prepared to sit with the discomfort and tension is an important part of becoming a team coach.

When has a client, or a moment in the room, changed how you coach?

I was co-coaching early on in my career, where a team was constantly pushing back on us trying to hand over responsibility to them for doing the work. Essentially, they wanted much stronger facilitation than we were providing, and having a looser structure simply didn’t work for them. This taught me the importance of meeting the team where they are at, and providing just enough structure to enable the team to do the work needed.

What’s the one thing you hope every APC learner leaves with from your module?

That they understand the most important thing about team coaching is not learning new tools and models, but developing a practice that is congruent with our beliefs and stance as a coach. There are many different ways of team coaching, so this module is about helping learners start to understand which approach feels most congruent for them.

What’s the biggest misconception new coaches bring into the room?

The biggest misconception is that there is single model or approach i.e. one size fits all to achieve a particular goal such as “high performance”. The best way to work with this is to explain how each organisation and team is different, and each coach will have a different philosophy and approach. Therefore an off the shelf model will cannot be the best fit in every situation.

What enticed you to join the faculty?

Little Dave… joking apart, I love helping educate other coaches and challenge preconceptions and assumptions behind their practice. APC offers the opportunity to work with like minded coaches and educators to help develop further coaches’ skills.

What pulled you towards coaching in the first place?

I started my business over 25 years ago, originally working in the client feedback space for professional firms. Whilst collecting the data was useful, I recognised quite quickly that what mattered most was what happened to it subsequently, and specifically how you could change behaviours based on the feedback. I had done some limited coaching as part of my corporate career and was drawn back to this as I worked with individuals to help them change how they worked with clients. This eventually led me to executive coaching and then team coaching.

What’s changed in you, outside of coaching skills, because of the years spent doing this work?

Fundamentally what changed for me was being asked “Who am I and how do I coach: I found this incredibly difficult to answer. Having spent the past 10 years in reflective and reflexive practice has not only allowed me better to answer that question, but also deal with difficult personal issues that I have faced over that time. It’s helped me understand how my own actions and reactions have been influenced and driven by my own story which, in turn, has increased my capacity to be with others.

What’s the one person you’d like to coach if you could coach anyone (and why)?

Not a person but a team: the Red Roses. It would be fascinating to work with them and to learn from them how they have sustained their fantastic levels of performance and success.

What question should I have asked you? And how would you have answered it?

What is team coaching anyway? My answer is: it depends on the coach! We’ll explore this during the workshop.

DR SEBASTIAN FOX

Team Coach. Researcher .Author

Interview with Sebastian

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