3 Summarising and reflecting
Listen to the following audio that will introduce you to the coaching skill of summarising and reflection, and the effective impact both techniques can have on a coaching session.
Transcript: Summarising
Summarising keeps both the coach and the client on track in a coaching session. Importantly, summarising shows the client you're really listening. Summarising also helps the client to review and consider what they said, and this often provokes new and deeper thinking. It’s important to summarise only what you’ve actually heard, without interpretation or judgement.
As an alternative to summary, you can also use reflection, in which you repeat back to the clients words they use which seem to have particular emphasis or significance for them.
In the video examples of summarising, you'll see an example of bad summarising and an example of good summarising.
When the coach offers summary or reflection there are a number of benefits:
- The coachee knows they are being listened to – even if the summary is not 100% accurate.
- The coachee has the opportunity to reflect on what they have said – the summary acts as a kind of mirror to them.
- The coach stays on track – in order to summarise you simply have to listen.
- If summary and reflection is done well, rapport is enhanced.
It is an art rather than a science knowing when and how often to summarise, but rules of thumb are:
- when the coachee might be getting a bit lost or confused
- when the coachee seems to be losing energy in what they are saying
- when several subjects are raised simultaneously
- when the coach gets lost or confused!
It is useful to bear in mind you can summarise under the same categories as we use to monitor our listening, i.e. we can summarise facts, feelings, values, assumptions, bottom-line and even the unspoken! Useful summary phrases include:
- Can I sum up here: the key facts seem to be ...?
- Can I just check – it sounds as if you are feeling disappointed ...?'
- It sounds as if the principle of fairness is really important to you – have I got that right?
- It seems like the bottom line here is that you want to make a decision sooner rather than later – is that right?
- I notice you have said nothing about how the others in the team see this.
A word of caution: summary should be just that – a summing up. The danger is that it becomes interpretation, i.e. something filtered through our own judgement and presented back to the coachee with a lot of our thinking in it. Summarising by saying 'It seems that you have identified problematic relationships with two others in your team – have I got this right?' is fine. Saying something like 'It seems you have a subconscious wish to confront other powerful males and I suspect this is firmly connected with your childhood' is not OK in coaching! We are there to help the coachee gain insight for themselves, not offer our own.