How to Coach Someone Through Fear (Episode 4 of “How Do I Lead Now?”)
Episode 4 of our Video Coaching Series: “How Do I Lead Now?” is here! This week, Cylient CEO and Master Certified Coach Dianna Anderson walks through how uncertainty makes us all fearful, and how that fear shows up in different ways for each of us. She walks through how to coach someone through fear. Watch, and then reflect on the questions below.
Last week, Dianna went over how to meet people where they are. This week, Dianna talks about practical approaches for helping people navigate through their fear. Fear is personal to each of us—it can show up in many ways. Very broadly, there are typically two ways that people react: They either fight, or they flight. You’re probably familiar with flight—people tend to shut down when they’re frightened, shy away from taking projects, and stay in a very comfortable zone. Fighting fear usually looks like someone acting out, complaining loudly about something, or taking something very small and making it a big deal.
The goal of coaching someone through fear is to identify what they’re really fearful of—they may not even know it at the time. To help coach through fear, some questions to ask are:
- What is bothering you the most about this?
- Help me understand what’s really getting in your way.
Reflection Questions
Watch the video for more details on how to coach people to move through fear and take meaningful action to counteract it. Then, reflect upon these things:
- Notice and identify behaviors that you may not have noticed before that could be someone acting out in a fearful way.
- Reflect upon when you tend to make up stories about other people, rather than get curious about their perspective. What kind of pattern do you notice?
Other Episodes of “How Do I Lead Now?”
Watch other episodes with the links below.
- Episode 1: The difference between traditional leadership approaches and coaching-based leadership
- Episode 2: What kind of leader do I need to be now?
- Episode 3: How to meet people where they are
- Episode 4: How to coach someone through fear
- Episode 5: How to make friends with fear
- Episode 6: Why the questions we ask and answer for ourselves really matter
- Episode 7: Why intentions work better than goals now
- Episode 8: Understanding and appreciating worldviews
- Episode 9: What to say when you don’t know what to say
- Episode 10: Using traditional and coaching-based leadership together
- Episode 11: How to coach people to build confidence
- Episode 12: Discerning patterns as a leadership skill
- Episode 13: How to create change in complex situations
- Episode 14: The problem with perfection
Receive Episodes in Your Inbox
If you want to receive these weekly episodes in your inbox, sign up and start with Week 1 here.
