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Help Me Test a New Coaching Tool

I’m looking for a few volunteers to test a new coaching tool that I might use in online coaching sessions.

I’ve recently discovered this collaborative brainstorming platform: Stormboard. It lets you organize virtual sticky notes on a shared screen.Since some of my favorite coaching methods involve sticky notes, I’m thinking this might be an exciting visual tool to use during Skype or phone sessions with clients.

Test New Coaching Tool
I have already tried it out with a few colleagues, but would love to gain some more experience with it in “apprentice mode”, to figure out whether and how to use it in coaching sessions.

If you’d like to try it with me (in other words, get a free online coaching session), email me. We can work on any problem or decision you’re currently facing.

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Book Recommendation: How To Write A Lot

Paul J. Silvia (2007). How to Write a Lot: A Practical Guide to Productive Academic Writing.

Paul Silvia makes a strong case for scheduling in his book “How to Write a Lot: A Practical Guide to Productive Academic Writing“.
It has been one of the most influential books for my own writing practice, and I often find myself mentioning gems of practical wisdom from this book in my own workshops and coaching sessions.

The book focuses on academic writing, but a lot of its advice applies to anybody who has a hard time working towards goals that are important in the long run, but not urgent on any particular day. Writing is just a really good example of such a goal.

by Ursina Teuscher at Teuscher Counseling,

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What Are Your Strengths? Review of Two Self-Assessments

I’m featuring two self-assessments here that focus on clarifying what your strengths are: the Clifton StrengthsFinder®, and the VIA Survey.

The Clifton StrengthsFinder® was developed by the Gallup Organization. Based on a lot of interview data, they came up with 34 distinct patterns of strengths, or what they call “talent themes”. The online self-assessment tells individuals which of those “themes” are most pronounced in them. From the perspective of management consulting, the assumption here is that by identifying people’s strengths, an organization’s overall performance can be improved.

The VIA Survey was created by Christopher Peterson and Martin Seligman, well-known researchers in the field of positive psychology. It is designed to identify a person’s profile of character strengths. The inventory informed the Character Strengths and Virtues Handbook (CSV), a counterpart to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) used in traditional psychology.

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Self-Assessments: The Myth of Personality Types

Or: Mind the Bell-Curve

First off, here’s a fun article about the Myers Briggs (MBTI) that I wish I had written myself. It speaks from my heart.

But even apart from the Myers Briggs, any theory claiming that people come in distinct personality “types” (e.g., the “Eneagram”, “True Colors”, “Are you a dog or a cat person?”, etc.) has a very fundamental problem: none of those types make sense, for two simple reasons. (Geoffrey Miller explains them in more detail and eloquence in his book “Spent”, which I had reviewed earlier on this blog.)

1. Personality traits have been documented in a huge body of research. After decades of studies by a multitude of independent groups, and after many data-driven revisions of initial theories,

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Infographic: Increase Your Productivity Without Burning Out

Here is a two-sided infographic. Together, the two pages give you a visual summary of my workbook: “Increasing Productivity in Healthy and Sustainable Ways”.

The first page provides an overview of important neurological and psychological findings. Based on those, I suggest best practices grouped along five broad principles.

The second page presents a framework for assessing your own work-habits, trouble-shooting your problems, and developing new habits.

Infographic: Increase Your Productivity in Healthy and Sustainable Ways

Infographic Productivity: Mastering Own Interventions

Find more information about the workbook here, or on Amazon, where you can look inside, read a sample, and see reviews. You can also order the workbook directly from the publisher on Createspace.

by Ursina Teuscher (PhD), at Teuscher Decision Coaching, Portland OR

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Video: A Dialogue About Procrastination

A conversation about procrastination with Joseph Rhinewine, PhD, from Portland Mindfulness Therapy:

by

 

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My New Waiting Room: Spella Caffè

(Or: A real-life example of a creative resource allocation decision.)

If you’ve been in my office, you already know that it has a great view, but no waiting room, let alone one with a fancy coffee machine.

spellacups

However, I have the great fortune that some of Portland’s best coffee is being served right at the entrance of my very office building, at Spella Caffè. It’s a small European style coffee bar with extremely friendly staff. Apart from coffee and espresso drinks, they also have truly outstanding chai tea and hot chocolate. If you think I’m biased, you’re probably right, but check out their yelp reviews.

So here’s my new policy: whenever you find yourself a little early for an appointment with me, please get something delicious on my tab.
They know.

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Coaching Online or in Person — Does the Setting Matter?

What the research says about online coaching:

At this point, there is quite a bit of research on this question, for example showing that coaching over the phone or through online channels can be very effective, that adequate rapport can be established between a counselor and client, and that some clients prefer the reduced stigma and easier access offered by online mental health services.

For more in depth discussion, this handbook addresses many practical aspects of online counseling, such as technological, ethical, legal and multicultural issues, treatment strategies, and testing and assessment:

Kraus, R., Stricker, G., & Speyer, C. (Eds.). (2010). Online counseling: A handbook for mental health professionals. Academic Press.

My own experience with online coaching:

While I do enjoy in-person meetings with clients,

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Interest Profiler for Career Choice and Development

Im my last post, where I discussed a free personality self-assessment, I promised to write more about self-assessments, in particular provide information about a test that is more geared towards career development.

Here is a website that offers several free career-oriented self-assessments and a neat way to explore information about hundreds of occupations: http://www.cacareerzone.org.

The interest profiler, for example, is based on the six Occupational Themes (developed by the psychologist John L. Holland). His idea assumes that people thrive most in career environments that fit their personality, and that jobs and career environments are classifiable in that way. The model classifies jobs and career along six occupational themes or “types”, and all the different combinations of those:

  • Realistic (Doers)
  • Investigative (Thinkers)
  • Artistic (Creators)
  • Social (Helpers)
  • Enterprising (Persuaders)
  • Conventional (Organizers)

As an acronym of those themes,

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Just for Fun: Assessing Your Personality

My clients sometimes ask me if I could do a personality assessment with them. Although I don’t think that’s usually necessary, I understand that learning more about our own personality, and how we compare to other people, can be fascinating and may inform our choices. And the answer is yes, I can. But so can you, if you want.

We are living in a wonderful open-source age, where the best things (especially the most scientific things) may be free, if we know where to find them.

Here, for example, is a short version of the IPIP-NEO personality test:
http://www.personal.psu.edu/j5j/IPIP/ipipneo120.htm.

It looks at 5 broad dimensions (also known as the “Big Five” in the field of personality research), and 30 subdomains of personality. This short version has 120 items to complete. If you feel intrigued or ambitious, you can also do the original long version,

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