Tag Archives: conflict resolution

Coaching Toward Better Family Relationships

This week’s offering is a guest post by Ronald B Cohen, MD, a Psychiatrist and Marriage and Family Therapist from Great Neck, NY. Dr. Cohen is a Fellow of the American Psychiatric Association and an Affiliate Member of the American Academy of Marital and Family Therapy.

In 2001, Betty Carter & Monica McGoldrick two of the most-respected authors, teachers, and clinicians in the field of family therapy, published Advances in Coaching: Family Therapy with One Person, detailing 25 years of research into the theory and techniques of “coaching” individuals to change themselves in the context of their family of origin. The technical term “coaching” refers to preparing and acting for change in the individual’s natural system of relationships.

In contradistinction to traditional individual therapy, coaching focuses on real world behavior with significant others rather than the in-session therapeutic relationship. It is not the interaction with the therapist but rather the individual’s relationships with their family of origin that is of utmost value. Although this approach is regarded as one of the major modes of intervention in family therapy, the actual methods and techniques are not widely understood nor often implemented effectively. Techniques for helping individuals deal with difficult family relationships are not widely known by most individual therapists.

The goal of coaching is to help individuals proactively define themselves in relationship to others in their families without emotionally cutting off or giving in. The process of change is built upon ownership of one’s emotional reactions to old triggers and interactions. Coaching, or family therapy with one person, offers individuals a process for making change in their relationships even without the participation of other family members.

As a therapeutic coach, I help people plan and strategize. I begin by training individuals to become observers and researchers of their role in their family‘s patterns of behavior, what the anthropologists refer to as being a “participant observer”. The information and interactions are then reviewed and we talk about what kind of responses they got, what worked and what didn’t, and where they got stuck. Then we plan what they might do different next time in order to get a response that is more in line with what they are looking for.

The process then moves to helping individuals bring their behavior more in line with their deepest beliefs, even if this means upsetting family members by disobeying family “rules.” An important part of the coaching process is to help people develop realistic expectations when moving toward changing their part in the family dance. This includes being prepared to respond productively even if unfortunately the other person reacts unfavorably.

Coaching teaches the possibility of dealing with differences without losing connection, which is one of the primary developmental tasks for a young adult. If you are tied up with all of the stuff and rules and roles of your family of origin, it is really hard to figure out who you are and what you want to do with your life.

Coaching is “differentiation in action,” guiding people through a process of changing their own participation in unsatisfying family relationship patterns. It is a conscientiously thought through approach to establishing a unique one-to-one relationship with every individual in the family system.

This post was written by Ronald B Cohen, MD, a Psychiatrist and Marriage and Family Therapist from Great Neck, NY. Dr. Cohen is a Fellow of the American Psychiatric Association and an Affiliate Member of the American Academy of Marital and Family Therapy. As a consultant specialist, Dr. Cohen provides clinical supervision, and confers with individual therapists and other health care professionals and organizations to help them consider how adding family therapy sessions to the treatment program is both restorative and proactive as improvement is long lasting.

Dr. Ronald B. Cohen graduated summa cum laude, from Brandeis University and The Albert Einstein College of Medicine. In addition to his psychiatric residency training, Dr. Cohen was educated at the Psychiatric Epidemiology Program of the Columbia University Joseph L. Mailman School of Public Health. Subsequently Dr. Cohen completed the four-year core postgraduate training program in Family Systems Theory and Therapy at The Family Institute of Westchester

Please feel free to comment, request more information and/or schedule an initial consultation contact Dr Cohen at: http://www.familyfocusedsolutions.com/contact/

Or email him at:

RBCohenMD@FamilyFocusedSolutions.com

 

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Making Others Wrong

This week’s guest blog is by frequent contributor: Cinnie Noble. Cinnie is the founder of CINERGY™ Coaching, a division of Noble Solutions Inc in Toronto, Canada. She is a lawyer-mediator, a certified coach and a former social worker, who has studied and practiced a range of conflict management services, for over 20 years. Cinnie is a much sought-after speaker and regularly presents internationally, on conflict management coaching. Cinnie  is a guest lecturer at Osgoode Hall Law School, in their Masters of Law (Alternative Dispute Resolution) program. She is the author of “Conflict Management Coaching: The CINERGY™ Model”, available through Amazon.com
 

One of the things that sometimes happens when we are embroiled in an interpersonal conflict is that we perceive the differences between us as a matter of right and wrong. That is, that we are right and the other person is wrong! That perspective may be the other person’s too, of course. In many cases, such attributions do not apply and mostly, they don’t serve us well. Yet, when there is a need to find fault, it seems many of us think in positional terms of black versus white and hold strongly to those oppositional views.
Insisting on being right and making others wrong is one way of managing conflict. However,  the reality is this approach doesn’t advance resolution, reconcile the relationship, clear the air or achieve positive outcomes, there are other ways to proceed if we want to. This blog will include self-reflective questions for those who want an outcome that helps to make amends and is based more on thinking about the grey in between the starkness of black and white positions.
Please consider a dispute in which you and another person have disagreed or are currently disagreeing, and ask yourself these questions:
• What makes the other person’s viewpoint ‘wrong’?
• What is ‘right’ about it?
• What makes your viewpoint ‘wrong’ for him or her?
• What is ‘right’ about your perspective that he or she doesn’t seem to understand?
• What seems to be keeping him or her from understanding your perspective?
• What if anything may you both agree on?
• What is the main thing (do you think) that is keeping you two from accepting each other’s point of view (and even agreeing to disagree)?
• What do you think it would take for him or her to acknowledge the way(s) you are ‘right’?
• What do you think it would take for you to acknowledge the way(s) he or she is ‘right’?
• What approach may you take that is neither black nor white but a shade of grey, to help you make amends?

Try asking these questions when the next right/wrong battle comes up for you.

Cinnie Nobel  is the founder of CINERGY™ Coaching, a division of Noble Solutions Inc in Toronto, Canada. You can contact Cinnie at: 1-866-335-6466, cinnie@cinergycoaching.com or visit her web site at: http://www.cinergycoaching.com/
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The Elephant or the Mouse in the Room, guest post by Cinnie Noble

This is a guest post by Cinnie Noble, president of CINERGY™ Coaching is a division of Noble Solutions Inc. based in Toronto, Ontario, providing conflict management coaching services and training worldwide. You can contact Cinne at: cinnie@cinergycoaching.com

The proverbial elephant that appears in the room when we are in conflict isn’t always as big as an elephant. It may be more like a mouse. However, a mouse is no less problematic when it scurries around and inserts itself in small places, like the crevices of our hearts and brains.
Elephants and mice represent the unspoken hurts or words. They are what is going on between disputing people that isn’t being said. They are the lingering doubts and the niggling feelings. They are the missing pieces of the puzzle. They are present without being identified.
At times, it may appear that we resolve matters without ever acknowledging elephants and mice that hover around. Without bringing them into the room though, conflict conversations are destined to have blinders on so that we don’t actually acknowledge their presence. Inevitably though, it seems, the mouse or elephant will reappear in the next conflict, with this person or another.
When we are in conflict, we are responsible for letting the elephant or the mouse in and identifying what they are telling us. The quest for conflict mastery acknowledges this point and you may find it helpful to consider how to acknowledge the elephant or mouse in your conflict conversations, with these types of self-reflective questions:
• Think of the last dispute you were engaged in, when an elephant or mouse was there that wasn’t identified. What was it?
• What kept you from acknowledging its presence, do you think?
• What do you suppose kept the other person(s) from identifying it?
• Which image – a mouse or an elephant – most resonates for you in that dispute and why?
• How would bringing the elephant or mouse into the conversation have changed things?
• How would that change in the conversation have benefited you?
• What part would have been detrimental for you and how?
• How may the other person have benefited if the elephant or mouse were identified?
• What part of that change would hurt the other person and how?
• Generally, under what circumstances may it be best to identify and not identify the elephant or mouse present in the room?

CINERGY™ Coaching is a division of Noble Solutions Inc. based in Toronto, Ontario, providing conflict management coaching services and training worldwide.
Phone: 416-686-4247
Toll free (Canada & US): 1-866-335-6466
Fax: 416-686-9178
Email: cinnie@cinergycoaching.com
Twitter: @CINERGYCoaching
Please add any other comments about this topic. Or, what other ConflictMastery™ Quest(ions) add to this aspect of conflict mastery that may be helpful?

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