Ending well

Reflections on the article "Finishing Touches" published in Coaching at Work November 2021

Sue Gammons, Gregor Findlay, Lilian Abrams, Jamela Khan - with added reflections by Frances White

One of the questions posed by the group in the article felt like a great inquiry - what are your own attitudes and habitual patterns around endings?

"One ethical question I have pondered is if, when and how we should continue our relationship in some way. A coaching relationship is not a friendship. We have been unequal in our sharing, listening and contributions to each other and our relationship was bound and contextualised in particular ways ... I am uncomfortable with the potential complexity, nuances and ethical questions around this transition and do not befriend former clients." (Lilian Abrams)

Sue Gammons shares, "I became aware of the strategies I adopted ... to avoid the discomfort and fear around separation and loss. Through supervision, I recognised how this might play out ... I might not express my emotions about our ending, which may inadvertently influence my client to enact the same avoidance."

For me, these two reflections felt relevant on many levels - what are my attitudes and patterns relating to endings generally - relationships, contracts and phases of my life, versions of myself? Also, what are my attitudes to endings specifically relating to coaching assignments and how do these affect my contracting, both with individuals and teams, as well as the commissioners of the work?

Triggered by Lilian's statements about friendship, I also wondered about the nature of "friendship", since I have friendly relationships with most clients, though professional friendships not social friendships. That triggered questions about friendships themselves, as well as about endings in coaching relationships - am I not ending well enough? If so, what might that mean for them - and what then is the nature of the continued relationship? Is there something about the nature of my patterns to do with friendships that is relevant to notice here? How might that insight inform by stance towards my clients?

A couple of things seemed relevant - one is that, having spent the entirety of my childhood moving on, as my father was in the RAF and we were posted to new places regularly, I must have unusual patterns relating to endings. I notice that I do not have a strong expectation or belief that relationships will continue, I easily withdraw and generally I just drift away rather than saying goodbye. As a child in the 60s and 70s, there was no phoning friends, no emails, we just occasionally sent a letter but that was rare and usually only once or twice. So, I have no old friends, none. It is not surprising that I would find relationships might all feel "friendly" and that there is no real expectation that they will continue over time, so endings might not feel relevant.

What might this mean for clients and the work with them, where we have contracted usually very specifically and clearly for a number of sessions and hours? The inquiry triggered by the article was so helpful, it triggered me to reflect also on how I contract per se - I am suspicious that I am holding that part of contracting very lightly - and that seems not to honour the nature of contracting. So, I am paying closer attention now to contracting and thinking very specifically about my attitude to how each contract will end.