This issue’s column from the Association of Coaching Supervisors (AOCS), explores supervision of coaching using horses
Dr Michel Moral
This issue’s column from the Association of Coaching Supervisors (AOCS), explores supervision of coaching using horses
France and more widely, coaches are increasingly using horses as a tool to help the client to change. It is particularly relevant for working on leadership, trust and team coaching. Let’s call them equicoaches. They usually work with an equine behaviourist or trainer.
Supervision of such coaches raises a number of questions, including:
- Should the equicoach be supervised using horses?
- Should the supervisor have experience of coaching with horses?
- What are the appropriate tools?
CASE STUDY 1
Members of a board were successively asked by the coach to group four horses into the corner of a large paddock.
Most of the coachees succeeded by mobilising their inner energy and moving calmly. But one of the coachees failed and started to shout and run around the horses making big arm movements. The horses were panicked and ran in different directions. Very annoyed, the coachee insulted the equicoach and left. The other board members said: “He’s always like that…”.
The metaphor for work was clear.
Later, the equicoach asked their supervisor: “How can I avoid a coachee losing face and leaving without learning anything? And what do I do next?”
In this situation, the ‘resourcing function’ (to help them release emotions) as well as the ‘qualitative function’ (to help review their standards or ethical practice) of supervision are activated. The equicoach might feel guilty and harbour doubts about their professionalism. To work on this, the supervisor doesn’t need to have experience of coaching with horses. Similarly, they don’t need such experience to rebuild the coach’s alliance with the upset coachee. However, some understanding about coaching with horses is needed to help the coach better manage the exercise in the future.
The hypotheses explored by the supervisor are multiplied because the supervisee-client system has more interactions, which percolate up to the supervisor-supervisee relationship, just as there are one or more horses which can act as an amplifier of the client’s relationship patterns for an equine behaviourist to interpret.
Although the coach (supervisee) plays their usual role, parallel processes will be richer and more complex. For example, if a client works on their leadership during an exercise with a horse, their difficulty will show precisely what the areas for improvement are. If the client shouts at the horse they probably shout at their staff, for example.
During supervision, the coach (supervisee) brings a lot of information to the supervisor about the interactions between the actors (client, horse, behaviourist, coach). If the supervisor is not an equicoach, they’ll need to have a dialogue during which they should be particularly attentive to ‘eye 5’ (parallel process) and ‘eye 6’ (the supervisor’s reflections) of the Seven-Eyed model (Hawkins & Shohet, 1989)
Especially, the supervisor might misinterpret the reported facts because they don’t know the logic of a horse’s relationship with humans, which is based on trust.
CASE STUDY 2
In individual coaching with horses, there’s an exercise aimed at gaining the horse’s trust. The client stands in the centre of a riding arena with the horse at the edge. The client is asked to make the horse walk, trot, gallop, change direction, etc.
If the client does this without dominating, the horse’s confidence will have been gained and it will eventually join the person at the centre of the arena.
If the same exercise is carried out with a group, it will only work if they act as one person, without the slightest disagreement, even in thought. When the group acts as a team this exercise helps the individuals to align with the collective intention.
During the debriefing, the coach analyses any negative feelings that each participant has about things that went wrong. Repeating the exercise helps participants manage negative emotions for the benefit of the group.
The same exercise can be done in an individual supervision session or with two team coaches working as a pair on a team coaching journey.
Summary of benefits
Working with horses can be transformative when linked to leadership, facilitation, trust, authenticity, building self-esteem and self-confidence, developing presence and rapport, and team development.
After a session with the horses, individuals are encouraged to transfer their experiences to make connections to their personal and professional/corporate lives.
Equicoaches also benefit from coaching supervision, to reflect on and review their experiences, to gain the most from the interaction between people and horses, and then apply the learning in future horse coaching sessions.
- Next issue: Sile Walsh challenges readers to see their bias and critically think about their views of supervision
- Dr Michel Moral is a doctor in clinical psychology and a winner of the European Mentoring & Coaching Council Supervision Award 2021. https://www.linkedin.com/in/michel-moral-msc-phd-8a86425/
References and further info
- P Hawkins and R Shohet, Supervision in the Helping Professions, Open University Press, 1989
- Resourcing and qualitative functions of supervision, adapted by Peter Hawkins and Nick Smith from the original work by Brigid Proctor
- Parallel Process – behaviours that show up in one relationship that reflect behaviours showing up in another relationship (Searles, 1955)