Analysis of Advice
“Do you ever get frustrated when people don’t take your advice?” I was asked recently, “And how do you deal with it when that happens?”
I get so many questions and comments about advice - about what it’s like to have advice-giving at the center of my job and my work, requests for opinions about how people should behave, references to advice that I apparently offered people. It seems like this is one of the biggest misconceptions about coaching - that it’s all about advice, all the time.
It’s not. In fact, advice-giving is one of the primary things that I was taught not to do in my coach training. So, it’s a little confusing that it comes up with such regularity. Many of my coach colleagues and I struggle with how to navigate this mismatch of understanding and expectation - because no matter how many times we say “I don’t give advice, that’s not my job,” our clients continue wanting and expecting it.
This all made more sense to me as I was talking to a friend recently, who said “Karen, that distinction does not matter to most people. It’s an important nuance in your profession, and no one else really cares. They wanted more clarity on how to move forward, and they have it. So, to them, it was advice.”
From a coach’s perspective, there are so many things that can lead to new thinking, to clarity, to forward progress. And advice is, for a variety of reasons, usually not one of the most effective.
For my purposes here, “advice” is giving someone an opinion about the best thing to do next. It puts the advice-giver in some sort of elevated position, based on perceived expertise or authority or righteousness or something. There are a variety of downsides to setting up that difference in positions, for everyone involved.
So, what are some options to try instead? What might we request instead?
Active, attentive listening
Reflection and skilled summarization
Curiosity and questions that expand thinking
Holding space for emotions and exploration
Witnessing
Brainstorming questions or options together
Roleplaying or rehearsing a situation
There are so many ways to gain insight into a situation that aren’t what I (have learned to) think of as advice. And frankly, as I’ve become more aware of the distinctions and the other available options, I’ve noticed that the amount of the time I actually want advice is pretty small.
Perhaps it’s true for you, in your life, that the nuances around interactions - and particularly interactions that clarify a path forward for someone about a challenging situation - aren’t important.
But, if you, like the person who asked me how I handle my frustration around people not taking my advice, are finding yourself struggling when others aren’t responding to our advice in the ways we want, it might warrant some attention. Alternately, if you find yourself frequently asking for advice and then rejecting, discarding, or resenting it - you might get different results if you got curious about what you really want in those moments.
Because the answer about whether I get frustrated with people not taking my advice? Is that I probably do sometimes - but it’s not a major source of emotional distress in my life, mostly because I don’t give enough advice to set myself up for it to be a problem.
