{'fraction_non_alphanumeric': 0.014066496163682864, 'fraction_numerical': 0.0, 'mean_word_length': 5.2103174603174605, 'pattern_counts': {'":': 0, '<': 0, '<?xml version=': 0, '>': 0, 'https://': 0, 'lorem ipsum': 0, 'www.': 0, 'xml': 0}, 'pii_count': 0, 'substrings_counts': 0, 'word_list_counts': {'cursed_substrings.json': 0, 'profanity_word_list.json': 0, 'sexual_word_list.json': 0, 'zh_pornsignals.json': 0}}
A Privileged Conversation

Simon Western, PhD works independently and his Company focuses on liberating individuals and teams to discover their ‘freedom to act’. He designs organizational architectures that inspire creativity and encourage leadership to flourish. Lynne Sedgmore CBE is the Chief Executive of the Centre for Excellence in Leadership for the Learning and Skills Sector in the UK. This paper reflects on a coaching relationship that became a ‘privileged conversation’ between a leadership coach and a CEO over a two-year period. It was privileged in the sense of having a profound impact on both parties and on the organization. During the initial contracting both parties were aware of the others spirituality however the focus of the contract was clearly on improving the performance of the leader and the organization. However as the coaching relationship developed, spirituality became more explicit and a powerful aspect of the work. This paper will describe Think Coaching, a new framework that focuses on creating a ‘thinking space’ and working with hope, imagination and connectivity across networks. As the spiritual dialogue evolved both parties were freed to work in an integrated manner to unusual depths whilst remaining task orientated. The paper concludes by showing how this coaching framework can encourage a coaching process that works across the boundary of spirituality and a secular workplace. The framework also offers the potential to be developed and used by spiritual directors and within different settings of pastoral care.