Motivational Interviewing in Coaching
Invoking peoples’ motivation and supporting them to achieve self-fulfillment.
What Is Motivational Interviewing?
Motivational Interviewing (MI) is a counselling, coaching and therapy approach that attempts to move an individual away from a state of ambivalence (indecision or uncertainty) towards finding the motivation necessary for making positive decisions and accomplishing a goal. Essentially, MI activates the client’s capabilities required for a beneficial change. Although some people can initiate and continue change on their own, others require some support and encouragement.
MI was created by William Miller and Stephen Rollnick in 1983.
MI uses a gentle and positive guiding style to engage with the clients, to clarify their strengths and aspirations, evoking their own motivation for change and promoting autonomy in decision making (Rollnick et al. 2008).
MI considers ambivalence (doubt and uncertainty) about change normal, which constitutes an important motivational obstacle in recovery. Ambivalence can be resolved by working with the client's intrinsic motivations and values.
MI utilises a collaborative effort between the coach and the client to spark motivation and initiate change. This alliance is a synergetic partnership to which each person brings important expertise.
MI shares similarities to the person-centred (or humanistic) therapy technique created by Carl Rogers (1902-1987) and builds on his optimistic and humanistic theories about people's capabilities for exercising free choice and changing through a process of self-actualisation.
What Makes MI Different?
MI practitioners do not:
behave in a coercive manner, and do not argue with the client,
do most of the talking, blasting the client with unsolicited information,
use an authoritative stance (expert v layperson), leaving the client in a passive role,
impose a diagnostic label,
offer direct advice or prescribe solutions without first asking the clients’ permission and without actively encouraging them to make their own choices.
What is Ambivalence?
Individuals who need to change an aspect of their habit or behaviour are usually aware of the risks associated with that behaviour but continue with it anyway. They may want to change, but at the same time, they do not want to. These contradictory feelings can be identified as doubt or uncertainty (ambivalence), and they are natural.
Nonetheless, it is important to understand and accept the client's ambivalence because it is often the root of their uneasiness about the change. Apprehension of change and lack of motivation for it can manifest this ambivalence (Miller and Rollnick, 1991). If ambivalence is interpreted as denial or resistance, friction occurs between the coach and the client.
The Spirit of Motivational Interviewing
The strategies of motivational interviewing are more persuasive than coercive, more supportive than argumentative. The motivational interviewing must proceed with a strong sense of purpose, clear strategies for pursuing that purpose, and a sense of appropriate timing and good questioning. The spirit of MI (the model) is based on the five principles: expressing empathy, developing discrepancy, avoiding argument, adjusting to rather than opposing client’s resistance, and supporting self-efficacy.
Expressing empathy through reflective listening, communicates respect for and acceptance of the client and their feelings and establishes a nonjudgmental, collaborative relationship.
Identifying discrepancies between clients' goals or values and their current behaviour (sustain-talk v change-talk). The coach/therapist should help to focus the client's attention on how current behaviour differs from ideal or desired behaviour. Discrepancies should be highlighted by raising the client’s awareness of the negative consequences of problem behaviour and helping them confront the behaviour that contributed to such consequences. Awareness of discrepancies between present behaviour and important goals motivates change, and the client themselves should come up with the arguments for change (see Columbo’s approach).
Avoiding argument and confrontation. Trying to convince a client that change is needed could trigger more resistance. If the coach/therapist try to prove a point, the client predictably takes the opposite side. Arguments with the client can rapidly lead to a power struggle and do not enhance motivation. However, progress can be made when the client, not the coach/therapist, argues for change.
Adjusting to the client’s resistance (ambivalence) rather than opposing it directly. Resistance (ambivalence or sustain-talk) is a legitimate concern. Resistance could mean that the client is behaving defiantly, or perhaps it is a sign that the client views the situation differently, which requires the coach to understand the client's perspective. Resistance is a signal that the coach should change direction or listen more carefully. It actually offers the coach/therapist an opportunity to respond in a new, perhaps surprising, way and take advantage of the situation without being confrontational.
Adjusting to resistance (ambivalence) is similar to avoiding argument. It offers another chance for expressing empathy by remaining non-judgmental and respectful, encouraging the client to talk and stay involved.
Supporting self-efficacy (belief in one's ability to do what’s essential). Many clients do not have a well-developed sense of self-efficacy and find it difficult to believe that they can begin or maintain the desired behavioural change. Improving self-efficacy requires evoking and supporting hope, optimism, and the feasibility of accomplishing the change.
These require the coach/therapist to recognise the client's strengths and bring them to the forefront whenever possible. Unless a client believes change is possible, the perceived discrepancy between the desire for change and feelings of hopelessness about accomplishing the change will likely result in rationalisations or denial to reduce the ensuing discomfort.
Because self-efficacy is a critical component of behavioural change, it is crucial that the coach/therapist also believes in the clients' capacity to reach their goals.
Sustain-Talk V Change-Talk
By differentiating a self-motivational statement (change-talk) from a counter-motivational assertion (sustain-talk), the coach can reinforce the client's self-motivational statements by reflecting on them (nodding or making approving facial expressions and affirming statements), encouraging the client to continue exploring the possibility of change.
This can be done by asking for elaboration, explicit examples, or more details about remaining concerns. Questions beginning with what else are particularly useful.
Sometimes asking clients to identify the extremes of the problem (e.g., "What are you most concerned about?") helps enhance their motivation.
Another effective approach is to ask clients to envision what they would like for the future. From there, clients may be able to begin establishing specific goals.
The Columbo’s Approach
The Columbo approach is used to develop an awareness of discrepancies with the client. In the old "Columbo" TV series, the late Peter Falk played a detective (Lieutenant Columbo) who had a sense of what had really occurred but used a somewhat bumbling, unassuming Socratic style to question his prime suspect, strategically posing questions and making reflections to piece together a picture of what really happened.
This approach is particularly useful with a client who prefers to be in control. Essentially, the coach/therapist expresses some understanding and continuously seeks to clarify that with the client but appears unable to perceive any solution. A stance of uncertainty or confusion can motivate the client to control the situation by offering a solution.
The OARS Model
Open-ended Questions - Affirmations - Reflections - Summary
The OARS model is designed to help clients address their natural ambivalence and provide a good starting point. The model is based on the five principles described in the previous section: 1) expressing empathy, 2) developing discrepancy, 3) avoiding argument, 4) adjusting to rather than opposing client’s resistance, and 5) supporting self-efficacy.
The first four strategies are derived from client-centred counselling and help clients explore their ambivalence and develop reasons for change. The fifth strategy is specific to motivational interviewing and integrates and guides the other four.
Open-Ended Questions: Asking open-ended questions helps the coach/therapist understand the client’s point of view and draws out their feelings about a given topic or situation. Open-ended questions facilitate dialogue; they cannot be answered with a single word or phrase and do not require any particular response. They neutrally solicit additional information, encouraging the client to do most of the talking and help the coach/therapist avoid making premature judgments.
Affirmations: When it is done sincerely, affirming the client supports and promotes self-efficacy. More importantly, affirmations acknowledge the difficulties the client has experienced. The coach/therapist may say, "I hear you”, I understand you", and validate the client's experiences and feelings. Affirming helps clients feel confident about mustering their inner resources to take action and change their behaviour.
Reflective Listening: In reflective listening, the coach/therapist demonstrates that they have accurately heard and understood a client's communication by restating its meaning (reflecting). That is, they hazard a guess about what the client intended to convey and express in a responsive statement, not a question. Reflective listening is a way of checking rather than assuming that you know what the client meant.
Reflective listening strengthens the empathic relationship between the coach and the client and encourages further exploration of problems and feelings. This form of communication is particularly appropriate for the early stages of coaching. It reduces the likelihood of resistance (ambivalence/resistance), encourages the client to keep talking, communicates respect, cements the therapeutic alliance, clarifies exactly what the client meant, and reinforces motivation.
Summary: From time to time, it’s useful to summarise what has happened in a coaching session. Summarising consists of refining and condensing the essence of what a client has expressed and communicating it back.
Summaries reinforce what has been said, show that you have been listening carefully, and prepare the client to move on. A summary that links the client's positive and negative feelings can facilitate an understanding of initial ambivalence and promote the perception of discrepancy. Summarising is also a good way to begin and end each coaching session and provide a natural bridge when the client is transitioning between stages of change.
When presenting a summary, you can strategically select what information should be included and what can be minimised or left out. It would be best to invite the client to offer corrections or comments about your summary, which often leads to further discussion.
Summarising helps clients consider their own responses and contemplate their own experiences. It also allows you and your client to notice what might have been overlooked or incorrectly stated.
The Acronym R U L E
Resist the righting reflex: The righting reflex is the coach’s tendency to advise his client about the right path for success. This often has the opposite effect, inadvertently reinforcing the argument for maintaining the status quo and invoking resistance. The core principle of motivational interviewing requires coaches to suppress their initial righting reflex to explore the client’s own motivations, strengths and resources for change.
Understand your client’s motivations: The client’s own reasons for change, rather than the coach’s, will ultimately result in behaviour change. By concentrating on the client’s interests, concerns and values with curiosity and openly exploring the client’s motivations for change, the coach will get a better understanding of his client’s reasons for and/or potential barriers to a change.
Listen with empathy: Effective listening skills are essential to understanding what will motivate the client, as well as the pros and cons of their situation. A general rule-of-thumb in motivational interviewing is that at least equal amounts of time should be spent listening and talking.
Empower your client: Clients’ confidence, conviction, and passion will improve when active collaborators in the coaching process. Empowering clients involves exploring their ideas about how they can improve their chances of success. A truly collaborative relationship is a powerful motivator. Clients benefit from this relationship the most when the coach also embodies the hope that change is possible.
Strengths Rulers
• Please think of a scale from zero to 10 of how ----- (important) ----- it is for you to ----- (finish this course) -----(on this scale, zero is not important at all, and 10 is extremely important).
• Why are you at -- (4) -- and not zero?
• What would it take for you to go from – (4) -- to --(a higher number) --?