the Coaching Studio – Season 2 | episode 28 Tünde Erdös, Ph.D., MCC

Lyssa deHart

Hello I’m Lyssa deHart and welcome to the Coaching Studio today. It is my honor to introduce Tunde Erdos. She is an MCC Coach with the International Coaching Federation and she’s also my guest today and has done a huge body of research which we’re going to get into in a bit. But before we even start there, welcome to the show. Really glad to have you here today.

Tunde Erdos

Thank you so so much. And I know that my name is a pain in the neck,

Lyssa deHart

well my name doesn’t always roll off the tongue either so it just makes you memorable. That’s what it does.

Tunde Erdos

I really just wanted to honor that because I know that it’s it’s a Hungarian name so not every it’s not easy to pronounce it.

Lyssa deHart

Well thank you for helping me also to do a better job with that. So it’s always good to ask how people want you know how they are called. So that you know so I you know I start off the show really exploring sort of the coaching journey that MCC’s have taken and and I’m really interested what was your sort of meandering path to this place and time that you find yourself?

Tunde Erdos

mm the place and the time meandering. So you’re bringing up this metaphor of meandering. It was really a meandering thing because I would never have thought that I would do the thing that I’m doing today. And unlike probably other people’s path, mine was um from law, studying law uh then studying simultaneous interpreting and translation, uh to um communication training, and then eventually moving to coaching what we call coaching today. Mhm and I mean law and so what do these fields have in common for me? And what is the mandarin in this? Is that what I noticed about myself was that when I was younger I was extreme sickly motivated. So it was not my idea to do law, it was my father’s idea because I was a bright child and he wanted that bright child to earn a real bread.

Lyssa deHart

Yeah, support herself,

Tunde Erdos

remember back and then I loved painting and drawing and I’m just my eyes are moving to the painting behind you. Because I really just notice how it’s uh grabbing my attention because it connects very deeply with me. And of course my parents said, well you’re not gonna do that because we don’t want to see you end up in the streets, so that was clear right from the start and I and I was a good girl. And I knew like it was it was really interesting because even today, and it was true also back and then when I was a young adult that I I loved everything sort of. So there was there was nothing that I thought I couldn’t do and while I loved painting and I was earning my pocket money with that, so I was really selling that stuff to my colleagues at school and co-students and because I wouldn’t get any pocket money back and then because my parents said when you learn to, you know support yourself, as you say. And I loved really doing it and I thought that’s that’s the art and and being artful, this is gonna be my my path. And then my dad said, look you you started Latin and Latin and law. So this is just um is the other side of the coin. It’s the same coin, but just the flip side of the same coin. I said okay then why not? But very soon I noticed that and I was way into my second part of my my legal studies when you know have a you have an internship and you start specializing. And I was working for um a criminal like that was a lawyer that was defending criminals. And because I was speaking various languages including French. He took me to the provincial prison one day. And my job was to um interpret for him because he didn’t speak any French. So and we were in this tiny cell and I I didn’t have any space to sit down because they were just facing each other sitting down. And what struck me back and then was this violence and aggression that I perceived that the lawyer was displaying. I said this is is this what I’m going to do one day too?

Lyssa deHart

interesting.

Tunde Erdos

And and the guy was just dealing with black papers, okay, black documents. I mean he didn’t kill anyone. And even if he had, you know, it’s still like how are we choosing to deal with people? And that was something in me already that said no, no, no, no, no. This is, I cannot imagine ever being someone like that person. So that was a clear, it was, it was such an um, a breakthrough or a shifting moment today. We would call it like coaches, we call it like shifting or something that that you know, creates this shift. I didn’t know it was a shifting moment. I just thought this is not for me, I’m not going to do this anymore. The next day I didn’t go back to the office anymore, this cabinet anymore. Um, and then I was kind of like, I needed to go back and tell my dad that this is not gonna be the, your dream. You won’t want to listen to this. But I’ve got to say, but I was really uh, I’m really admiring my courage that I had back, and then. Because he was supporting me, he was um, he had supported me heavily with my studies and I was really way into almost finishing. And then he, I mean he didn’t say anything, but he said, okay, so what are you gonna do now? And then I was talking to my girlfriend, a girlfriend of mine back and then. And she said today, you’re so good with languages, why don’t you study languages? And I said, okay, I study languages then. So you know what I’m getting at is that I used to be extrinsically motivated. So when people say something to me I would pick it up and and sort of like play with it. For me it would be played because it wasn’t a drain, it wasn’t painful, it was, I really love languages, and I finished my studies, and it was okay. And then I was in that business simultaneous interpreting and and even working for um the parliament in Brussels in uh like the European Parliament ah but I got bored, I got bored 10 years of doing it, I get bored, you know sitting in the booth and but I noticed something about myself that there was this listening capacity. You know when you are some simultaneous interpreter, you have you have you need to listen very deeply at a level and speak at the same time and transport meaning. You cannot waste your time just keeping the focus on words because then you’re gone, the train is gone. People speak so you need to be very smart at how you recoup transport meaning and at any level even at a level when people start joking and ingesting, you need to pick up that sense of the of the of the joke. And then transport it into the other language. But I got bored so and then I thought okay I’m still good with languages and everything. So what else could I do? And I thought, okay, so I like working with people because being in the booth, I was missing the people. And then I I ended up doing communications trainings. And there I realized that people were having fun. They learned a lot, but I could bored again because I couldn’t see the transformation happening when people learn the skill uh, in a training, they went back to their daily routine and, and as if the law had evaporated.

Lyssa deHart

Yeah, gone.

Tunde Erdos

and so that I couldn’t see the impact. And then I went home, I remember I went home and I asked my husband, hey, look, I’m done. And I was, I was like 30 something and I said, so I I need some, I I want I want something real, something that intrinsically motivated. And then he said, well go, let’s agree on a month. You look for a month. I look for a month, about the same time. And see what you would find for yourself as something that your heart is singing for. Something that you your heart is singing for. And then I look up something and then we’ll talk. And we found the same thing, it was coaching.

Lyssa deHart

I love that idea of looking for something that your heart is singing for. And I mean, just to sort of encapsulate that journey that you’ve taken all of it was developing your ear also for being in that listening space with another human being. And then the one in the transfer, the transformative part of it, you know, at the end of it. Um but that’s listening with your heart. And so you find coaching. Brilliant. And what what do you think coaching, in what ways has your ideas about coaching shifted from when you first found it? Your heart was singing, you first found it, but then the, you know, that’s kept you not bored honestly, because you’ve continued to grow and develop as a coach. What was the shift that you noticed during that that time?

Tunde Erdos

I’m not sure Lyssa, if I’m not getting, I’m not going to get bored one day with coaching. Okay, because I’m.

Lyssa deHart

Fair enough, fair enough.

Tunde Erdos

Uh so although I can answer your question if you will, so it’s it’s not that I couldn’t, but I I there’s a caveat to this because I know myself when I get too good at something good good without sounding hopefully arrogant and it’s just like when there is a routine in that, and you don’t see, like I need the sense of something is that I’m impactful and changing and and and shifting, so I love change actually, and and so I can’t guarantee that won’t happen. But how my idea of coaching has changed is a lot, and I’m just thinking which aspect to bring up most, which which one matters to me most is? Today, I don’t want to know any more. In terms of when I’m going into a coaching session or I’m meeting a client that’s gone, I don’t want to know, I don’t want to know anything. So that’s, I just look forward to meeting a person. We’re going into an organization. Actually, whenever I know something, it’s, it’s as if I wanted to shelve it somewhere. Just don’t tell me, just let me just sense it, let me just let me just send it and figure it out in, in whatever is emerging in this emergency moment. So I don’t want to know and interestingly what I realized today and I didn’t know that before when I was a novice coach, was that anything that we need to know to start working with, emerges in the first 5 to 10 minutes in any encounter. And because I have made this experience, this is what I’m looking for. This innocent, this blank sheet, you know, going in as a blank sheet as best as we can. I mean, I’m not a blank sheet ever because I’m bringing myself in anyways and that’s everything but a blank shit. Um why when I was a nervous, oh God, I wanted to to know it all and be prepared and have the structure and, and the skill and which tool and today we’re gonna do this and what did we do yesterday or the or the or the last time and then studying everything and it was all in my way, but I didn’t know that.

Lyssa deHart

Yeah.

Tunde Erdos

And back and okay back and then it was okay. But today that doesn’t serve the coaching that I I like doing. Let’s put it.

Lyssa deHart

Yeah. You know the thing that’s really showing up is you’re talking about this is this movement towards ‘letting go’ and ‘attachment to’. And it’s almost like the outcome like we get all like I need to know everything. I think it also shows up in conversations where a client brings worth something sort of superficial in those first 5 to 10 minutes. They brought typically up the deeper, underlying meaningful issue also. But we hear this sort of surface topic, and we’re like, I want to know all about that so I can, what? Help you solve it. I can help you be um, you know, solve whatever this problem is. Um and what I’m, if I’m hearing you correctly and please correct me if I’m wrong. For you it was the letting go of the need to know. Need to know the details, need to know just even what we did last time. Because things have probably changed since the last time we met. The need to have a direction or a plan for the coaching for that day, but rather to just really fully be with another human being. And that really kind of translates into the work that you’ve been doing around Presence and I would love to hear a bit more about what your research has been exploring?

Tunde Erdos

Um yes, I’m just noticing, let me just take in what you have shared is you know before I come to answering that question. Let me just share one more thing about that. I would even go as far as saying that I’m ready to let go of the need of needing to not to know. Yeah. Sometimes.

Lyssa deHart

Yeah, being in that neutral space. Yeah.

Tunde Erdos

Sometimes there is a need to know something. Okay. It’s not that I hope that when people are listening to this, they don’t believe that I I never get informed about my clients. Yeah. This is not what I’m saying. It’s just like to not be obsessed not to be obstructed. By just being open to okay. What what what’s the situation, what does the situation want us to do now and if it’s too okay go and pick up that information because you will need that. Okay. But not from a place of needing it, the neediness of it. Yeah. Listen is it is it really useful or or would it be better for the sake of the entire thing that we are embarking on? Not know first and then maybe come back to that piece of information at a later point in time. So that’s something that I I wanted to add. Presence. Wow. So this is a big topic you’re opening a big chapter is and a chapter that I, well it grew out of. Let’s start with that it grew out of an experience and almost failure moment again with my with my with a client of mine. Where I did not realize although I was an MCC back and that place. So when MCC does not guarantee anything for me, doesn’t I was an M. C. C. And this is not to say that the people who are accrediting us are not doing a great job, but there are so many things that we don’t know so many things we are, we are each and every MCC also needs to still grow.

Lyssa deHart

Yes, it is not a destination. It is just a mile marker, that’s all it is. Yeah.

Tunde Erdos

You just step on a different boat again.

Lyssa deHart

That’s right. New boat, New river.

Tunde Erdos

That’s exactly,

Lyssa deHart

I love it. And so then it’s time to start row row rowing the little boat again. Yes.

Tunde Erdos

I’m an advocate of getting accredited with different or professional bodies and that’s what I’m doing actually. So I got also accredited with EMCC. And I’m pursuing because each professional body will be looking into different qualities of of a coach and to make a coach complete because we are looking for wholeness and how can we expand who we are as coaches um with your fairness and you respect to to ICF. They cover many things but a different organization will help us grow through an accreditation process yet in a different way. So it’s not about, you know getting accredited and getting all those accolades. But actually, there is this curiosity around, what do they pay attention to when they want to see a master-level coaching. The curiosity around what what would they define as such? And again APEC’s in the U. K. They are looking at it from yet a different perspective. So that’s what I’m curious about. Like how can we grow and really do the test. Because we also need to undergo tests. That’s my that’s my belief. My core belief is to go back and get ourselves tested over and over again. Because we are also just human beings and um yeah but I think we’re getting off track here so Lyssa please help me.

Lyssa deHart

Okay so let’s go back to the presence and what your research is discovering because I really do appreciate the myriad lenses, at which different organizations explore coaching giving people more. I don’t know agency more capacity to be fully present with another human being. Which really is what the work is that you’ve been working on. So I see that I see a connection for myself as you’re talking.

Tunde Erdos

I got there. I don’t know something that triggered me to um just to say that and mentioned that [Yeah, no, that’s beautiful. ] Here I want to create value and maybe I should let go of that of this. Need to create value for a moment so that I don’t end up in chaos when I’m sharing stories. So um so it was almost failure moment because and I was an MCC. And I did not realize how I was bringing organizational pressure into a session. Mm Because when I was hired by the CEO he wanted the female client that I was uh coaching. She was meant to be um included at the leadership level like a board level in into leadership and that that leadership team consisted of men only back and then. And he wanted for whatever reason, I don’t want to judge, this include that coach. E. That I was having was a woman. And I remember when he hired he said you better make a good job of this.

Lyssa deHart

Oh nothing nothing else to trigger that good girl. Huh?

Tunde Erdos

Of course. Exactly. And that triggered that good girl in me because of course I will. I mean I mean excuse me what else would I do?

Lyssa deHart

What else would I do?

Tunde Erdos

I’ll make a good job of it. But it was so heavily um you know embodied, it was really in my body. It was it was really like everywhere that I showed up in a way that I didn’t realize. And the client picked it up. The client was saying at one at 1 point very early on in the coaching engagement. Tunde, why are you moving backward when the words that you’re saying it’s a yes that the yes is a forward word. You know it’s the forward, it has a potential to be positive. But when you at the same time your body is your leaning back into the chair. it’s a no And she picked it up and I didn’t even notice that I was doing that and I became very, very curious about this incongruence of the verbal output and the nonverbal output. And how important it seems to be the decline because and that really made me think, okay, so, I mean, I I’ve never thought that people were stupid. But that was the conviction that Jesus, clients are there, and picking up everything because they’re looking for trust, what can I really trust here in this space, and it’s not just the words and it’s not just what we what we offer in terms of, you know. But there seems to be an energy around us that is made up of more than just the words and the verbal output. And if we are not congruent in any way, well that will show and that other person will pick it up, but they’re not stupid. But I never believed that they were so but it’s it really was this conviction of, I need to pay more attention to this. And then I started looking out there, like, what do we know about this phenomenon of synchronicity? And and then I found that psychotherapy knows a lot about it. Natural sciences, you know, when when we speak about the schools of fish, how, how schools of fish, you know, naturally how to respond to each other in the water to pressure next to each other because they don’t speak and the beautiful dance that actually, you know, emerges when we are looking at at the schools of fish. Then I understood a case. So my client was responding to my pressure that that was lodged in my body and not to the Yes.

Lyssa deHart

Yeah. You know the image that just showed up as you’re talking about this is I’m really envisioning Jane Goodall she’s meeting with like she’s creating the relationships with the chimpanzees and that sense of mirroring. And And the connectedness that that is so important of the nonverbals. I mean, given that what 85-90% of our communication is nonverbal. So how those that incongruence see to use your language is so crucial to that sense of trust and and connectedness, and safety to explore further. Absolutely.

Tunde Erdos

And it’s it’s not just a mirroring, it’s really like we are responding to each other. It’s we’re saying mirroring and I am not saying that you said that, but what what is it’s prompting me to mention that? Because mirroring is something more conscious.

Lyssa deHart

Got it. It’s really more of the unconscious just synchronicity of the two people who are in the dance.

Tunde Erdos

We naturally connect. We naturally, we are wired to naturally connect unless something in that relationship doesn’t match. And we disconnect for some reason and we might believe that we are connected because when I was doing the research coaches who were MCC. The higher the experience, the hired the accreditation level, the more the coaches were convinced that they were present. But the videotapes were showing that they were not. Because we were measuring this what we call motion energy, in the room between the client over several sessions. So we have sub substantial data showing that over the course of the engagement, how they were actually, that, that the presence was decreasing over time not increasing. Not decreasing over time, which we interpreted in a very specific way, but we are having or maybe maybe maybe let me just be very careful. Aren’t we having let me ask the question, you know, very coach like man area, aren’t we? Having assumptions a lot about presence because when all those accredited coaches, the novices were a lot better. So they were more more cautious about how they were, they were more open and you know, having this beginner mind Sure, because the obvious is have the beginner’s mind. We coaches who are established, we are so so this is what the data was showing is. We believe we have very big beliefs, we believe that we don’t have beliefs but we do have beliefs about the presence and and they would say that we are present and we were not, they were not and I’m calling this in my book the Snow White phenomenon as if we were the Queen in the Snow White fairy tale looking into the mirror and saying Mirror Mirror on the wall, who is fairest is the most present of them all. And we are doing this and and the more established the coach the more he or she would show in the study and we had 184 coach client pairs over time over 10 sessions. So we have substantial data to say something like this. What does that tell us about who we are as MCCs. Just to take that mastery level by ICF. And other mastery levels by other accreditation bodies. What does it say about us in terms of what we, what we believe that we know about presence?

Lyssa deHart

That’s a really interesting question. What does it tell us, in your mind?

Tunde Erdos

Um Well what we found is that, I can only just very humbly share what we found. And it’s the first substantial study looking into this nonverbal motion presence through movement only. So not caring about the verbal output about the conversations, we didn’t know what the coaches were talking about. My premise was that who we are essentially and how we are connecting will show anyways because that’s what I I experienced with the client of mine. It will show anyways I don’t need words, it will show in how I am showing up. And what we found to our surprise, were several things that it’s more complex. It’s not just let’s cocoon or let’s be attuned. These are all big words, what do they mean? What’s that? You know we’re saying that. But when it really comes to, I’m supervising uh, internal coaches at the United Nations were having a session today, a supervision session. These coaches understand and they ask, they know that person’s okay, this is a human. How to do it to them, How to do?

Lyssa deHart

That is the million-dollar question, isn’t it?

Tunde Erdos

We are throwing about. There’s a lot of big words and the question is and how to? And the fact what we found is and again, very humble about this. Yeah. Because other people and I invite other people to go out there and do more research into this. Although I know that people say presence cannot be measured and I would like to challenge that anything that you want to measure can be measured just a matter of how you are looking at something. And what is the instrument with which you are measuring. So everything is measurable. Uh, so several things. One is that the presence is not about the coach, but we’re still calling it coaching presence in the terms of the coach needs to be present. We are not viewing it yet really as a relational capacity that we are very, very much shaped by how the clients show up. And that we are not detached uh, systems where we we set the button, like we press the button and do like clean and then we go into session and then we pretend that we are. And we shouldn’t be because actually, what the whole point of, of staying detached? It’s about, it’s about building up a proximity with the client. That is of course professional. And I’m calling it in my professional proximity rather than detachment to acknowledge. In what way am I really right now, influenced in any way, potentially by that client to be open to this? And we are not.

Lyssa deHart

Yeah, or or we can be though. So like are there are there things to be intentional about, are there things to really be to be exploring within oneself as a coach that would allow for creating more of this relational, relational dance proximity and, you know, um, invitation for presence between the two people. Right? Like?

Tunde Erdos

I mean, I’m not sure what you’re saying.

Lyssa deHart

Well, I may have asked that is a really poor question so I can try again, but let’s see what you come up with from there.

Tunde Erdos

Yeah. What I what what comes to my mind about this is that in what way do we share what we notice? In what way do we really pay attention? Like how we are impacted? In what way do we take on an invitation by a client? For example, I had a client the other day was didn’t want to set on a, settle on a goal? He said, okay, I just noticed. Okay, so I’m noticing that I’m feeling lost because it was really a feeling of lost with the client. And I said that it was interesting that this process of not finding the goal leaves me with the sense of lost. How do we, how can we make sense of this, how this impact? Is that my stuff or is it our stuff or is it what do we want to do with? And that created such a shift. Suddenly the client said yes, because I don’t want to have a goal and I said okay, so what do you want?

Lyssa deHart

Right, okay. So what I’m hearing and what I’m really excited about is this idea of how do we really transparently share our experience of this relationship that we’re having in ways that invite our client to share experientially what they’re experiencing and then be able to name their need. I don’t want a goal today, I really want to do something completely different and then we get to go with them wherever that happens to be. But it’s that if I’m hearing you correctly, there’s a real transparency piece here of “I’m feeling lost, I don’t know what we’re doing and I’m enjoying the conversation, but I’m not sure how it’s a value to you. So please, you know, help me to understand”.

Tunde Erdos

Yes and this openness to this, this openness in what way is is whatever the client is is bringing or how he or she is showing up because we know from psychotherapy already that there is transparency and counter transference always for example, let me give you another example because that that transparency can also manifest in a different way. Mhm No I was a supervisor then and I was observing that coaching client, the coach was showing up as a parent.

Lyssa deHart

Mhm Yeah. Really.

Tunde Erdos

Yes and it was a matter of age because the coach was a lady like it was like two female um interlocutors, the coach was way older and the client was way younger, like you could like even when when I first saw them they were showing up like okay so the age my age show up, you know to have curiosity about anything that is there. And bingo charlie, it was a matter, it mattered a lot, this age thing, I didn’t know that but I just noticed it so age there’s age difference okay good, let’s let’s take the next step and then and then they were saying okay we we we already have known each other for a long time and I said oh okay

Lyssa deHart

You have a history of a relationship.

Tunde Erdos

but also just saying it out loudly, that seemed to matter in how they had already you know settled on a relationship with each other that we feel sort of safe but it was a fake safeness, safety. Because it was actually a transparency from the, from the client in how she was showing up as a helpless child and the coach was bringing in all the all the like it wasn’t the coaching, it was an interrogation. Like at the police station, like bringing a lot of questions to support to rescue the child because the child was so helpless and because she responded to that to the client from the counter transparency thing. She and she didn’t notice it how the clients transparency. The clients showing up helpless was was triggering her counter transparent so

Lyssa deHart

They were like yin and yang.

Tunde Erdos

being but it went unnoticed. If it doesn’t go unnoticed, then it can be really a super platform for for clients clients growth and also for the coaches growth.

Lyssa deHart

Mm You know, and as you’re talking about this, I’m a huge advocate of supervision and coaching supervision. And and in therapeutic supervision and frankly, I think anybody who works with human beings, so whether it’s lawyers or doctors or you know, anybody who really works on in any kind of depth with human beings probably could really benefit from supervision. But this place where we get to bring these clients where, you know, I’m finding myself wanting to just tell them what to do. Is a great place to do what you’re talking about and explore this transactional analysis and how do we show up as adult to adult versus having our parents or our expertise engaged to the clients and noviceness. um I often consider the idea of what if I’m the novice to your point right, what if I’m the novice and the client is the expert, what what informs my curiosity at the point that I’m the novice? Versus I’m the expert in my questions are all trying to lead you to the outcome that I think you need to learn. Which how can we be in presence with another human being if we’re in the role of telling them what they need to do, based on our life experience. Which is completely nonsense for their life experience.

Tunde Erdos

And even even we coaches know that we are not we are not to give advice. But the advice can come in hidden ways through questions

Lyssa deHart

It can come through tone of voice and facial expressions. Yes, Because we know that look when somebody is like hmm

Tunde Erdos

hmm hm.

Lyssa deHart

and the client knows immediately that we think there’s something they’re missing. You know, like I mean it doesn’t take much for us to do that, right? We don’t have to make such a big facial expression.

Tunde Erdos

Well, there’s a lot of relationality and these are just two examples. And I’m happy to give a third one for example. And it’s I’m taking that example from the research. So what we observed is when we were then also asking them, we were asking both the client. So the client was giving feedback about each session. We were having the videotapes that we could analyze with the software. Plus we were also asking the coaches for feedback and then then we were comparing uh each piece of feedback to make sense of what was really going on. We never know what was really going on. But kind of like make some sense out of what might have happened. Uh what we found in one particular case. And and and I keep telling this this example because it’s so telling. The coach was saying well with that client it was an ideal coach client relationship. And then I said okay, so what what makes you believe that it was ideal? Yeah, because the client was ready for coaching. There was readiness for coaching. The client was she was learning, she was there, she wanted to do, she was just, I just couldn’t lean back and do nothing and it was really like ideal. And it’s true that actually it’s the clients who ought to do the work and the coach doesn’t do the work etcetera. But.

Lyssa deHart

But

Tunde Erdos

what the data showed that the first thing where I got suspicious and I showed her look the video tapes showed that you were completely out of sync with the client. That you were not responding to the client at all. Plus the client is reporting not having felt safe. So how can we make sense of that? It’s totally unexpected, right?

Lyssa deHart

Can I take a stab?

Tunde Erdos

Yes.

Lyssa deHart

The thought that comes to my mind though, is if if it’s an ideal client, but there’s this sort of judgment that’s coming in from the coach about what’s the right thing to do and that client is getting their own ‘be a good girl’ right? That that perfect child activated, it may not feel safe because it’s so reflective of past relationships where you don’t have any choice. And then and then they but there’s no wanting to disagree. So it feels very easy for the coach because the client is just accepting and and going along with, in order to get along, I don’t know, that’s my guess, what, what did you guys discover?

Tunde Erdos

Brilliant. So what we found and the coach confirmed it, she brought in her pleaser driver. So the police, a driver was there, so she brought in and was immediately pleasing the coached and the coach took it on as something as readiness. She didn’t get curious about how that’s interesting, it feels like an idea, she didn’t question herself with this novices mind is this beginner’s mind of hm…

Lyssa deHart

Why is this so easy? Why is this client so ideal? And and again, it’s that self reflective piece, right? Where we start to explore our own what’s happening with us and with the situation that we find ourselves in also.

Tunde Erdos

And the relational thing again,

Lyssa deHart

Always relational.

Tunde Erdos

I know that I was calling it dancing in the moment, but what exactly is this now, when, for example, when I’m training this also, like based on the research and the book. Now I’m training and this piece of presence and I am training it in in synergy with leadership. So I’m bringing in, it’s always just a boutique boutique group, it’s four coaches and four leaders. So I’m not just training coaches alone because we are reproducing ourselves. That’s my, that’s my hypothesis. But how can we do the real learning work as coaches together with the real clients, the real leadership and the real, the real people and those real people also learning more about presence working with coaches. Because presence is also relevant for leadership.

Lyssa deHart

Absolutely.

Tunde Erdos

What we found is that how hard, when, when this is what I’m seeing in my in my training practice. Uh that the coaches are coming in and how they are there like cartographers when they are working with the leaders. It’s sort of as as if they were wanting to know everything. So it’s, it’s wanting to know. You know, wanting to get everything right and get get done and be a good coach and a great coach demonstrate, mm Also detrimental. We’re finding it detrimental. We’re bringing in our needs. And impacting how the leader is then showing up in the same way or depending on the personality, probably quite the opposite then. They’re seeing all these needs, how they are, you know, influencing each other. Just wanting to be a great coach, you know, wanting to demonstrate coaching capacity and agency said the word agency today, how this can be also in the way of effectiveness. Um and that’s also what we found, how any need, any need that we have is, and any need that the client is bringing in, it’s feeding into how things will be co-created. And we don’t need big words of attunement. We just need to understand, okay, where are we with our needs? What are we really bringing into this?

Lyssa deHart

Yeah, yeah. I mean again it’s, you know, you’ve said several things and I really want to just sort of capture them that I think are so important. It’s all everything’s relational. whether we’re having a relationship with a person, a dog, our story about our biases, about our belief systems, ourselves, right? Like I mean we just everything is relational. And this need to slow down and have some curiosity about what it is we’re bringing into the space with another human being. Whether it is, I’m working with the CEO who I’m like holy cow, I can’t believe I’m working with the CEO of this giant corporation and now I’m feeling intimidated. So I bring in my good child in order to try and please that that particular client. Or if I see myself as sort of like I’m the voice of wisdom for you young, you know, young Luke. Um and I’m the Obi wan Kenobi to help you learn how to become a Jedi master. I mean either way we’re bringing stuff to the table. And it impacts this dance or, or Relational Proximity that that is created in the space between two people. Um you know, I would, I would love to hear about your project because I know you’ve got a movie that you have are putting a documentary, I think it’s kind of more, is it a documentary or a movie? I may be getting it wrong, but I would love to hear kind of what you’re up to right now in the world?

Tunde Erdos

right now, I am getting away from probably because I’m getting bored again,

Lyssa deHart

So you’re gonna become a producer now?

Tunde Erdos

No, no, I’m still with with coaching, but I’m I think I’m bored with with just you know, this fad of… What we call, like let’s create transformational coaching for a client or even teams. I think that the power of coaching lies beyond that. And just recently I think it was 2019 that ICF started looking into what they call social, social impact, watching that coaching is a social impact intervention and instrument rather than just a one-on-one team or group coaching intervention. And even goes beyond organizational development even so it’s really a social impact instrument. And do we hone this mindset or are we too obsessed with our egos in, I created transformation for the client. I mean, so to get so this is what I’m seeking right now. And it also grew up out of a very painful moment in my life when I understood, “Woman, wake up, ” this is not about you empowering yourself through successful coaching engagements, you know when when we start running around and feeling successful and we are great coaches and stuff yeah, and then we are posting this everywhere. How we create change and actually, so like are we really, so, so there was a painful moment in my life where I woke up saying to myself, “Woman, stop telling yourself this lie that you are and stop empowering yourself when you’re saying that you’re coaching, stop it, because it’s, it’s not about you feeling powerful, it is about how are you really empowering other people? “

Lyssa deHart

Mhm, huge transformational shift.

Tunde Erdos

it’s a very big one because it’s no longer me believing that I am there and I can create change. And I, I it’s not me, me, me yeah, it is about okay, so what is the thing that I can put in place and we can collectively do something that’s bigger than I can do the, I, bigger than the I and in that painful moment, it was the moment when uh when I finished my PhD, when my husband said bye bye honey. You love coaching more than you love me or you loved your PhD more than you love me. Where I was in my ashes and I, and a lady contacted me and said, I see what you have done in terms of research, I have seen uh what you’re doing in terms of practice, I would so much love to go to Kenya because she was planning to go back, she was in Austria for a while and then she was planning to go back to Kenya to her homeland. And she said, I would so much love to bring all the knowledge that I have built up here in Austria and put it in the service of women there. Because the women in Kenya, they suffer from the patriarchal system there and she knew of an organization that’s called MaMa organization and they really are into um supporting women in becoming more entrepreneurial, setting up their own businesses and they support them with funding at the outset to. They train them to have business skills and they were interested in in coaching as well, so they said, can be trained the coaches to the women to become coaches? And and this lady was telling me this story and she said, Tunde can you help me with this because you have the experience and I remember when she was saying that, I immediately said yes and I didn’t even know how we would do that, it’s not like I just felt like, wow, even in my darkest moments, life is there and it’s just giving me a sign of when, when, when I, you know, I have this resolve power away from me, yeah, away from me to, to power to others. The call was coming, the call was coming really almost simultaneously, so in synchronicity when we are aligned with ourselves and and and and this, the energy is right, our own energy feels right, we’re not just doing something to, to do something for the sake of it because we believe we must do, I don’t know what. but we’re really aligned with our attuned sense energy. Is true when we are really alive, life is gonna bring us the opportunity and I had this opportunity and just sat to that woman, I said, look, you can have all the experience that I have and all the knowledge. but we need money because I don’t want to hire coaches, bring them to Kenya and not pay them. I I wouldn’t want to do this, I wouldn’t want to talk to coaches. And because we all invest in ourselves, train ourselves, which is a lot of money. We also invest in ourselves. So we need to honor this how, how coaches are looking after themselves to get trained and are investing. We can’t just tell them, oh, please let’s democratize coaching. And because we’re democratizing coaching, let’s just do it free of charge, okay. So I’m not the person that we need to honor that do you give give everybody to use the thing that they deserve? Give give and take life is about give and take. So we need to give back to those coaches. Although I’m sure that there’s a lot of coaches who would be happy to do that free of charge, but that’s not my philosophy. And then I had this idea of, okay, I know that there is this fairytale out there that currently there is a trend, to people are talking about democratizing coaching, but basically what it means and it’s, it’s touted by digital coaching platforms most of the time it means that they are of course a platform, a mediator between the client and the coach, but you, you don’t earn really like you

Lyssa deHart

You don’t earn anything very much. Yeah, it’s good for practice, but it isn’t sustainable for career because you’re gonna get burned out.

Tunde Erdos

Exactly. And I said

Lyssa deHart

Because they are a corporation.

Tunde Erdos

Exactly and, and and they’re selling it under the motor of democratizing coaching and for me that doesn’t resonate well, yeah. And how can I create a platform that can give the coaches the hope that we can do or really, the truth about democratizing coaching is not about coaching earning less. It’s, we can, we can find other ways. We can, we can think beyond, we can we are coaches, how can we shift perspectives and democratized coaching also in a different way where coaches to earn less. So that’s where I said, okay, what is the way to create a fund for this project? You know, training women in Kenya. The coaches can earn enough and we can create a social impact at the same time. So I thought, okay, look, I have done this massive doctoral thesis where I was traveling the world like a mad woman, and my husband finally left me because of that because I was never around. So that was how can I use that opportunity of knowing so many beautiful people. Okay, I can interview them. These people will say yes to this project, I’m sure and they did. So we could create a documentary. So creative in terms of knowledge and I know that I have got very challenging ideas about coaching. Because I don’t believe that coaching is just good. I also think that it has got shadow sides. And nobody’s talking about the shadow side. So maybe by creating a documentary about the Light and the Shadow of coaching, which nobody is addressing it at the moment. We can create value for those who donate and watch. And with those with that money, with those funds we can then, so it’s kind of like, it’s the same thing to do.

Lyssa deHart

And it’s a, it’s a beautiful window into what really motivated you also to do the Light and shadow of coaching I think and I want to have a link to where people can go and um, and view it and donate towards this, this fund for coaching for women in, in Kenya. I’m gonna have a link to your website so listeners can find you. But I have as we’re moving to a close, your final question for you. I don’t just, just the final question, if you were, if you were to write an autobiography today, what would you name it, what would the title be?

Tunde Erdos

Oh good. That auto biography would be um “Let’s be Dirty, ” but not in a way that probably that might sound.

Lyssa deHart

You know what it’s, I love it. So thank you today so much for being on the podcast today. Oh my gosh, you’re, you have so much. Um God, just so much. I honestly, there’s a piece in there where we’re looking at this idea of how much “I” we bring into coaching conversations. I’d almost like to have another conversation with you at another time just about that because I’ve been really playing with that particular idea myself. And so maybe we can figure something out for another another episode. But I have absolutely enjoyed spending time with you today. Thank you so much for being on the Coaching Studio.

Tunde Erdos

Thank you Lyssa. And there is a lot more to say about the findings as well. I didn’t say that presence can help and harm. That’s also what we found, but we didn’t get to talk about that.

Lyssa deHart

I know, so we’ll have to have another conversation at some point

Tunde Erdos

to everyone who is interested in growing, which is something natural and listening and taking time and appreciating the work that you do. Like creating spaces for other coaches to grow. I really truly appreciate that. Thank you Lyssa.

Lyssa deHart

Thank you