I recently attended a coaching conference where the keynote speaker was sharing statistics about the coaching industry. One of the stats she shared was that less than 1% of the global population are coaches by profession (that’s on par with PhD’s!) You could see the audience struggling to wrap their heads around this as the common perception in the room was “everyone is a coach.”
Why is that?
Because those in the audience surround themselves with other coaches. They belong to coaching associations. They follow fellow coaches on social media. They study the latest trends in coaching. And I would argue that these are important for coaches who want to ensure that they are at the top of their game for their clients. This affiliation and immersion into your discipline is a crucial component to building your expertise and credibility in your field as well. At the same time, this very insular focus can skew your perspective.
Breaking out of this echo chamber to broaden your purview takes intentionality but it doesn’t have to be hard.
Here are some ideas:
- Departmental Meetings — Ask to attend meetings of other departments in your organization.
- Non-discipline Conferences or Associations — Attending meetings outside of your domain (your discipline or industry) such as Chamber of Commerce, Business Roundtables, Economic Forums, etc.
- Social Media/Podcast/Reading — This could be as simple as asking those non-discipline peers whose point of view they find valuable. You could also make this ask to your network on social media, just be sure to make it clear that you’re looking for non-discipline resources.
Each of these actions will not only expand your network, but you’ll see how they are framing the issues that are most relevant to them. These insights will help you to ensure that you are putting the work that you are doing in a broader perspective. Additionally, you may find that interesting collaborations and nonobvious solutions to issues you’ve been struggling with emerge from these inter-disciplinary conversations.
The danger of remaining firmly entrenched in our echo chamber is that we may only hear those messages that reinforce the common narrative for the group as you saw in the opening example, “everyone is a coach.” Breaking out of your echo chamber offers you the opportunity to challenge your thinking by actively inviting in diverse points of view.
