🎙️ Toward Solutions Podcast | Episode 10: Progress in Complex Environments with Annette Gray

And I used to think years ago when we worked together Jason that people couldn't need to learn coaching first before they learned solution focus. I don't think that way anymore. Solution focus is the coaching way to learn how to ask more and tell less. Hello and welcome to the Toward Solution podcast where creativity meets practical application. I'm Deon Singh and I'm Jason Pasco. Together we dive deep into the world of solution focus exploring its transformative power across a variety of contexts. Come join us each month as we engage in enlightening conversations with experts and practitioners who are applying solution focus in their unique environments. Whether you're looking to enhance your personal life, professional practice or community projects, our discussions will provide you with valuable insights and actionable ideas. Tune in to discover how you can implement solution focus practices in your own context, unlocking new possibilities and creative solutions. Let's embark on this journey of exploration and innovation together. If you like this podcast, leave us a review and subscribe now so you don't miss an episode of Toward Solutions. Welcome welcome welcome Annette Gray. It's been a while since you and I caught up and after goodness me how long do we work together about seven or eight years? So yes, seven things about seven years. When did you discover solution focus and approach to coaching? 2011. That's right. It's the first time I did any training in it. Yeah. So that was an amazing experience for me because I remember coming into this organization and you were just so excited about this solution focus approach. And now after working together and then kind of going off on our own paths we get to catch up again for the podcast. Yes. Welcome welcome. We've got four questions that we ask everybody and then we just see where the conversation goes. I'm going to let Dion jump in with the first one. Why is it the love it? And there's kept you using it years later. A number of reasons. But the two strong ones are it just works. It works as an approach to cut through what is wanted and to move thing make progress quickly. And what what I love most about it is leaders get it. And whenever you train anyone in it they just get it so quickly and have amazing results really fast. So that's one aspect of why I love it. It just it works when things are complex and things are difficult just cuts through. The other is I just love the community and the first time I got to experience solution focus consultants therapists people using this approach was in Oxford in 2012 and that's where I got to meet the whole SF community. And I was blown away because I presented twice at that conference and I got one of the bigger roots. And I was brand I was only a year into knowing the approach but they gave me one of the bigger presentation conference rooms and I was like wow there's no hierarchy in this community. I love this. So if you're brand new or practice it for over 30 years you were treated as an equal. And I just went wow this is this is the community I want to be part of and have been so since then. So cool and we've definitely again the since we kind of on a bit of a whim decided to do this we the conversations that we've had in the generosity of people including yourself and making introductions and yet truly is an amazing community. Yes, yeah and I think what it demonstrates is how any organisation culture can be like you know we're all people working together to work things out and why complicate it by hierarchy and who's got more knowledge than other like it it's a really good model of how to be inclusive you know how to be respectful yeah it's a great model of what ideal culture looks like collaborative culture yeah. So there's two questions that come to mind but the first one is so having discovered it back in 2011 experienced the community in 2012 how you're using it now in 2026. The thing I love to do most is to train leaders in how to be solution focused and coach like in your conversations that that is my program that I just I just love presenting because a lot of leadership programs are not practical and can't be used straight away and that's what I love about solution focus people get it they can use it straight away and I tend to use Hayson Moon's DOQ Dialogic Orientation Quadrant as my go-to model these days and I used to think years ago when we worked together Jason that people couldn't needed to learn coaching first before they learned solution focus I don't think that way anymore solution focus is the coaching way to learn how to ask more and tell less I agree 100% yeah and over that time and what's changed in the way that you've used that you use solution focus I've been influenced by a few people I did a summer school with the brief guys over COVID so two or three years in a row I got up in the middle of the night and did their three day through two or three day program and I got influenced by them and the what's the word you what's the word I'm looking for the minimalist approach that they use so I use a lot of their questions or down to two questions I think they're down to you know but I still infuse it with Mark and Mark McGoughouse and Paul Z. Jackson's tools solution tools I still infuse it with that so I think I've just gone simpler and simpler in my approach in some way to your question yeah that's what's changed so there's there's kind of the journey and where you're up to if you I don't know bumped into your next door neighbor in the shopping center and they said what do you what do you do what is this solution focus thing how would you describe it to them? it's the a simple way of getting a helping change happen fast I think that's yeah it's interesting probably like both of you your children pick up you know how you converse with them and you know my daughter Emma who's now a assistant principal in a school like fast track careers she's 29 so she went along to a leadership program as she said 'mom I know a lot of this stuff you know this is how you've been talking to me since I was a teenager and even in primary school so I know how to ask questions and I know how to interact with people and you know it was interesting she said in that program because she only did it last week she said I could just coach and I didn't know I could coach because of what you've done for years so I'm not sure what your question was but it's what's worse so if you were to you know you having that conversation with there maybe it is your neighbor that you've bumped into I mean I said well so how do you do that so you know how is it that you do what it is that you're doing? um I think the key is asking what people want rather than what they don't want and the general population do not know how to do that you know because they think going and unpacking the problem and finding out the root cause of the problem is the way to change and they get blown away when you can actually just jump over that. And you know what, I do a lot of work with engineers and they are the root cause experts. You know, because of the context that they work and they're generally working with machines or working in environments that are not people, they want to go to the root cause. So it's a real eye-opener to them that actually, you can actually build a better relationship with people if you just ask them what they want and what they don't want. Yeah, so that, again, I can't, I don't know what you can't ask me. But yeah, that's, that's in essence, what is it you want and how will you know when you've got it? What would be some science that tell you you've got it? And have you had it before? What, you know, have you experienced that before? So I just love the how the approach is it's tapping into people's agency, their resourcefulness that often gets missed, you know, particularly in corporate organizational settings, you know, we're often not tapped into what we bring to the role or what we bring past experiences or even our home life. We're pretty successful at home most of us, you know, we can, that those resources can be tapped into. So I'm just thinking about engineers because Jenny Clarke brought up engineers as well when we when we spoke to her and you're right, they've got a very particular way of thinking what's what's one of the biggest shifts you've seen in a training when people come and get it, whether it's from a group of engineers or or other. I think for me the most recent, well there's two examples. One's engineers and one was safety leaders. And and this was in Dubai last year. So I went to Dubai twice to run workshops for this organization who are a global company and they flew in all all their safety leaders and then they opened it up to all their operational leaders to learn solution focus where coaching. Because so that they because they were on rigs and they would go on these rigs for four weeks and you know you could imagine on these rigs they they they had to develop a culture of everyone to get on with each other and they wanted positive cultures on these rigs because they're living together and working for four weeks together. And so what surprise not surprised me but reminded me of how universal solution focus is and there were 19 different cultures in the room. You know from Malaysia, Philippines, Canada, New Zealand, Egypt, Middle East and it's an equalizer. You know it's just a universal way to work with people to help others take responsibility and ownership because these safety leaders couldn't shadow every single person and this is a high risk environment and they have to help others take responsibility for their work particularly around their machinery you know the and all elements of safety and solution focus help them to do that better because it all comes down to having better conversations. So that's one aspect the engineers I ran a mentoring program a coaching approach to mentoring and and often people who in professional type roles think mentoring is I just share all my wisdom and you're just meant to take it all up and I said no you can ask more you know you can find out what they know already and build upon that. So you're actually doing a lot less in your mentoring than what you think you should be doing yeah and so where we're starting where people are at and helping them grow from there. It's not about you showing how expert you are and sharing all your wisdom and they just sit there nodding and then suddenly their cups fall it doesn't work that way it works where people learn best when they start from where they're at and build on that. So yeah they were blown away because they thought mentoring was you just tell them and they should be they should grow from that. Very cool. You were talking before about the training leaders to be more coach-like in their conversations. How else you paint a picture of what you're currently doing in relation to solution focus? What's a day in the life? Well yeah that's one one program I offer and so the other things I do so I did it the other day I work one-to-one with people less and less these days but I got this message text message saying can I have an SOS coaching session like today you know and she was a person very very incredibly capable woman senior leader just found out her her boss had been asked to leave and because of a particular culture survey and assumptions that were made around that and she was rocked totally rock so that session was about reminding her of how capable she is you know just by asking solution focus questions and you know you know you know this is wrong situation what is it we can actually do about it? Yeah so how are you going to respond to this she said because all I feel like doing is just crying but I know I have to go back out there and tell my division that he's leaving and that we are going to keep going and then how things are going to look so we worked on together not unpacking why he's leaving but what is it what how can she present her best self in that situation so that's another context in terms I do individual coaching for for leaders but I also help people in terms of group coaching do focus on well-being and how you can fully thrive and leaders need to understand what it is to be fully thriving themselves before they can model it to others so that six month group coaching experience is really about learning about where you at and how can you do more of that and how can you notice what others are doing that might be helpful for you so it's a collaborative learning environment that firstly starts with a survey that unpacks what does fully thriving look like and how close to that I you in terms of inside of work and outside of work we do an individual debrief and then they select what would make it better for them over the next six months what's your project in terms of your own well-being that you are you going to model in your organization and then the whole six month to our coaching sessions once a month are all solution-focused yeah I don't have a set curriculum it's more about where you at what do you need to learn and what do you want to learn from the rest of the group so that approach is done in terms of solution-focused coaching methodology and then my other program is how do you collaborate and I think solution-focused is the best way to learn to collaborate yeah because of being respectful for what others know how do you ask great questions so it sort of dovetails into being coached like but you know collaboration is one of those buzz words like empowerment was years ago and you know all the other next shiny object but I think what it shows in terms of our world leaders there's not much skill in how do you collaborate and how good it would be if our world leaders wouldn't know how to use solution-focused because you know we might get some great change happening around them um what if you so like that's an amazing depth of experience in team teaching solution focus. What have you found, what works in teaching people solution focus? What have you found? I think what I've done since 2019, or 18, when I came across Hey Sun's way of teaching it, that's my go to and that's where people just get it straight away and I now help them with coaching cards. So you can see how you've got Hey Sun's model and then the six solution tools as well on there and that's the starting point and then it's my de-star. So these are their prompts and I've incorporated questions from everywhere. You know, I've picked, I've picked, everyone's good questions and put them together in that and I just find start with that simple four quadrup model where do you need to direct the conversation and people just pick that up so easily. Yeah, that's the best way to start. And I actually went to a session a couple of weeks ago because I'm right into sustainability and it was called, was it called, I was trying to think climate, fresh, no climate, something. Anyway, I went to this sustainability session to learn about, oh, it was circular economy collage and it was put on by it's a not-for-profit group called People for Nature and I highly recommend everybody do this three hour session and they've also got a climate version of it as well. And it looks about what's the difference between the linear economy and the circular economy and it's actually raising people's awareness around, well, what can you do at a local level to actually look at the impact of buying new clothes and where is it come from and how sustainable is it and you really need it. Like it's starting to question your mindset or what we've used to value, not even think about the impact it has on us consuming more clothes or consuming cups of coffee and where does the coffee cup, the polystyrene cup come from and it's starting to raise, I don't think solution focus can help with that because it's start with what's important to you now and are you doing any of that? So my mindset has shifted so much around purchasing new clothes. Do I really need it? I don't need the latest season things. I've got perfectly good clothes. I've had to really shift the way I think about consuming because it's not helpful for us because we're going to run out of water if we all keep consuming in that way. But I'm thinking of learning to be a facilitator for that program and I thought, oh, how could I weave in solution focus there because people are already doing a lot and being aware that's the starting point. How do we build on that? I think that's that's so cool because like I remember us sitting down in a room in Roseville, you know, starting when we just discovered this solution focus stuff and we were trying to weave it into things we were already doing and so you've this conversation has kind of gone from, well, he's where we started and then I this is how I do it with one-to-one, then I do it with groups, then I do it with collaboration and then, oh, world leaders had learned more from this and now we're kind of a climate change and how can we infuse all this sort of stuff. What was that moment, right? Back in 2011 and I know you went and did some training but what was that moment where you went as a coach and a trainer and something shifted. You've described it really well in Dubai, what happened and people in your training but what was it for you that made that switch? I think the key shift was when I did Mark McGurgo's 16-week online program, never done online learning before, but the culture that Mark created in terms of the learning community and supporting others learning, you know, I think the criteria you might remember, yeah, literally the me Jason, but you had to comment, you had to to blog about what you'd learned about and what you thought about questions that Mark was posing and then you had to comment on two or three other people's blogs, but you had to comment or what you appreciated about what they put in there. I had never experienced a learning community that was so inclusive and so supportive and celebrating each other's learning. There was no hierarchy. There it was all about supporting each other to learn and that's when I was sold on it. It was like there's something in this that you can create this by appreciating what everyone brings and that often gets ignored. Absolutely, I remember, remember you're talking about a firms regularly after that and I love the way now that you're thinking globally about that. Like I saw the beginning of the journey and I was privileged enough to walk six or seven years of that journey with you and then we've had this big gap and now you're way out here like we can change the world. We believed it back here. We found something that could change the world and now you're actually thinking about how do I infuse it into a three-hour session if I become a facilitator for this and there's a beautiful through line in all of that as we grow the approach grows with us. Yes and it's interesting you say that Jason because what I see now is in terms of leadership development it has to be on a system level. That's why I've sort of moved away from I'm doing less and less one to one. I only really want to work with people who are like the elite athletes of the leadership world. Because you can see great impact that they can have on a system. But yeah there's always connect you can't impact one work with one person who's going back into a system that's not supporting them. And so yeah even yesterday I was briefed on a piece of work to work with a particular principle because you know they haven't got the right leadership ability and I said so what impact is the board having you know because they saying oh they haven't got that they're not focused on the priorities so well how are you supporting them to know what those priorities they can't just work it out themselves. So yeah I'm always looking at how can we broaden this to have a bigger impact on how the system works and then there's another piece of work. I love what the Teal movement did in the political world here this coalition of the willing you know I think that can happen in organisations as well to change culture and there's one group of women. I'm working going to be working with in a solution focus way to how can they infiltrate and change the culture of this organisation from being male dominated and competitive to being collaborative and inclusive because that style of leadership isn't being recognised as being a worth so how can we work together to help infiltrate it to shift it over and yeah that's going to be an interesting project to work on. I'm really interested in what you've learnt about what works at engaging at that systems level. I'm interested to hear your thoughts on you know we're all love to get in and work with organisations. I think the question is often how do we you know how do we get in and work with big organisations to you know to change some of those things at a systems level and definitely we've had some really good discussions on here with people about how they're doing that but you're really interested to hear your thoughts on what you've found work or what works in engaging at organisations and systems at that kind of level. I think it's getting the wise open mindset leader that can see we've got to do things differently and so it's tapping into finding that person and they're then able to influence the rest of the organ in terms of how it's going to be. So for instance, this work in Dubai, one guy that's responsible for safety, he came on to one of my public programs and he just said, "Oh my God, this is amazing." So he went back then and went, "We've all got to do this." And so that it took, it took 18 months of influencing for him to go, "You got to get an net over to run this workshop." And it was so funny at the end of the first day, this guy's boss sent him a text message and said, "You've still got your job." So he was pretty wrapped with a day. You know, it was a risk for them to fly me over and twice to do it. Yeah, I think that's the key. You just get one person who can see the light and then it just has a ripple effect from there. It's getting that open-wise person to go, "You know what, I think there's something in this." It makes me wonder, because often you'll meet someone who's interested in doing some work. But they don't have the wise open mindset. They have the problem fixing mindset. Come in and help me fix it. And it makes me think about that idea of customer visitor complainant and Steve DeShay's writing about it and then saying, "Well, everyone's a customer for something, but it's our job to find out what that is." So how do you, I'm just curious. How have you noticed when someone might come to you with that sort of, "Come and help me fix this team or fix this organisation or fix this culture?" How do you use solution focus to help them move into that wise open space? I think for yesterday was a good example of what they came with of what they thought the solution was, of why they wanted me, just to work with this one person, one leader. And I went, "Yeah, I'm wondering if there's a bigger issue here." Yeah, so it's more what I bring into the conversation to raise the awareness of the bigger system. Yep. So they've come in. And the sponsor of the coaching came in with saying, "This is what we need to do. I want you to do this." And I think it's better if it's someone external to that particular system, education system. And I said, "I'm wondering if it's something different." So I think it's the curiosity of this could be a different problem. Yeah. So let's explore what else is going on in the system. So it starts from that initial conversation and having the, I think for all consultants, it's having the soft front-firm back of going, I think this might be a different problem that you're trying to solve here. Yeah. And having the willingness to hold up the mirror and go, "I'm hearing something different." But the curiosity to go and lightness of touch, you know, I remember Mark McGurgo years ago running a workshop. He said, "You want to be the butterfly consultant? You don't want to be the locusts." Yeah. Yeah. So I might be the right fit for you. But here's what I'm seeing from what you've said. And she went, "Oh my God, I can't believe I didn't see that." You know? So it starts at the initial conversation. So they, that's a great example of she had a fixed idea. Of this is how we're going to solve this. And I brought in my thinking to it. So, you know, we're both working at collaborating to solve this, rather than I'm the expert consultant and I'm going to come in and tell you what you need to do. We're going to co-create it together. What's the best way forward? And as it turned out, where we ended it, it was like, "No, I think you need to have an issue." You need to have an initial conversation with the board chair and the principal separately. So that we can see what the best solution is. It might be what we first thought. Yeah. So that co-creation of what solution focus brings is what's really important. And people, people get surprised, particularly in corporate settings. They get surprised that you want to co-create it with them of how we're going to solve that. Because so many consultants operate from, "I'm the expert, I know best, and I'm going to tell you what to do." And one piece of work I did years ago was Lang O'Rourke, the construction company, and we started off having a pilot program of, you know, a leader as coach program. And then they went, "Oh, we want to do so many more." And it kept growing. It was like 13 workshops later. But he, from the initial pitch, because that to pitch for that work. And there were, you know, three other big consulting firms that came in. And the key sponsor of the program went, "No, I think I can work best with you." Because you didn't come in going, "I'm going to solve it for you. I'm going to tell you what to do. Let's co-create it together." I think that's fascinating, because it's, that, here's the way I'm hearing it. You know, people are so used to us problem solving mindset that they look for the expert to come in and fix the problem for them. And yet, we decide to show up differently to those conversations. And so they can't quite be the way they used to be. That's right. That's exactly right. Because your modeling, how to be open, curious, interested, not fixed on, this is what's going to happen, because I'm an expert, not been doing this for years. It's that, it's that beginner's mind, and that openness to be curious around, how do they do it here? And what my best work here. Awesome. You know what? Nine times out of ten is exactly same approach. And now one of the things that we really wanted, when we, when we started the podcast, was for people who listened to it to be able to walk away with something that they can go try. When I first started getting into solution focused, I found Alfie and Dominic's podcast, and that was kind of my, my go to, I learned stacks from that, and I'd, you know, learn something, or then I'd go read something, and I'd try it out. And anyway, so one of the things was, we really wanted to create a resource for, you know, for listeners that they can, you know, go learn something, and then go try it. What could you teach our listeners that they could go away and try in their, you know, in their worlds? Oh, look, I think it's the opening question. Yeah. How, how will you know that this conversation's been useful for you? Yeah. Tomorrow, the next day, like, how will you know? Yeah. Start with that. And then the follow-up question is what difference would that make if you're able to get that? Just, just those two questions. And it'll change the whole way they interact with people. Very cool. Absolutely. Direction, destination. How will you know? Gives a direction. What difference will it make? Gives the description of the destination. Well, love it. Is there anything that you'd like to cover or say that we haven't asked about? Once you get into the solution-focused world, start connecting with all these amazing human beings. You know, you had Victoria on, like, what an amazing person she is in terms of in a war. She can still be solution-focused, like, it's incredible. And tap into solution-focused in organizations that are 24 hour conference, all those recordings on YouTube. You can learn so much, just like you said, Dion, I listened to all, I couldn't wait for Elfian Dominic's podcast to come out, you know, because that was brilliant. So, yeah, tap into all those resources that are already there. And then the other is, you know, like we do for the ASF-A, the Australasian solution-focused association. We have a monthly, some practice solution-focused, the cafe conversations, which we try and do once a month. And that's so good. because I learned so much by being coached by another solution focused practitioner, whatever that's setting there from. So yeah, do, do look out for those things, I'd be saying. And you may want to put those links in the show notes. Yeah. I think that's a great kind of rap because you've said way back at the beginning of the conversation, it was just this horizontal, like you were put in the biggest room in Oxford, you know, and you realize there was no hierarchy. And then the thing that shifted for you personally was on marks course where everyone was the expert. There was no hierarchy there. So yeah, come and try out the things that are available, connect with the community because if you ask a question, you're probably going to get some answer, direction, or some connection out of it. So good. Exactly. Thanks a net. It's taken us a little while to get here, but so glad that we finally did. Thank you. Yeah, thanks for your time and appreciate, you know, your wisdom and thoughts and, and ideas. I'll be going away to ponder some more for sure. Awesome. Thank you. I've enjoyed listening to all the other episodes. So thank you for inviting me on. I really appreciate it. 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