In this episode of The Dietitian Success Podcast, we cover the following questions about coaching and dietetic practice:
- Phrasing open-ended coaching questions
- How to combine the coach approach with motivational interviewing and what the overlap is
- How do you set the stage for a coaching relationship?
- Is every client or patient is appropriate for this coaching?
- Asking follow-up questions after someone gives a response to a more self-reflective question
- Scope of practice for coaching vs. therapy
- How do you respond to a patient that starts off an appointment with, “I just want to know the do’s and don’ts, what to eat and what not to eat”?
- How do you approach this method when clients are quiet or they say, “I don’t know”, or they give really limited responses
Links:
- The DSC Nutrition Counseling & Coaching Certificate doors are open again! Check out the program information (pricing, components, etc.) & join here
Episode Transcript:
Welcome to the Dietitian Success Podcast. I’m Krista, the founder of Dietitian Success Center, an online learning platform for RDs and students. I am on a mission to help more dietitians build confidence and expertise in running successful, profitable businesses. I went to business school so you don’t have to.
My team and I have grown DSC to a platform that serves hundreds of members. We’ve experimented with all types of marketing, tech, sales strategies, productivity tools, systems, and more. And we want to spill the tea on what’s working, what’s not, and how you can leverage our insights to kickstart, expand, or elevate your own business.
Ready to dive into your business school crash course? If so, let’s get started.
Hey there and welcome to a new episode of the dietician success podcast. So last week I did a live webinar. On the coach approach for dietician. So if you have been listening to this podcast for a little while, you know, that I have been doing some of my own personal and professional development in the area of coaching and actually going through the process of. The training required to become an ICF credentialed coach, which is ICF is the international coaching Federation.
It’s basically like the sort of like a regulatory body for coaching. Now, coaching is not a regulated industry. So there actually isn’t a regulate regulatory body, but. It is essentially the body that oversees. Ensuring that there are quality coaches out there essentially. And so, I’m doing this for my own personal and professional development because I really see I’ve worked with coaches before, and I see a lot of value in terms of what coaches can offer, whether it comes to business or like business coaching, executive coaching. Life coaching, all of these different aspects of coaching. And I wanted to learn. How coaching can be applied back to dieticians and dietetics. And what perhaps coaching skills we can take from the coaching profession and bring back to the work that we do.
And so last week I did a webinar on just some of the things that I’ve learned so far, just sharing some of the things that I’ve learned, and some of my thoughts on how these principles or practices can be applied back to. Dieticians. And so if you want to give that a listen, it’s actually last week’s episode.
So episode 180 8 of this podcast, you can listen to the recording of the live webinar. But if we’re bringing this back to a business perspective I actually haven’t done a live webinar in a long time. Probably since before I got pregnant. I just, haven’t done one for a long time and live webinars can be a really great way to bring more people into your world, essentially to get in front of more people, which is essentially what we’re trying to do whenever we’re trying to. Market ourselves, but I love. I love webinars like this, because it’s a way to do it in a very leading with value kind of a way.
So it’s like, yeah, let’s get in front of more people with this really amazing topic. Give a ton of value in this type of a session. And bring people into our world at the same time. And so one of the interesting things that I observed and really wasn’t sure about before this webinar was I think post pandemic, there was a little bit of a. Webinar’s got really big during COVID during the pandemic, because of course we were all sitting at home and had more time to hop on a webinar.
So I think that. We got a little bit webinar exhausted. Post pandemic. And so I really wasn’t sure whether there would be interest in a free webinar. Uh, anymore. And interestingly, we found quite the opposite. So it was really cool to see we had over 300 people register for the free webinar. And what was even cooler is to see that, but 115 people actually attended live, which you might think, well, that’s less than 50%. Trust me.
That’s pretty good. For a live webinar. You know, so many people will sign up for a live webinar and then things will come up on the day of, and they’ll think, oh, I’m just going to catch the recording. Like that happens all the time. So, I’m really happy with that number. I think that’s great.
The number of people that attended live, but then also the number of people that would have watched the recording after or listened to the recording through this podcast. So anyways, I think this is just a note that webinars are not dead. Particularly if you’re choosing a compelling enough topic that people are actually interested in learning about. And you can provide a ton of value through a free webinar.
So. One of the things that we did learn with the webinar. And I hope that this, if this was you, then I apologize. But we actually used Vimeo as our webinar software. Because it is a platform we already pay for because we host our videos, our course videos on Vimeo, and they have the ability to offer webinars.
And so we wanted to experiment with using their webinar feature. And unfortunately what happened is. Which was frustrating and we didn’t, we tested this and this didn’t come up. It only came up during the actual live webinar. Where. When people joined the webinar, they actually had to refresh their browser in order for the live. Feed to show up on there.
So they would sign in. To the webinar that would access the webinar and then they’d have to press refresh in order to actually join the live feed, which is so annoying. So, yeah, that was frustrating. We tested in that never came up, but you know what, it’s also just a reminder that, Hey, now we know for next time to give people a reminder, send people a reminder via email before the session.
Hey, you may have to refresh your back browser in order to access the webinar. So anyways, it’s always just learning that tech can provide you with some headaches sometimes, but it’s okay. It’s all an opportunity to learn and do better next time. Okay. So we definitely want to keep doing webinars like this in the future.
So. And I know the word webinar is incredibly boring, so I have to think of a better word to. To describe these types of sessions, but But yeah, if you have any ideas for events like this in the future topics that you’d want to see topics, you’d be interested in, please share them with us. Reach out on Instagram at dietician success center.
We’re always open to hearing ideas. That’s really where we come up with. Our ideas is sourced from our audience and what the needs are. So yeah, check out the episode from last week. If you want to actually listen to the recording. And then the other thing we decided to do is from that recording, if there were, or from that session, that live session, if there were questions asked, instead of addressing them during the webinar, we actually took all of those questions.
We discussed them as a team and we said, we’ll share them in this episode of the podcast. So that’s what this episode is for, is to provide some answers and thoughts to some of the questions that came up during the session. And so to follow up on that, so. Regardless of whether you attended the session or have listened to this session.
I think that there’s a lot of value shared in these questions and these answers in terms of how dieticians can use tactics from the world of coaching. Within their practice. And so the one thing I do want to clarify before we get into this, episode is. The context in which we’re talking about coaching.
And so I’m talking about coaching as a skillset that can be used by dieticians as a technique that can be used by dieticians. Very much like motivational interviewing. In fact, there’s so much overlap between the two. And we’ll talk about that in a little bit. But it is, we’re talking about it in relation to a skillset, something that really any dietician can use. Whether it’s with patients or clients, but also with colleagues, with friends, with partners, with kids, some of the examples that we gave. In the webinar, we’re actually in relation to personal relationships and how you can use the coach approach in personal relationships.
So, that is what we’re talking about. That is really the context in which we are talking about. Now, the conversation around practicing as a nutrition coach versus a dietician. And whether or not coaching allows you to work outside of your state or your provincial licensing and registration boundaries.
That’s not what we’re talking about here. That is a whole other topic. That is a whole other topic, which we can save for another episode. And that gets more into like scope of practice, how you define what you’re doing, your boundaries, all of those pieces. That’s actually a completely different conversation.
So we are talking about the skill or the art of coaching here, which is really genuine listening and asking self-reflective questions. And so the principles of this can be really incorporated into any setting. And they’re really techniques that anyone can use when working with, or talking to other people in general.
And so, some of the questions that I’m going to address in this episode today is there was a question around phrasing coaching questions that I will talk about. We’ll talk about how to combine the coach approach with motivational interviewing and what the overlap is. We talk about the question was, would you recommend preparing this coaching approach?
When patients first ask, what can I expect in this dietician appointment? So, how do you set the stage for a coaching relationship? Do you feel every client or patient is appropriate for this method? Someone asked the question or made the statement. I always worry that I won’t know what to say after someone gives a response to a more self-reflective question.
So how do we respond to that without going outside of scope? How do you respond to a patient that starts off an appointment with, I just want to know the do’s and don’ts what to eat and what not to eat for pre-buy prediabetes or whatever the other medical condition is. So what you could say to that, And We’ll talk about how do you approach this method when clients are quiet or they say, I don’t know, or they give really limited responses. And yeah, that is what we’re going to get into.
So what we did is we collaborated on these responses as a team to provide some more Yeah, just to, to provide a balanced perspective to provide some different approaches. But I think that it’s always important to remember too, that these are ideas, these are just some thoughts, but there’s always going to be room to explore and dig deeper, .
And, I’m still very much in the learning phase of coaching. So this is my take on what I’ve learned so far. Far and thoughts on how we can bring this back to dietetics. I think that the coach approach and coaching as a profession feels still feels very new.
And I feel like we’re still uncovering a lot about it. And we’ve sort of only just started to talk about what it looks like for dieticians. So I’m excited to just introduce this topic and start. Having some of those discussions and asking some of those questions around how can dieticians use coaching techniques.
So with that, let’s get into the questions.
Question number one was in relation to an example of a coaching question that we provided in the webinar, which was. Exploring somebodies blocks. So a block is a feeling, a thought, a belief that someone has that we can then probe and explore a little bit deeper into. And so the coaching question was. Positioned as I heard and then insert whatever that block is.
So in the example that we provided it was, I heard struggle. Tell me more about that. So the question was, can we rephrase a sentence? Like I heard struggle to, I heard you say struggle. Tell me more about that. And I think that this is just a really good reminder that with all of this, there’s no hard and fast rules. Coaching is essentially the art of asking self-reflected self-reflective open-ended questions. And so we can use these questions as building blocks to define our own style.
And how, you know, for me, one of the things I’m doing is as I’m going through my coaching training every week, I listen for. Different questions that other coaches ask that I really like. And I add those to a list that I have a growing list of questions, which is becoming my coaching repertoire.
And that’s going to be different than anyone else’s coaching repertoire. And so I personally, I like to use. I like to say, I heard the word X or I heard struggle. Uh, tell me more about that. I don’t know. I think for whatever reason, I find that it almost helps me feel like I’m bringing neutrality and objectivity to the word. So something to be explored with curiosity. But I think it’s totally up to you here.
And it’s a part of this process is understanding that this is you know, this is a framework there’s no hard and fast rules. We can take these questions and we can make them our own. And we can try them out one way or the other and see what it provokes and see what ends up happening when you ask it one way versus another way. Question number two was, do you combine the coach approach with motivational interviewing and how do they overlap?
Yeah, so there’s actually so much overlap here. So in both approaches, they’re both very much client centered. They rely on active listening. They rely on collaborating with the individual. They rely on goal setting action planning in a very non-judgemental way. And I think some of the key differences is that motivational interviewing does typically apply to health scenario.
So it’s typically something used in the health world. Whereas coaching is actually more broadly applied. So we have different facets of coaching. We have health coaching, life coaching, executive coaching, business, coaching leadership, coaching. It really can go on and on and on. And so coaching. Ends up being a bit more. Applied a bit more broadly. Now I think, uh, the other thing with motivational interviewing is that motivational interviewing can be more directive in nature.
So there’s more emphasis on asking questions, but also giving feedback with permission, whereas in a true coaching session, a true 100% coaching. Session, which I talk about in last week’s episode. You actually don’t provide any feedback or advice like the coach does not provide any feedback or advice.
So I think that’s been a really interesting key difference to kind of explore and to understand. I think one of the other things too, is that when we talk about motivational interviewing or learn about motivational interviewing in, in some of the definitions of motivational interviewing, they talk about how. There’s really an emphasis on overcoming ambivalence. Whereas I think more often in coaching because it’s not always used in a healthcare environment, typically people will seek out a coach because they’ve chosen to, they want to, and I don’t think that this is always the case in a counseling or in a dietician scenario.
So those are, I think motivational interviewing has been crafted to address some of those. Challenges. And so motivational interviewing, we know there’s the, the oars approach, right. Which is stands for open-ended questions, affirmations, reflections, and summaries. And I think we’re coaching really shines is actually in the O category because coaching is really all about. Those open-ended questions. And so what I really like about coaching is that it provides more ideas for asking open-ended questions, but then also, how do we follow up on those questions? And then I think the other thing too, with motivational interviewing is that. It can be more directive towards a specific nutrition goal.
Whereas coaching, you don’t really know where a coaching session will take you and it can take you in any different direction. And so there’s a lot of overlap, but I think that’s also why I like to take the approach of taking principles from coaching and thinking, okay, how do we apply this back to dietetics practice and motivational interviewing versus thinking about them as two separate things?
I don’t think they are two separate things. And especially if we’re talking about coaching. As a skillset that can be used in different scenarios in different ways. But yeah, I feel like coaching really shines in the old category, the open-ended questions and giving you those ideas for open-ended questions.
Cause I know that’s always been a struggle for me. Is that how do I know the right way to ask things or. What is the right way to ask things or what is the right way to follow up? When somebody says something. That’s always been challenging for sure. So the next question was, would you recommend preparing this coaching approach when a patient first asks, what can I expect in this dietician appointment? This is my first time with the dietician. I think this is always a great idea to set the stage for expectations.
What someone can expect when you work together. And my. Teacher for my coaching training. She was talking about how, whenever she meets with a client or a prospective client during a discovery call, she always talks about what she does do and what she doesn’t do. In order to ensure that alignment.
So for her, she always makes sure to say, I don’t provide you with advice. So that if somebody is looking for that, then that’s not the right service for them or the right service provider for them. And so I what this could look like for you is saying something like. I won’t just tell you what to eat or give you a prescriptive meal plan because, you know, from my experience, I know that this approach just isn’t the most effective.
So. My approach is really understanding your unique goals, your internal motivators, your unique behaviors in order to come up with a plan that will work for you. And as part of that approach, there is going to be an opportunity for some self-reflection and kind of diving into your internal motivators and why you do the things you do and what can you do in the future in order to achieve your goals.
And so that could be a way that you frame that, but. I think that, yeah, absolutely getting clear on what you do
and what you don’t do
Is helpful in any scenario.
The next question was, do you feel every client or patient is appropriate for this method? So I, again, I think just to reinforce the answer to the first question, I don’t feel like coaching is a hard and fast method, right? It’s a technique. That you can take pieces from and use in different scenarios.
It’s simply how you’re framing and asking questions. And so I think the degree to which you use it is going to vary. Based on the patient and how receptive they are or how open they are to self-reflection how open they are to you and your questions, how. Much trust they have and willingness they have to open up.
And I think we’ve all seen examples of where this can take time to happen. And so I think it’s just a case by case basis. And really, again, Taking principles from this approach and making them your own based on what you feel is the right approach for that individual client.
The next question was I always worry that I won’t know what to say. After someone gives a response to a deeper, more self-reflective question. Or even that their response may be beyond my scope. So I think this is really where having your coaching toolkit or your question toolkit can come into play.
And so we have a, a counseling program that we, offer through dietician success center. And as part of that, we have this digital and print workbook, which has. A list of different questions, these open-ended questions. And one of the things that I’ve been doing through my coaching practice is I’ve been taking questions that I’m seeing other coaches ask or I’m reading about, and I’m writing them out.
I’m coming up with my own question bank that I can use and rely on. When I’m in these scenarios, I can try them out and see what happens, because I think this is very much a practice, right? It’s something that we have to practice and we have to test and we have to learn. And so there are certain questions that I will be curious about using myself to see where the direction takes us.
And so I think this is really the question answering, like I said before, the asking open-ended questions and then the followup questions is really. Where principles of coaching shine. And so. I’ll share some of those questions that I’ve been using and practicing and testing out. And you can feel free to write those down.
If they resonate with you. But, I think that in these scenarios, when somebody talks about what somebody responds to your open-ended deeper question, there’s this important aspect of validation. So thank you so much for sharing that. I can tell that you’re feeling really strongly about this, about wanting to make these changes. And then some of the followup questions I’ve really been liking are one of them is what assumptions might you be making in this scenario?
So I think this is really a cool question to have somebody actually challenge their own assumptions, thinking that they’re assuming something to be true, which may actually not be true. The question of what evidence do you have to support that? I love this question and I use this question a lot in my personal life, too. Right.
When we kind of jumped to these dramatic statements about things that are happening in our life. And it’s like, okay, but you know, what evidence do you actually have to support that? Or I’m doing a bad job at this. And it’s like, okay, but do you actually have any evidence to support that? I love the question.
What’s the best outcome in this scenario. And what is within your control here? I like that one too. Bringing it back to what is within your control? What can you actually do here? And, uh, I think that a great way that we’ve learned in coaching to be able to redirect them back to the nutrition issue, which is what we’re talking about at the beginning. Is asking the question.
So if somebody is sharing then asking the question. Okay. So how does this relate back to the initial goal that we set at the beginning of X? Whatever that nutrition goal is.
And so let’s take a minute here and just talk about the scope piece, because one of the biggest aha moments for me when we talked about scope of practice for coaching versus therapy, was that. Coaching is focused on present and future. So what is happening today and how can we move forward? Versus therapy is retrospective.
So it is looking at the past diving into the past. Asking probing questions around the past and how that has influenced who you are today.
And so when we start to get into that past area, That could be an indication that that’s not an area that we want to explore further, because that is the scope of therapy. And so, let’s say something like that comes up something that the client starts talking about, something that was happening in their past. It can be a good opportunity to redirect back to, okay.
So let’s bring it back to the original goal. The initial goal that we set out in this session. And then saying something later on in the session, like, or wrapping up the session by saying, Hey, you know, I know we touched today on some of your childhood, some of the things that have come up for you in the past.
Do you currently meet with a therapist or have you ever considered it? And then saying something like, you know, a part of my role is just around referring to other healthcare professionals. When I hear something come up that I think could be worked on with another professional, would you be open to some suggestions?
Here are some, some referrals here. And so I think that could be a great way to be able to. Then make sure that they’re getting the help and support that they need without you diving into those areas that are outside of scope.
The next question is, how do you respond to a patient that says, or that starts off the appointment with, I just need to know the do’s and don’ts what to eat and what not to eat for prediabetes or whatever the medical condition is. So in response to this, as a team, we were talking about how we feel like what people say they need versus what they actually need or what actually happens can be quite different. So, an example from my. Coaching that I’ve been doing lately, is that. I was working with somebody who originally. We had talked about coming up with some nutrition planning for endurance sports because that’s an area that I have, done myself and. To this point.
We haven’t even talked about that yet because there’s been so many other things that have come up. It’s been, it’s taken so many different directions when we started to actually understand some of the root challenges for this individual. And I think that this becomes more clear as you start talking and you start asking questions. So I think in these scenarios, you know, it can be a great opportunity to validate and say, okay, great.
Let’s see where this session takes us. And then and then moving forward from there and seeing what comes up, this came up in our Q and a actually that we do for the counseling program. And it was the question of like, what do you do when somebody says, I just want a meal plan. And I think what’s important here is to. Question those assumptions around what is someone’s definition of a meal plan?
Do they even know what that means? Maybe your definition and their definition is different. Maybe they just want meal ideas. And this is something that you can start to explore. Then as you start to probe into these questions and to be self reflective questions, and it kind of brings up that quote. And I’ve heard this a few times and maybe you’re familiar with it, but. People come to you for what they want, but you give them what they need. And it sort of highlights this idea that while clients may initially seek out services or guidance for specific surface level things, It’s really the practitioner’s role to help them uncover and address those deeper underlying needs that are going to lead to more meaningful, more sustainable changes.
The next question. How do you approach this method with clients who are quiet or say, I don’t know, or don’t give much of an explanation. And I actually asked this during my coaching training because. We’ve all been there. Right? We’ve all had that individual who is maybe more quiet or. Or perhaps they’ve been told to come and see you, and they’re not necessarily they’re enthusiastically. And so the suggestion that was given to me, which I think is really. Great is.
responding back with something like, okay, I’m here to support you. And we have about an hour of time today. So how can I best support you? And the reminder I was given as well is being okay with some silence. No, not feeling like you immediately need to jump in. Uh, and move into problem solving mode, being okay with silence and creating the space for someone to be able to think and respond. And Maria from our team, she gave a great suggestion too.
She said, you could even say something like now, if you’re not sure we can just sit on that for a minute and see what might come up for you or. You know, would it be helpful if I rephrased the question and you could try asking the question in a different way, if there’s a question that you’ve asked that they’ve responded, I don’t know, too.
So I think also the acknowledgement that. Openness and being open doesn’t always happen for every person on day one. And sometimes it takes time. And I remember hearing about this example of, a coach who was working in a scenario where they were working with people that didn’t necessarily choose to come and work with them.
And. They had mentioned that it took, a good three or four sessions for someone to really start to open up and then they started to really get somewhere. And so, yeah, I think it can be a progressive journey for some people and that’s okay. And that’s a normal part of the process.
All right. I hope you enjoyed this episode. And I hope that it’s been interesting following along on my journey in coaching and sharing what I have been learning. And applying that back to your own practice. And if you’re interested in learning more about our counseling program, make sure and check that out.
The link is in the description of this episode. And otherwise I am really excited for next week’s episode. I recorded it an interview with a dietician earlier this week, and it was a really great interview about her experience, um, building her insurance-based dietetic, private practice from working out of a gym, building up her client base, and then transitioning that into her own in-person practice at virtual practice.
So such a great episode, so excited to share that with you that.
We’ll come out next Thursday. All right. So I hope you have an awesome week and I will see you next Thursday.
