Analysing business coaching: Using modal density as a methodological tool

Abstract

AbstractIn this article I present an analysis of three extracts from a business coaching session captured on video. In business coaching the coach aims to help the client generate solutions to their own issues, often by finding different perspectives. However, there has been a lack of empirical studies focusing on the coaching interaction. Here I set out firstly to describe how the coach carried out the act of coaching, and to illustrate the use of higher and lower-level actions and modal density to focus on the detail of an (inter)action, while not losing sight of the whole. I analyse all the relevant communicative modes (Norris, 2011a), and focus closely on specific lower-level actions in the interaction. I use modal density (Norris, 2004) as a methodological tool to consider these lower-level actions as constituents of higher-level actions, and as a measure of participants’ relative engagement in various higher-level actions. Overall, I show that modal density and lower and higher-level actions can be used as useful tools for the analysis of business coaching at the level of the interaction.