The Triangular Contract for Coaches
Finding your way through collective contract complexity

In general, the triangular contract concept illustrates the complexity of three-way formal agreements and partnerships.  In coaching, three-way negotiations characteristically occur when dealing with clients who belong to such systems as families, corporations, teams and other social and professional organizations. 

This article first develops some of the original reflections permitted by the triangular contract concept and then proposes means to map out more complex webs of relationships common to indirect and prescribed coaching situations.   The main background references for the text and terms below are from Systems Analysis on the one hand and from the triangular contract concept from Transactional Analysis first developed by Fanita English on the other.

Beyond the coaching field, we suggest that other communication and relationship professionals such as consultants, trainers, therapists, social workers, etc. pay the triangular contract concept developed below all the attention it merits as it also immensely useful in those related fields.

We would also like to stress that one of the best ways to explore the complexities and specific issues a communication professional regularly faces when negotiating triangular contracts and agreements is to engage in individual or collective supervision sessions.  These practical learning environments for communication and relationship professionals offer excellent opportunities to work on the complexity of such three-way professional situations and clarify the numerous ethical issues that may arise.  

In the coaching profession, the triangular contract concept reveals possible strategic interactions between a coach on the one hand, and several other significant actors within the client organization or system, on the other.  The interactions in these complex situations include more than two interfacing people or groups and often involve a high level of personal or collective energy.  The triangular contract concept can be useful to reveal and work with multiple hidden agendas, political objectives, strategic goals and personal expectations.

Note that this presentation on the concept differs from the original proposed by Fanita English.  The original concept was more appropriate to illustrate the triangular relationship between a social worker, a prescribing judge and designated asocial clients who were to be both accompanied and monitored by social workers to help their social reinsertion.  The model proposed below is more adapted to corporate contexts and particularly concerns prescribed training, consulting and coaching contracts.  Obviously and by extension, the triangular contract can also  be used to help clarify a host of other tripartite agreements.

• Example: Imagine a corporate HR who calls on a coach or consultant to have them implement a coaching, training or consulting process for the benefit of a designated third party such as a person, group or team within a given organization.

The three roles mentioned above could be played by a number of different people or functions in analogical triangular situations similar to the one described.

• The HR representative is the  “contact”.  This role can also be held by a buyer, or a hierarchic decision maker or leader. 
  
• Depending on situations, the “coach”  position could be held by any provider, consultant, trainer, external expert or internal functional support staff. 
  
• The designated third party or “target” can be an employee, a manager, a system such as a team, or a more informal group such as employees, the personnel, the audience, etc.

To initiate our reflection on the triangular web of relationships between the above cthree ategories of actors, we suggest the following figure.  It is a triangle with one of the categories of actors positioned at each of the angles.

This triangular configuration of the tree-way contract illustrates the fundamentally different position held by the coach, the consultant or external provider.  This person or team is normally positionned outside of the organization represented by the dotted line, or in the case of a relationship with a functional support staff, external to the hierarchic executive line.   The other two actors or roles are usually more directly involved with each other within a vertical structure, their shared organizational context. Indeed, in most cases, the contact holds a position senior to the targeted individual or group.

Note that the sides of the triangle correspond to three distinct and oftentimes consecutive relationships or interfaces, as illustrated below.  The HR already knows the target and has a perception of the latter’s needs (relationship A).  The contact or HR then calls on and meets the coach, trainer or consultant to brief them on the target’s perceived needs (relationship B).  The coach then meets the target and works with them to attempt to satisfy those stated or predefined eeds (relationship C).

The A relationship not only precedes the other two, but may often rest on a long history.   Its nature is generally coherent with the organization’s culture and professional context prior to the coach’s or consultant's arrival.  In the triangular contract’s representation, this relationship is also considered more or less directly hierarchic: the target is subordinate to the contact’s organizational level if not directly reporting to the latter.

The B relationship takes place during the negotiation between the provider called in by the HR or contact.  At minimum and in most cases, the contact will detail the target’s needs and issues in the latter’s absence.  This formulation of the target’s needs and issues will serve as a foundation for the contract to the effect that the coach or supplier will often consider that the contact is, in effect, the real client, representing the organization's interests. 

The C relationship is the last one to enter into the picture, and the one that is often central to the operational dimension of triangular contract.  It is the relationship within which the supplier’s competencies are expected to be demonstrated, to the satisfaction of the contact’s defined needs.   This relationship takes place when the coach or consultant meets the target, possibly first implements a diagnosis and follows-up with the negotiated coaching, training or consulting process. 

Note that the three binary relationships or interactions illustrated above each include only two of the three actors.  Each relationship takes place in the absence of a different third party.   In turn, each actor is absent from the interaction between the other two and can consequently imagine or fantasize that a sort of secret coalition is being formed out of their presence or control.  The hidden relationships in the triangular contract leave enough space for each party to invent, suppose, or fantasize a risky secret coalition resting on a hidden agenda.  The following drawing illustrates the presence or nature of three possible types of triangular contract fantasies, each with its different set of secret objectives. 

Note that each of the three blind spots and the fantasies that may accompany them can be experienced very differently by different actors depending on whether the absent partner feels they are in a superior, dominant situation or in an inferior or fragile position compared to the two other actors. 

The consultant, coach or equivalent does not really know the nature of the relationship between the contact and the target before being invited into their context or environment (relationship A).   The coach could therefore imagine that there exists a strong conscious or unconscious coalition between the two.  This coalition could resti on a long-lasting historical culture proper to the system.  As most cultures, it could have an exclusive dimension, difficult to breach by outsiders.  The coach can fantasize, for instance that all the members of the client organization are protecting themselves from the external world and resistant to any influence that would provoke change in their professional stability. When it is perceived by the coach or consultant, this type of defensive partnership proper to the client organization is called a collusion coalition.

The collusion fantasy is sometimes confirmed by external coachs or consultants when they later indirectly discover information that is vital to their mission’s success but that was purposefully or accidentally omitted by the two internal actors during initial briefings. 

Likewise, the target person or group is not present during the external provider’s initial meetings with the contact.  This targeted person or designated group can fantasize about some hidden agenda items that may have an effect on their  success, career or professional context (relationship B).  The targeted individuals or group could mistrust the other two actors’  and their possible coalition. They could construe the existence of indirect manipulative or organizational objectives which could be contrary to their interests as a targeted person or group.  This fear or mistrust is called the target’s domination fantasy.

Note that the fact that the target person or group is designated as such by the internal contact rests on a diagnosis which very often establishes a need or an issue in the target’s absence and without their explicit approval.  Experience seems to confirm that numerous coaching, training and consulting programs designate scapegoat targets which may be considered responsible for organizational issues who’s systemic responsibility could be shared with much larger populations. 

Consequently, the fact that a coach or consultant agrees to focus on a specific target could be interpreted as an obvious proof that those external providers share a common secret diagnosis with the contact.  All seems to indicate that this preliminary diagnosis designates the target as being centrally responsible in some organizational issues.

Once the coach, consultant or trainer meets the target, the contact is moved out of the picture of onging interactions.  This third relationship (relationship C) operates out of the contact’s immediate control.  The contact could feel that it is necessary to keep an eye on this relationship so as to make sure it doesn’t get out of hand.  What if the external providers and target person or group come to an understanding that the designated organizational issues are of someone else’s responsibility?  What if they both agree to change the fragile equilibrium within the organization and point out that responsibilities for real positive and sustainable change lie elsewhere?   This possibility for a  coach-target coalition, perceived by the contact is called the subversive fantasy.

These three blind spots and the three corresponding fantasies give an indication of areas that call for special attention when negotiating and implementing contracts in complex organizational contexts.

The possible clarifications concerning the three hidden relationships illustrated by the triangular contract permit the elaboration of different constructive or protective strategies that could be implemented by the coach or consultant.   Consider the following strategies below which could be an integral part of any individual or collective coach contracting process in most corporate contexts: 

• The coach can insure transparency through the systematic use of written contracts that can be shared with all concerned parties.
• The coach can avoid meetings between the external provider or coach and the contact or hierarchy in the absence of the target or target representatives, from the start of the coaching program and throughout its evolution.
• The coach can establish numerous written briefs and share them between all the concerned parties throughout the unfolding of the coaching process.
• The coach can establish numerous tripartite meetings, at minimum at the onset and the end of the coaching process, and whenever there appears the need tor substantial contract modification. 
• The coach can get all parties to agree to precise measures and measure instruments to focus the coaching processon specific goals established by all the parties, ensuring the target’s success.
• The coach can establish confidentiality clauses that specify what remains confidential in the work with the target group, what can be shared, and how.

These and other standard operating procedures in coach contracting help keep designated coaching triangular relationships ethically and sustainably healthy in most organizational contexts.

The complexity of most real situations in the corporate world can often include a number of other hidden pertinent actors.  Coaches could well be advised that in a large number of situations, the above three-way contract could be extended to directily or indirectly involve some of these in order to achieve success in their accompaying process.

The coach, consultant or trainer could be a member of a larger organization, that may be at the origin of the contract negotiation, and that may have quite an infulence on its operational results on the longer run.  If the client is negociated by a fourth party, and then subcontracted or delegated, to the coach, the final coach or consultant in contact with the target may discover that needs and issues in the field do not correspond to the description of the stated mission, as described by the original negociation. 

The target person or group may be in daily contact with indirect beneficiaries such as clients for a salesperson, or personnel for a manager.  This -1 level, subordinate to the target person or group may even be at the origin of the defined coaching need, and may expect measurable results or ultimately be consulted to evaluate the effectiveness of the coaching process.

The target person or group may also have a leader or leadership group just above, different from the contact, in the original triangular relationship.  This is the +1 level, hierarchic to the target person or group. This level may be quite instrumental to the success of the coaching mission, if not the person or group mainly responsible for the expected measurable results.  Oftentimes, the main success factions for the target group and for the contact reside on this level in the organization.

The contact may also be under pressure from upper echelons in the organization, or from an immediately superior decision maker who is expecting visible results in predefined dimensions that may be of a more political or strategic nature.  The object of the coaching process may sometimes be tied to hidden interpersonal, confidential or political organizational issues which have not been clearly exposed to the contact, and which originate on that level.

In this all too common and complex environment, it may become very difficult for a coach or consultant to decide whom should be considered the real client.  This choice is often defined as opting for one of two options:

• Either the coach will consider that the hierarchy is paying and defining organizational vision, mission, objectives, goals and means.  Consequently the final word is top down and should be pronounced by the most hierarchical available actor in the system.
  
• Or the coach or consultant will consider that the designated target and lower echelons of the systems are the ones closest to being competent to defining their real needs.  According to this coach frame of reference these actors should consequently have the final word when defining operational coaching objectives.

Often, this choice is predictably related to the coach’s or consultant’s personal profile and professional preferences.  Does the coach personally identify with the employee or designated target, or does the coach identify with the organizational hierarchy and decision makers? 

Whatever the choice of sides, it is often the best way to become incompetent in the eyes of the other half of the system.  Indeed, it is generally observed that when coaches side with hierarchy, they loose credibility with the personnel, if they side with the personnel, they loose it with hierarchy.  On which side one should choose to play the game of coaching, or whom to favor when defining a coaching strategy is therefore the wrong way to put the question.

A more systemic answer for coaches is to consider serving the system rather than any single one of its members or representatives.  Each of the pertinent actors within the organization could or should be perceived by the coach as functional representatives of the organization as a system, regardless of each one's individual vision or personal interests.  

Consequently if coaches are ever to consider one person’s responsibility in any organizational issue or problem, they are to immediately consider every other pertinent actor’s responsibility in the same issue or problem.  If they are ever to compliment one actor on an achievement, they are to immediately underline every other actor’s participation in making that achievement possible.  This strategy is one which continuously consists in revealing and working with organizational interfaces rather than persons.  In effect, coaches should consider that they are paid to accompany the system rather than any individual.

Practically, this could go so far as to expand all prescribed coaching contracts to include sequences during which the coach would also work with the contact, the hierarchy, the absent beneficiaries, the initial contract negociator, the absent decision makers, etc.  In all contracts concerning designated clients, the more coaches officially include all the pertinent actors, the more they can transform potential scapegoating processes focused on individuals into system-orientedevolutionary processes involving shared responsabilities.

These last considerations about systemic coaching strategies are a step beyond the initial object of this article which is to share an understanding and possible uses of the triangular contract concept.  To conclude, however, consider that a good knowledge of the concept often permits a clear understanding of complex contractsing situations which include multiple significant actors, positions and strategies.  The triangular contact concept and  some of the variations and extensions explained above can help a consultant or coach gradually develop a perception of the bigger picture. This can help one gradually move from a purely individual coaching approach to one that accompanies more complex client organizations as coherent systems intrinsically worthy of attention.

For a systemic coach, organizational clients are not singular  people designated by internal contacts but an intricate web of relationships that need to be addressed as such.  Beyond the designated client or coachee, each person the coach meets or hears about can be a pertinent actor in the general system constellation and each of those needs to be perceived as totally responsible to ensure the success of the coaching mission.

Copyright 2008.  www.metasysteme.eu  Alain Cardon