My good friend Fiona McBride has recently become a qualified yoga teacher. She has blogged about how, somewhat unexpectedly, she had found a connection between her yoga teaching and her work as a facilitator and coach. You can read her post here https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/crossover-fiona-mcbride.

The post resonated strongly for me as a few years ago I qualified as a Personal Trainer. Completely removed, or so I thought, was this learning from my day to day HR and coaching work.

But not so much.

Good and less good people stuff has similarities – whether we are talking about work or wellbeing (or indeed both).

Too often, personal training tackles symptoms and not causes. You want to get fit? Here’s some cardio. Want to tone? Have some weights. Lose weight? Here’s a diet plan. All laudable, but the missing piece is what lies beneath – and is where you can make a real difference. One that will sustain.

Why someone put weight on in the first place. Why someone suddenly wants to change their lifestyle. How they got to where they are today. Motivation, commitment, will.

Goal setting, starting with why, starting with the end in mind, identifying success, asking good questions, understanding, encouragement, appropriate challenge. Individual coaching, personal training…. the two are often the same in terms of approach. That one takes place in a work setting and the other in a gym barely matters.

But in organisations too, we see similar themes. We see a problem and want a quick, shiny solution. We don’t always take the time to really understand the true nature of the issue or how we got to where we are. We don’t do the deep work. We don’t seek the evidence. Treating symptoms and not causes. Instead, we use unhelpful phrases like ‘we are where we are’.

Whether we are talking about a fitness regime or the latest change initiative, quick fixes don’t work, and neither does ignoring the journey to now.

Doing the deep work is what makes all the difference.