Zooming in: Identifying fine-grained verbal dynamics that influence coachees' self-regulation statements during copreneur coaching sessions

Workplace coaching can enhance the performance and well-being of coachees. To identify key psychological mechanisms that contribute to the effectiveness and most proximal outcomes of coaching, we adopt a behavioural process perspective. This study investigates verbal dynamics in workplace coaching sessions with small business owners and their partners, so-called copreneurs. Using personality systems interaction theory, we examine which verbal statements and working alliance-indicative statements and patterns elicit goal-oriented self-regulation statements from coachees—an in-session indicator of active engagement with goal achievement. We included 20 heterosexual copreneurial couples, with one to three sessions analysed per couple, yielding a total of 29 videotaped coaching sessions. Using lag sequential analysis (N = 28,603 behaviours), we showed that working alliance verbalizations did not elicit coachees' self-regulation statements. Instead, coaches' provision of support and open questions elicited female coachees' self-regulation but not male coachees' self-regulation. Furthermore, we support the active coachee notion by emphasizing the facilitative effect of coachees' verbal engagement, such as self-disclosure and problem-focused or informative statements, on self-regulation statements. These findings contribute to our theoretical understanding of the verbal mechanisms that determine the effectiveness of coaching and key factors for practice, including gender differences and the importance of an active coachee.