Coaching Toolkit: Balance coaching to find new perspectives

The power of mindset shifts and choice and a Tech and Tea balance coaching tool to guide you through uncertain times.

Sandy had been looking for a job for over a year.

She started off confident — she had solid experience and was ready to reenter the tech industry after a break with family. But after months of hearing nothing back, applying into a brutal market that seemed to prefer candidates without visa needs, that confidence began to thin. Not just about her ability to get a job, but about whether she even wanted one in tech anymore.

“It feels like being in a desert with no map,” she told me.

She’d spent years in tech, often the only woman on the team, often feeling like she needed to shout just to be heard. Now, she felt pressure to perform in new ways — to build a personal brand, to constantly self-promote — but it all felt very performative.

When you’re in a place like that — confused, wavering in confidence, a little lost — it’s hard to know what to do next.

This is just one situation where balance coaching can help find a way forward.

Balance Coaching and Mindsets

Balance coaching is one of my favorite Co-Active coaching tools for moments like this.

Simply put, balance coaching helps you name the perspective you’re currently holding — the one that’s shaping your experience — and then explore different ones. Ones that might help you see your situation more spaciously. Ones that give you more agency.

When we’re stuck inside a single lens, everything can feel high-stakes, high-pressure, and low-control. We think the way we’re seeing the world is the world.

But what if you could change the lens?

You’ve probably heard of growth vs. fixed mindset:

• Fixed: I’m either good at this or I’m not.

• Growth: I can improve through effort and learning.

Carol Dweck’s research shows that just introducing language aligned with a growth mindset shift changes how students take on challenging problems. Students who are exposed to language that reinforce a fixed mindset are more likely to give up when encountering challenges.

Other common shifts I’ve seen in coaching:

• Scarcity → Abundance
  → There’s not enough / I’m running out → There’s enough, or I can create more

• Victim → Agent
  → This is happening to me → I have a say in how I respond

• Judgment → Curiosity
  → Why am I like this? → What might this be showing me?

• Self-Criticism → Self-Compassion
  → I’m behind / failing → I’m doing my best in uncertain times

• Perfectionist → Experimenter
  → I need to get it right → I’m here to learn something

Want to try this for yourself?

In the next section, I’ll walk you through balance coaching step-by-step as applied to Sandy’s story — and an experimental AI coaching tool to help you apply it to your own life.