Contenu du sommaire : Le coaching, enjeux, paradoxes et perspectives

This article re-examines current sociological issues reflecting on various practices in organisations : it will deal with the psychologizing of problematics first, then with the interiorising of social restraints, and finally with the conforming of individuals to managerial norms. The article also deals with coaching being the product and/or the producer of a present trend among researchers, a trend that points to psychological and relational causes when a conflict occurs in an organisation. Secondly the article will question methods and conventions of introspection resulting from reflexive practices in organisations : should those liberating principles be given full steam ahead or should they be condemned for their conformist properties ? Finally, the article will go beyond this opposition by considering reflective thought as first and foremost defending a specific form of social regulation.

A previous study by one of the authors, about psychotherapists involved in a struggle for the legal recognition of a psychotherapist profession, in France, has indeed shown many interrelations between psychotherapy and coaching. This paper aims at situating coaching with respect to psychotherapy, and the diversity of psychotherapies. As a psychological intervention practice, which denies being psychotherapeutic, though requiring psychotherapeutic competencies, coaching can be considered a "bastard" of the Human Potential movement of the seventies, a term by which the French sociologist Robert Castel used to name the "new therapies" of this movement in their relation to psychoanalysis. Psychoanalysis has long been a normative reference, and has imposed its imprint on psychotherapy and coaching, particularly through the training of coaches in the psychological domain.

This article aims at showing how coaching in a call centre belonging to an energy-supply company is becoming more and more instrumental in standardising and controlling emotions when dealing with customers. The seduction techniques which are being advocated seem to come on top of the demands of a more rational work process. Workers who may be opposed to such techniques hesitate between full rejection of the task (a rejection which paradoxically amounts to a strict respect of standards of behaviour) and moral involvement in the task (particularly when a personalised form of relationship occurs with certain customers).

Coaching is considered as an essential tool in the competitive business world. It is taking on a progressively important role in the public domain of social welfare, especially concerning the unemployed. Based on a case study bearing on Brussels Employment Agency, and its way of introducing coaching into its programs, the article attempts to analyse the impact of this innovation on methods of communication, on organizational structure and on professional identity. A change is occurring. Organizational change seems to be successful. But the institution is now challenging the redefining of common professional representation and the building of a new identity. Evidence suggests that this process of change, including the introduction of coaching methodology, was, in part, considered as a means of losing power and increasing uncertainty.

Nowadays, French economic magazines devote considerable space in their columns to coaching and coaches. Through the content analysis of seventy-two articles or documents which refer to this topic, and extracted from the type of press above mentioned, we have tried to show evidences of how the latter organises the promotion of coaching through its pages. Next, we have examined the message conveyed by coaches through our corpus and more particularly, its prescriptive and ideological dimensions. The articles we worked on seem to reflect a discourse aiming at normalizing, even standardizing behaviours within organizations in order to ensure their effectiveness and durability through time and changes.

This article is an analysis about emergent coaching practices within organisations. It represents a continuity in the author's reflection about dynamics of change linked to a co-evolution of organisational forms and communication strategies. First, coaching will be presented with a critical point of view, as a continuity of another fashion phenomenon, neuro-linguistic programming. Then, present research work in communication of organisations (new organisational forms, communication of change, mediation) will explain the success of these professional practices, as an answer to the economic, technical, organisational and communicational stakes lived by the organisations.

This article seeks to present a specific type of coaching and different means to analyse. It begins by describing a real experience and then defines the major elements that differentiate this experience from the more conventional approaches. Borrowing from the Science of the Concrete and Chinese thought will help us provide a more general analysis of the approach. The work herein does not seek to define or justify a new model, but rather to open up and share new perspectives in research and development of practices in coaching.

In the military, secrecy and restriction of information has been the regime for a long time. But in the new era after the end of the cold war, the expansion of NTIC and the suspension of conscription, the Armed Forces began to communicate. In order to be more visible and to seem more attractive, they often sacrificed their identity and lost superordinate goals. This degradation could be disastrous in the future because it gives a wrong image of servicemen and their missions. On the contrary, a systemic approach respectful of the specificity of the military institution could be contemplated, by updating and realizing their values.

Forum Intranet of discussion gradually tends to take up an increasing deal of room in the field of Information Sciences and Communication research, as well as, in practice, among organizations. This research questions on the attributes of such a device in the field of the internal communication of organizations. It tries to characterize, through an exploratory approach on theoretical and practical spheres, its main strategic purposes, likely to be used by the communication manager.

In a production economy, value creation depends on land, labor and capital. In a knowledge economy, value creation depends mainly on the ideas and innovations to be found in people's heads. All one can do is mobilize collective intelligence and knowledge. If knowing how to produce and sell has become a basic necessity, it no longer constitutes a sufficiently differentiating factor in international competition. In the past, enterprises were industrial and commercial; in the future, they will increasingly have to be intelligent. In this framework, coaching can be seen as a powerful tool.