Re-Authoring Conversations: The Landscape of Action
Nour
Founder, Coachful
Re-authoring conversations use the landscape of action to explore what someone did, in which circumstances and over time. The aim is to develop an account that a broad problem description has left out, then ask what significance the person gives it.
“I only pass instructions on” may omit occasions when a person noticed a difficulty, asked a useful question and helped others coordinate. Those occasions do not prove a permanent strength. They can provide a more detailed basis for understanding a contribution and choosing another action.
This guide focuses on connecting episodes through time. The fictional case follows an initial work event, a remembered earlier contribution and a later attempt with a real error, a late result and an agreed extension. It keeps proposals, accepted responsibilities and completed work distinct.
Locate action within the wider re-authoring conversation
Michael White’s 2005 workshop notes describe re-authoring as linking neglected events into alternative storylines. Following Jerome Bruner, the notes distinguish action and identity landscapes. An account of action concerns events, circumstances, sequence and time; identity inquiry explores the significance the person gives those experiences, including purposes and commitments.
Dulwich Centre’s Re-Authoring Map teaching page emphasizes movement through time, from earlier experiences toward the near future, across action and identity. That is more than extracting a positive quality from one event. It concerns how several episodes may become connected in a story the person finds meaningful.
These sources developed within narrative therapy. The procedure below is an original workplace coaching aid, not a reproduction of the map, a clinical protocol or evidence that this exercise improves business performance. The coach’s competence and agreed role still apply.
The action and identity guide examines the narrower question of how an event relates to a client-chosen meaning. Here, the emphasis is how that meaning is explored across episodes and tested against later experience.
| Part of the account | What it helps you distinguish |
|---|---|
| Reported episode | A particular occasion from a general description such as “I never contribute” |
| Conditions and contributions | The client’s action from what colleagues, preparation and resources made possible |
| Client-chosen significance | What matters to the person from a trait the coach wants to assign |
| Connection across time | A possible theme from a claim that every past event proves the same thing |
| Later experience | What actually happened from what the client hoped would happen |
Develop an episode rather than collect a success slogan
Start with an occasion the client wants to examine. A modest or unfinished development can be useful. “I asked who would receive the handover” gives more to explore than “I showed leadership,” because it identifies an action and an immediate context.
Ask what happened before, during and afterward. A client may have prepared a document, received advice, waited for authority or acted after a colleague noticed the problem. These details help explain the event without assigning all credit or blame to one person.
Keep sources of knowledge visible. A client may remember their intention accurately while being uncertain about another person’s response. A note can say “I recall” or “I have not checked the later result.” Do not supply missing dialogue or imply that guided reflection retrieves a complete historical record.
The account does not need to become an investigation of every workplace fact. Check what matters to the purpose and can appropriately be verified. Do not ask the client to upload restricted material or contact former colleagues merely to complete the coach’s preferred story.
A more detailed account can include a difficulty. Perhaps the client raised the issue but did not secure an owner, or completed the work after the original deadline. Re-authoring should not make the event more flattering by removing those parts.
Worked case: make an overlooked contribution visible
All people, dates, messages, records and results in this case are fictional. Niko coordinates a service project. Marta, Soren and Jo own different work areas. Pia is the project owner with authority over the deadlines used below. Niko’s sole coach is Leila.
They agree three sixty-minute sessions on 2, 9 and 25 November. Niko wants to explore the description “I only pass instructions on; I do not improve how we work.” They choose a recent request handover, with a later opportunity to try a related practice.
Reconstruct the first event and correct its result
On 22 October, Niko notices that five service requests are repeatedly being forwarded between work areas. He prepares a short list of the questions still needing an owner and asks the relevant colleagues to review it. He does not assign duties outside his coordination role.
On 23 October, Marta accepts responsibility for two requests, Soren for two and Jo for one. They agree that the existing work board should show the accepted owner and next step for each request. Niko records those confirmations on 24 October.
At the 2 November coaching session, he initially says, “The board sorted all five out.” Leila asks which result he means. Niko reviews his permitted summary of the work record: three requests were closed by 30 October, while two were still open at that snapshot.
He revises the account. His contribution was noticing repeated forwarding, preparing the unresolved questions and asking for explicit ownership. The colleagues accepted their responsibilities and did the specialist work. Five clear owners were not five completed requests.
| When | Observed action in the fictional case | What it does not establish |
|---|---|---|
| 22 October | Niko identifies five unresolved handovers and asks for an ownership discussion | That his proposed owners have accepted |
| 23 October | Marta accepts two, Soren two and Jo one | That specialist work is complete |
| 24 October | Niko records accepted owners and next steps | That a board entry alone causes delivery |
| 30 October snapshot | Three requests closed, two remain open | That all five were resolved or that later status is known |
The old description omitted a deliberate contribution. The corrected account also prevents a new exaggeration. Both observations matter if Niko wants to use this experience when deciding how to act again.
Let the client decide what the episode means
Leila: What part of this was different from simply passing an instruction on?
Niko: I noticed we were forwarding the same questions. I asked people to make the handover explicit instead of forwarding them again.
Leila: What mattered to you about doing that?
Niko: Making it possible for someone to respond, without pretending I could decide their work.
Leila: What would you call that contribution?
Niko: Making the next step visible. I would not call it becoming a process expert.
Niko’s wording gives the action significance without turning it into a fixed ability. Leila does not insist that he identify a strength, select a heroic leadership identity or claim responsibility for the three closures.
The preferred account is tentative: “Sometimes I can improve a handover by noticing the gap and asking for a next step that the relevant person actually accepts.” It includes a condition, acceptance by others, that Niko will need to examine in the next situation.
Connect the episode with history without manufacturing a biography
At the 9 November session, Niko recalls a May discussion in which he and a colleague, Olive, clarified which team should respond to a supplier question. He remembers drawing a simple sequence on a shared screen while Olive supplied the technical distinction.
He does not remember the exact day or the final supplier outcome. He chooses not to contact Olive for the coaching exercise. The record therefore identifies this as a remembered May episode with an unverified date and result.
Leila asks whether it seems connected to the October event. Niko sees a shared interest in making the next step understandable. He also notices the difference: in May, Olive helped formulate the question; in October, he initiated the ownership discussion himself.
They do not need to make the episodes identical. A useful connection can contain variation in who initiated, what support was available and what was achieved. Those differences offer practical information about conditions, rather than reducing the history to a list of confirming examples.
Niko does not want to discuss childhood or search for the first time he ever behaved this way. Leila accepts that boundary. A coaching inquiry can use relevant work history without requiring a complete life narrative.
The emerging plot is an organizing interpretation, not a causal law: there are occasions when Niko helps others see a workable next step. It does not explain every event in his career, prove that he always follows through or authorize him to allocate other people’s work.
Turn the emerging account into a proposal others can accept
Niko has four new requests, labeled Q1–Q4 in the fictional case, for the 10 November planning meeting. He chooses to prepare the questions and ask for accepted ownership. His aim is a clear handover record, not to promise that every request will be completed immediately.
Before the meeting, he separates what he can do from what requires agreement:
- He can prepare the four questions, identify missing information and propose a discussion.
- He can record the owner and next step after actual acceptance.
- The work-area owners decide whether they can accept within their responsibilities.
- Pia decides any required change to the project deadlines; Niko cannot grant it by editing a note.
At the meeting, Marta accepts Q1 and Q2, and Soren accepts Q3, with completion due on 13 November. Jo declines Q4 because it is outside her available capacity. The record shows three accepted requests and one without an owner.
This refusal is not a failure of the narrative conversation. It is information the next action needed. The original October episode did not establish that every future colleague would accept Niko’s proposal.
Keep the failed step in the later story
After the meeting on 10 November, Niko sends the requesters an update saying all four requests are routed. That statement is inaccurate: Q4 has no accepted owner. His intended practice and his actual communication have diverged.
When reconciling the list on 11 November, he notices the discrepancy. He sends a correction through the same work email thread:
“My update yesterday overstated the position. Three requests have accepted owners. Q4 does not yet have an owner, so I cannot give you an accepted completion commitment for it. I will send the next ownership update by 16:00 on 12 November, including if it is still unresolved.”
The requesters acknowledge the correction on 11 November and ask him to keep the update time. Niko retains their concern about the earlier wording. He does not change the old message and describe the first communication as accurate.
On 12 November, Una accepts Q4 within her work area, with completion due on 18 November. At 15:00 that day, Niko sends the promised ownership update and names the accepted date. The requesters acknowledge receipt. The update is complete, while Q4’s actual work remains future.
This is the difference between an appealing theme and a lived sequence. Niko initiated a useful discussion, overstated one result, corrected it and obtained actual acceptance. An account that included only the first and last actions would conceal what he still needs to practise.
Review completion against the dates that actually applied
Q1 and Q3 are completed on 13 November. Q2 is blocked by missing information and is not completed by its original 13 November deadline. Marta and Pia agree on 13 November to review the blocker on 18 November; that is a review commitment, not a declaration that the work was finished.
The missing information arrives on 17 November. Marta completes Q2 on 18 November. Its original deadline was missed even though the blocker review and subsequent completion occur.
For Q4, Una identifies on 17 November that completion needs until 20 November. Pia, the authorized project owner, approves that extension the same day, before the original 18 November due date. Niko records the accepted change and sends it to the requester, who acknowledges it on 17 November. Una completes Q4 on 20 November.
| Request | Accepted owner | Original date | Actual result | Accurate status at review |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Q1 | Marta | 13 November | Completed 13 November | Met original date |
| Q2 | Marta | 13 November | Completed 18 November after missing information | Late against original date; blocker review had been agreed |
| Q3 | Soren | 13 November | Completed 13 November | Met original date |
| Q4 | Una | 18 November | Extension approved 17 November; completed 20 November | Met revised date, after original date |
At the 25 November coaching review, four requests are closed. Two met their original dates, one was late and one met an explicitly revised date. Four eventual closures are not four original on-time completions. Nor can the October five-request snapshot be combined with this four-request set as though they were one cohort.
Leila asks what Niko wants to keep in the preferred account. He changes the wording again: “I can initiate clearer handovers, check actual acceptance and return to correct an inaccurate update. I still need to check the record before claiming everything is routed.”
This is not a certificate that he is now reliable in every situation. It links a valued contribution to a current responsibility he recognizes. The three-session engagement closes as agreed; future projects and the later status of October’s two open requests remain unobserved.
Use a practical event-to-event record
This original record can keep the conversation coherent without reproducing a narrative therapy map. Use one page or a short worksheet, with room for the client to disagree with the proposed connection.
| Prompt | Niko’s completed response |
|---|---|
| Which broad account are we examining? | I only pass instructions on |
| What specific event complicates it? | October’s explicit ownership discussion for five forwarded requests |
| What did I contribute? | Noticed repeated forwarding, prepared questions and asked for acceptance |
| What did others contribute? | Specialist judgments, acceptance and actual work; Olive also shaped the earlier May question |
| What meaning do I choose? | I sometimes help make the next step visible |
| What connects across time? | May’s remembered clarification, October’s documented handover and November’s new attempt |
| What does not fit a simple success account? | Q4 initially unowned, my inaccurate update, Q2 late and Q4 requiring an extension |
| What practical responsibility follows? | Check actual accepted ownership before reporting a complete handover |
The record distinguishes a remembered episode from a documented work sequence, and a client interpretation from independent assessment. It does not need every email, colleague’s name or confidential project detail to serve the coaching purpose.
If the client wants a written account of what they learned, agree the wording and audience. A private reflection is different from a performance statement. The guide to narrative documents develops that separate writing task.
Choose questions that follow the client’s answer
- Locate one episode. Ask what the client wants to examine and which parts they remember or can appropriately verify.
- Develop the sequence. Ask what preceded the action, who participated, what the client did and what actually followed.
- Explore significance. Ask what matters about the event to the client, without supplying a compulsory identity label.
- Visit a relevant earlier or later episode. Ask whether there is a connection, a difference or no useful connection.
- Consider a present proposal. Check conditions, other people’s contribution and actual authority before treating a possibility as a commitment.
- Return after the event. Compare intention, accepted action and result. Keep a refusal, error or delay that changes the account.
This order is optional. You may stay with one episode, return to history or stop before proposing action. The client’s purpose determines whether the movement is useful, not whether every box on the coach’s worksheet is completed.
If a totalizing problem label makes this inquiry difficult, the externalizing conversation guide offers a related distinction. Do not combine several methods simply because they share narrative language.
Handle skepticism, missing history and unequal power
“It was a one-off.” Ask what made the event possible and whether any part is relevant now. A one-off may remain a one-off. It need not become a lifelong theme.
“I cannot remember another example.” Do not suggest a missing memory or fill the gap with your own version. Continue with the current account or leave the historical connection open.
“Other people made it happen.” Include them. Niko’s colleagues’ acceptance is central to the story. A richer account does not require the client to take sole credit.
“The new attempt went badly.” Examine the actual sequence before declaring either the person or the method a failure. An inaccurate report calls for correction. A refused request may reveal a real capacity limit.
“I have no authority to do that.” Respect the limit. A useful action could be preparing a question for the authorized owner, seeking appropriate support or deciding not to proceed. Personal meaning does not create a decision right.
Do not use the approach to pressure a client into accepting unfair conditions or to provide clinical treatment outside competence. The current ICF Code of Ethics addresses engagement agreements, confidentiality, competence and accurate representation. A narrative reflection remains within the actual service and information-sharing arrangements.
Keep the client’s account and review together in Coachful
Coachful is our #1 recommendation for organizing this original event record, client-selected reflection and agreed follow-through. It can keep preparation and review close to the coaching relationship without turning the account into an automatic identity judgment.
Leila assigns Niko’s worksheet through Clients > Niko > Worksheets & resources > Assign. The client shares a permitted summary of the handover, its significance and the mixed later result. The organization’s request board remains the authority for actual work assignments and completion.
Niko and Leila agree one brief clarification through their individual Messages conversation between the second and final sessions, submitted by 20 November at 12:00, Europe/London, with a reply by 17:00 that working day. On 11 November at 09:00, Niko asks whether correcting the all-routed statement invalidates his preferred account. Leila replies at 13:00 that the actual error and correction both belong in the review; the phrase should not decide the workplace response for him.
Niko remains responsible for the actual correction through the work email thread. Leila’s message does not send it, approve a project deadline or confirm a colleague’s acceptance. The final coaching review remains 25 November.
Ordinary tasks can record preparation and the agreed review. A completed task is distinct from the requesters’ acknowledgments and specialist delivery. Unshared journal and takeaway pages remain private to the client. Where enabled, Share with coach lets the client deliberately share an individual page with the coach. Keep sensitive personal words unshared; Niko chooses what to share.
Before using a session summary, Leila checks automatic recap settings, Approve before sending, type overrides and held-content review. No employer automatically receives Niko’s private interpretation. Explore Coachful’s features for the actual resource and client-plan workflow.
Frequently asked questions
Does re-authoring mean inventing a more positive history?
No. It explores neglected details and meanings while keeping uncertainty, other people’s contributions and difficult consequences visible. Do not fabricate achievements or remove an error to preserve the preferred story.
Must action questions lead to an identity label?
No. A client may prefer a description of a purpose or practical contribution. Niko chooses making the next step visible, without becoming a permanently capable process expert.
How far back should the conversation go?
Only as far as is useful and agreed. A relevant work episode can be enough. Childhood inquiry or contact with former colleagues is not required.
What if a later event contradicts the new account?
Include it and ask what the account now needs to say. One error does not prove the old totalizing story, and eventual success does not erase the error.
Can a coaching record prove improved performance?
It can describe actions and observations within its limits. A formal performance conclusion or causal business-impact claim needs the relevant criteria, evidence and authorized assessment process.
