How to find a critical friend

You can't stay in your corner of the Forest waiting for others to come to you. You have to go to them sometimes. A.A. Milne

Freddy Marschall

We have taken some care in our previous 3 posts to explain what a critical friend is, what their role is, who could benefit and the right time to involve a critical friend in your business. (If you want to read these posts in order start here.)

​When my article on this subject was published in April, we know of at least one coach who received a call from a client saying "This. This is how I want us to work together". And no wonder: the benefits of working with a critical friend for a business leader are measurable in terms of the improvement and focus they will bring. Unlike a pure coaching relationship, the critical friend is an independent expert, a source of suggestions, ideas and examples and a means of leveraging external networks.

So where might you find a critical friend?

A critical friend is bound to come from outside the business, as they are expected to bring an external perspective. 

Yet they will be someone who ‘understands and is sympathetic to the purpose of the [firm], knows its circumstances very well and is skilled in offering a second opinion about an issue’ (David Woods and Tim Brighouse, The A-Z of School Improvements: Principles and practice, Bloomsbury Educational, 2013). 

This would tend to suggest that a critical friend for, for example, a law firm should have, at the least, considerable experience in the professional services sector, if not experience in the legal sector. This might be in contrast with the non-executive director or chief executive appointments that a number of law firms have made in recent years, where they specifically want to bring in wider business or commercial experience and knowledge. 

But it’s not just a professional background you’re looking for – a critical friend needs to have the right personal skills. These include being a good listener, reflective, good at asking questions, capable of being frank and challenging, and unconditionally supportive of the individual / firm. But one thing sits above all of these personal skills: trust. The critical friend must either already have, or rapidly build, the trust of the individual or group they are working with – a trust based on confidentiality, knowledge and experience, empathy and understanding. In fact, this is much like what you would expect from a close friend. 

These are qualities that may be possessed by someone who is, for example, a coach, management consultant or former managing partner, but just because they have that experience does not necessarily mean they are critical friend material. There is no right way of going about identifying potential candidates – suggestions may come by word of mouth, through one’s own network, or through recommendation by colleagues or other advisers and consultants. But it would be sensible to meet at least two or three ‘candidates’ before selecting your critical friend. You need to find someone who is a good fit for the person or team they will be working with, but who is also able to see things differently from them, and willing and able to challenge them. 

If you are a coach or consultant considering offering a critical friend service, there is good news. Both Sally and I enjoy working as Critical Friends - it’s very much part of our ethos at Richmonte Wells, both in terms of the relationships we build with clients and our commitment to make change happen for them. From our perspective, spending time understanding the client and their drivers is well worth the investment. From our client’s perspective, having access to the full complement of skills, experience and contacts that goes beyond a pure coaching relationship adds considerable value to the time we spend together. The quotes scattered throughout our website are a testament to the benefits of a critical friend relationship, but if were to choose one it would be this.

In the final part of this series we will look at how to set up a critical friend arrangement. 

Richmonte Wells offers a full suite of executive individual and team development: coaching, succession planning, Board Development, Strategy and Away days, high performance team building, First 100 days and Lateral Hire Support. We also work with Senior and Managing Partners, CEOs and Practice Directors and their teams either through mentoring or Critical Friend support. If you would like to know more about Critical Friend support for you or your team, please contact Martin Griffiths.