Unlocking new perspectives: Using animal metaphors in coaching

A metaphor is when one kind of thing, idea or situation is used in communication in the place of another. It can be a powerful way to help understanding between one or more individuals when plain and direct words and sentences don’t cut it. Metaphors can quickly bring clarity and depth and can be expressed in a word or phrase, a drawing, a sound, or a gesture or movement. A metaphor uses the qualities, the essence, of one thing to illuminate the qualities and the essence of another.

The role of animal metaphors

Using animals as metaphors can be very helpful in many situations, and especially in coaching because animals’ appearance and behaviour are often very significant in individuals’ lives. Folklore and children’s stories about animals are deeply enmeshed in our cultures and touch on our own life experiences from early years into adulthood.

When people liken things or situations to animals, they are drawing a strong sensory and emotional component that enables communication to go deeper than everyday language.

I first started using animal metaphors professionally before I became a coach when I was working in branding and marketing communications. As a workshop facilitator, I would bring non-marketing clients into a discussion about their brand, and what it should convey to their customers. Working with lawyers or engineers or IT specialists whose day jobs involved a factual, plain-English way of thinking would have been uncomfortable or downright difficult had it not been for the use of metaphors. I needed a way to open up these highly intelligent individuals to a more emotional and imaginative mindset and to get them to express thoughts, ideas and beliefs in a way that they were not accustomed to doing.

When I moved into coaching, I found that my experience working with individuals and teams in brand and marketing facilitator roles had many parallels with my new coaching practice. The tools and exercises we use to get a more profound understanding of self and others are valid in many areas of interpersonal engagement.

Examples of animal metaphors

Animal metaphors offer endless possibilities for interpretation. Here are some common examples:

• cats are scaredy
• dogs are playful
• monkeys are cheeky
• fish are cold
• owls are wise
• eagles are keen-eyed
• wolves are wild
• spiders are creepy
• squirrels are thrifty
• toads are slimy
• bees are busy
• chameleons change
• dinosaurs are old and outdated

…the list goes on.

There are characteristics of people that can more easily be expressed by comparison with the stereotypes of animals; owls may not really be ‘wise’ but toads are definitely slimy. This use of metaphors is a useful shortcut and can help when summoning the actual descriptive words is difficult or insensitive.

That is why I now use metaphors in my coaching practice. Whether I’m working with a private individual who is reflecting about themselves, or a senior member of a company’s leadership team, I find metaphors can help to open up clients to new ways of thinking, about themselves and about others.

Applying animal metaphors in coaching

In a coaching session, when someone is trying to express how they feel about their relationship with a work colleague or a social contact, asking them to describe the other party in terms of an animal – appearance, behaviour, attitude – can be very revealing. It enables, me, as their coach, to enquire further about those characteristics and what it is that is perhaps positive or negative. This indirect and figurative use of language is often a different way of thinking and, as such, can trigger new thoughts and feelings that can be productive in making sense of issues like conflict, collaboration and teamwork.

A great use of animal metaphors was made by Kenneth W. Thomas and Ralph H. Kilmann when they introduced their Thomas–Kilmann Conflict Mode Instrument back in the 1970s. I have used this model in group coaching work where the leadership teams of businesses have comprised individuals from different disciplines who find it difficult to talk about their colleagues in an open session. The introduction into the workshops of ‘sharks’, ‘owls’, ‘foxes’, ‘tortoises’ and ‘teddy bears’ as metaphors for the team members makes it easier to point up attitudes and behaviour and to gain a better understanding of self and others.

So, to end, I would ask you what animal you might use to describe yourself and what is it about that animal that you most associate with by the way you think and act?