Babette Graham

An important and compelling read for anyone who wants to refine how they are thinking about systems and complexity in their coaching practice. Systemic Coaching: Five Ways of Thinking About Systems encourages us to sharpen our identity as coach so we can accelerate organisational development beyond the speed of individual and linear change. Complexity is here to stay, this book helps us to get really good at coaching within it.

Director of Coaching, Leadership and Talent, KPMG

Jennifer Garvey-Berger

Paul Lawrence has done it again! In this jewel of a book, he holds our hands as we get deeper and deeper into the systemic world, offering us new ideas, challenging the mindsets we didn’t know we had, and pushing us to be more reflective and more expansive about our practice. Equally useful for beginning coaches and for those who have been coaching for decades, there are already a dozen people I’m going to gift a copy of this stimulating and compassionate book.

Chief Executive Officer, Cultivating Leadership

Tatiana Bachkirova

Thinking systemically may look deceptively easy, but this book clearly shows that it is not just saying that you care about the whole organisation as much as your individual client. It is not even enough to say that you are an integral part of the clients’ systems. In shattering such simplicity, this book may stretch your thinking to the extent that it might feel uncomfortable. However, if you are not in the business of feeling comfortable, you will have a treat working on your own development.

Professor of Coaching Psychology at Oxford Brookes University