Estimated reading time: 12–14 minutes

For decades, coaching has focused on the individual: their mindset, habits, goals, and blind spots. This approach has created powerful transformations on a personal level—greater clarity, confidence, and performance. Yet as organizations, communities, and even families grow more complex, a quiet realization is emerging: individual change alone is often not enough.

Many people return from coaching energized, only to find themselves pulled back into the same dysfunctional patterns by the systems around them. Teams struggle despite having talented, motivated individuals. Leaders “do the work” yet remain constrained by culture, structures, and unspoken norms.

This is where the next evolution of coaching begins.

Modern coaching is shifting from an exclusive focus on people to an expanded focus on systems—the relational, cultural, and structural contexts that shape behavior. Group coaching, team coaching, and systems-informed approaches recognize a simple truth: people do not operate in isolation. They respond to incentives, feedback loops, power dynamics, and shared meaning.

This article explores why working with systems—not just individuals—is becoming essential, how group coaching addresses complexity beyond individual behavior, and what this shift means for the future of the coaching profession.

What You Will Learn

• Why individual coaching often fails to create lasting change inside complex organizations

• What “systems thinking” really means in a coaching context

• How group coaching reveals patterns that individual work cannot access

• The difference between fixing people and redesigning systems

• Practical implications for coaches, leaders, and organizations

• Why systems-aware coaching is not a trend—but an evolution

Why Individual Coaching Is No Longer Enough

Individual coaching emerged from humanistic psychology and performance traditions that emphasize self-awareness, agency, and responsibility. These foundations remain valuable. But they rest on an implicit assumption: that individuals have sufficient control over their environment to implement change.

In reality, many coaching clients face constraints that personal insight alone cannot resolve.

A leader may learn to communicate more clearly—but be embedded in a culture that punishes honesty.
An employee may develop boundaries—yet operate within a workload system that rewards burnout.
A team member may increase emotional intelligence—while structural silos prevent real collaboration.

When coaches focus solely on the individual, systemic issues are often mislabeled as personal shortcomings: resistance, lack of motivation, poor mindset. This creates frustration for clients who “do everything right” and still feel stuck.

The problem is not the person. The problem is the system.

Understanding Systems Thinking in Coaching

Systems thinking is the ability to see how parts interact within a whole, rather than viewing problems as isolated events. In a coaching context, this means looking beyond individual traits to examine relationships, feedback loops, roles, incentives, and shared beliefs.

A foundational influence in this field is The Fifth Discipline, which introduced the idea that organizations are living systems shaped by patterns, not personalities. Another key voice, Donella Meadows, emphasized that systems behave according to their structure, not our intentions.

Applied to coaching, systems thinking asks different questions:

• What patterns keep repeating, regardless of who is involved?

• What behaviors are being rewarded or discouraged—explicitly or implicitly?

• Where are the feedback loops that amplify stress, silence, or disengagement?

• How does the system respond when someone tries to change?

Instead of asking, “What’s wrong with this person?” systems-aware coaching asks, “What is this system designed to produce?”

From Linear Problems to Complex Reality

Traditional coaching often assumes a linear model of change: insight leads to action, action leads to results. Systems, however, are rarely linear.

In complex environments:

• Small actions can have disproportionate effects

• Well-intended interventions can create unintended consequences

• Problems persist because they are adaptive, not technical

For example, a team may struggle with accountability. Individual coaching might focus on assertiveness or time management. Systems coaching, by contrast, would explore how goals are set, how feedback is handled, how mistakes are treated, and how power flows within the group.

When accountability fails across multiple people, it is rarely an individual issue. It is a systemic pattern.

Why Group Coaching Changes the Game

Group coaching brings the system into the room.

Instead of working on relationships indirectly—through one person’s perspective—group coaching allows dynamics to surface in real time. Communication patterns, alliances, silences, and emotional undercurrents become visible and workable.

This is not simply “coaching multiple people at once.” It is coaching the relationships between them.

In group coaching:

• Patterns emerge that no single individual could articulate alone

• Shared assumptions can be named and examined

• Responsibility shifts from “fixing yourself” to co-creating healthier ways of working

When people witness how their actions affect others, learning accelerates. When they realize they are part of a larger system, blame softens and curiosity grows.

The System as the Client

One of the most profound shifts in modern coaching is redefining who—or what—the client actually is.

In systems-oriented coaching, the client is not just the individual leader, but:

• The leadership team

• The department

• The organizational culture

• The network of relationships

This perspective changes the coach’s role. The coach is no longer only a facilitator of insight, but also:

• A pattern observer

• A mirror for group dynamics

• A designer of learning environments

The goal is not to make individuals “better,” but to help the system function more intelligently.

Moving Beyond Blame and Pathology

Systems coaching naturally reduces blame. When problems are understood as emergent properties of a system, moral judgment gives way to shared responsibility.

This does not remove accountability—it reframes it.

Instead of asking, “Who failed?” the system asks:

• What conditions made this outcome likely?

• How did we collectively maintain this pattern?

• What structures need to change to support different behavior?

This approach is particularly powerful in organizational settings, where blame cultures stifle learning and innovation. Group coaching creates a space where mistakes can be examined without shame, and change can be owned collectively.

Organizational Context Matters More Than Motivation

Many coaching models emphasize motivation, purpose, and values. While important, these factors are often overridden by context.

Research in organizational psychology consistently shows that:

• Culture shapes behavior more reliably than personality

• Incentives drive action more than intention

• Structure determines outcomes more than effort

A highly motivated employee in a misaligned system will eventually burn out or disengage. Systems-aware coaching helps organizations align structures with stated values—so people don’t have to fight the system to do good work.

Group Coaching as a Response to Complexity

Modern organizations face challenges that are inherently complex: rapid change, uncertainty, cross-functional collaboration, and emotional strain. These cannot be solved through individual optimization alone.

Group coaching addresses complexity by:

• Increasing collective sense-making

• Enhancing relational intelligence

• Supporting adaptive, not prescriptive, change

Rather than offering answers, group coaching strengthens the system’s capacity to learn. This is a critical distinction. In complex environments, the ability to adapt is more valuable than any single solution.

The Inner and Outer System

Systems coaching does not ignore inner work. Instead, it situates inner experience within a broader context.

Emotions, beliefs, and nervous system responses are still relevant—but they are understood as responses to relational and structural realities. Anxiety may reflect role ambiguity. Defensiveness may signal psychological unsafety. Withdrawal may be an adaptive response to chronic overload.

By addressing both inner and outer systems, coaching becomes more humane and more effective.

Ethical Implications for Coaches

As coaching evolves toward systems, ethical responsibility increases. Coaches must become aware of power dynamics, inclusion, and organizational impact.

Key ethical considerations include:

• Not colluding with harmful systems by over-individualizing problems

• Recognizing when coaching is being used to adapt people to unhealthy environments

• Supporting systemic change alongside personal development

This does not mean coaches must become consultants. It means holding a wider lens and asking harder questions.

Skills Required for Systems-Oriented Coaches

Working with systems requires a different skill set than traditional one-to-one coaching alone.

Key competencies include:

• Pattern recognition across time and relationships

• Comfort with ambiguity and emotional intensity

• Facilitation of group dialogue and conflict

• Understanding organizational culture and structure

These skills deepen the coach’s impact—and expand the scope of what coaching can address.

The Future of Coaching

The future of coaching is not about abandoning individual work. It is about integrating it into a broader, more realistic understanding of how change actually happens.

As complexity increases, coaching must evolve:

• From individuals to collectives

• From traits to patterns

• From insight to system redesign

Group coaching and systems thinking represent not a passing trend, but a maturation of the field. They reflect a deeper respect for context, interdependence, and shared responsibility.

Conclusion: From Self-Improvement to Systemic Intelligence

The next evolution of coaching invites a fundamental shift in perspective. Instead of asking individuals to carry the full weight of change, it recognizes that transformation is a collective endeavor.

When we work with systems, we stop asking people to swim upstream. We begin redesigning the river.

Coaching, at its best, has always been about growth and possibility. By embracing systems thinking and group coaching, the profession moves closer to its true potential: not just helping people cope within complex worlds, but helping those worlds become healthier places to live and work.

References

• Senge, P. M. (2006). The Fifth Discipline: The Art and Practice of the Learning Organization. Doubleday.

• Meadows, D. H. (2008). Thinking in Systems: A Primer. Chelsea Green Publishing.

• Hawkins, P. (2017). Leadership Team Coaching. Kogan Page.

• Wheatley, M. J. (2006). Leadership and the New Science. Berrett-Koehler.

• Edmondson, A. (2018). The Fearless Organization. Wiley.