Coaching practices for Solution Focused Exceptions
Describe almost anything you are working through and IX Coach finds the practices whose real-world fit is closest. For Solution Focused Exceptions, these are the strongest matches in the current practice library.
Does this sound like the set of challenges you might be facing?
- It feels like this is just how I am
- I know real life needs the occasional exception, but every time I allow one in the moment it somehow becomes "well, today counts too"
- All day my attention goes straight to what went wrong
- Every time an approach flops I just throw it out and lunge at something totally different, and I keep slamming into the same wall
- My kid and I agree on a fix and it sounds great in the moment, but a few days later it’s fallen apart again
Practices that may help
- Exception Finding: When Is the Problem Already Less Severe?
Identify times when the problem was absent or less severe — these are evidence that solutions already exist.
Solution-Focused Brief Therapy: Building On What Works - Solution-Focused Brief Therapy: Building On What Works
Solution-focused brief therapy (SFBT), developed by Steve de Shazer and Insoo Kim Berg, directs attention to what already works — client strengths, past successes, and desired futures — rather than to analyzing problems. Meta-analyses report small-to-moderate positive effects across a range of presenting issues, with particular strength in behavioral problems and depression in adult populations. - Define exceptions in advance, in writing
A bright line with a pre-written exception stays bright; an improvised exception breaks it.
Bright-Line Rules: When "None" Beats "Some" - The Formula First-Session Task and Between-Session Noticing
Assign between-session observation tasks that direct attention toward what’s already working.
Solution-Focused Brief Therapy: Building On What Works - Treat failed attempts as constraint-locators rather than dead ends
Each failed approach tells you precisely where the active constraint lives — mine that information before trying again.
Constraint Relaxation: Escaping the Walls You Built Yourself - Evaluate solutions for durability: realistic, mutually satisfying, safe
A collaborative solution that fails one of three tests — realistic, mutually satisfying, safe — will not hold.
Collaborative Problem Solving (Ross Greene) - Drill down with the five whys
Ask “why?” repeatedly to move from a surface symptom to the root constraint.
First-Principles Thinking, Made Usable - Climb the why–why ladder
Ask "why is this a problem?" repeatedly to reveal the higher-level goal your current framing may be missing.
Problem Reframing: Solving the Right Problem First - Diagnose the challenge before choosing the response
Ask whether the problem requires new expertise (technical) or new values and behavior (adaptive).
Adaptive Leadership, Made Practical - Adopt a "not-knowing" stance before problem-solving
Delay solution-generation by first articulating what you genuinely do not know about a problem.
Beginner's Mind (Shoshin), Made Practical
Related concerns
- Bring Solutions Not Problems
Identify times when the problem was absent or less severe — these are evidence that solutions already exist.
Exception Finding: When Is the Problem Already Less Severe?
- Problem Solving Therapy During A Big Change
After implementing, honestly assess what worked, what didn’t, and what to do next.
Evaluate the outcome and adjust
- Solution Focused Brief Therapy Building On What Works As A Parent
Solution-focused brief therapy (SFBT), developed by Steve de Shazer and Insoo Kim Berg, directs attention to what already works — client strengths, past successes, and desired futures — rather than to analyzing problems. Meta-analyses report small-to-moderate positive effects across a range of presenting issues, with particular strength in behavioral problems and depression in adult populations.
- Solution Focused Brief Therapy Building On What Works For My Teenager
Solution-focused brief therapy (SFBT), developed by Steve de Shazer and Insoo Kim Berg, directs attention to what already works — client strengths, past successes, and desired futures — rather than to analyzing problems. Meta-analyses report small-to-moderate positive effects across a range of presenting issues, with particular strength in behavioral problems and depression in adult populations.
- Solution Focused Tasks
Solution-focused brief therapy (SFBT), developed by Steve de Shazer and Insoo Kim Berg, directs attention to what already works — client strengths, past successes, and desired futures — rather than to analyzing problems. Meta-analyses report small-to-moderate positive effects across a range of presenting issues, with particular strength in behavioral problems and depression in adult populations.
- When Kegan Subject Object Heifetz Adaptive Challenge Diagnosis
Separate problems you can solve with existing expertise from those requiring you to change.
Distinguish technical problems from adaptive challenges
Describe your situation in your own words to search the complete practice library.