Me, coach and villain

Dhe students who, in the course of “stand-up coaching”, dance in the amphitheater of a Savoyard university before shouting in chorus: “I am positive, I am an actor in my life. » Managers of large French companies who base their decisions on the enneagram, a dubious personality test resulting from the occult intuitions of a Greek-Armenian guru born in the 19th century^e century. Employees who are taught that “water can store emotions” or that we can “to evacuate bad memories via urine” during a company seminar and under the passionate eyes of the human resources department. These are the kind of testimonies that we discovered while diving – for this episode and next – in the world of coaching and personal development applied to business. A universe that is both uncomfortable and confusing, so many are the esoteric and mystical references. Fortunately, we had a guide of choice: Élisabeth Feytit.

This former follower of personal development and New Age spirituality is today the creator of a podcast, Shock meta, which is a wealth of information on these areas and their excesses (read episode 5, “Charlatans Éditions present…”). She has documented the dangers of coaching, particularly in a exciting series which tells in the first person and chronologically the enlistment of a marketing consultant by a personal development star during a coaching seminar in the United States. The name of the coach is not mentioned, for fear of reprisals, but many people say they recognize the methods of one of the international icons in the field: Tony Robbins. His method: positive thinking, $5,000 conferences in the form of extended shows where you clap your hands and listen to very loud music, archaic advice on the role of men and women in society… Tony Robbins, therefore. Remember his name.

Not all coaches are manipulators, but coaching is a manipulator’s dream tool.

After several years of research on the subject, the observation is clear for Élisabeth Feytit: “Coaching is the eldorado of mental manipulation. It uses methods that can bring people into extreme psychological states. Not all coaches are manipulators, but coaching is a manipulator’s dream tool. » The Miviludes (Interministerial mission of vigilance and fight against sectarian aberrations) confirmed to us by email sharing the same opinion: “In certain situations, a real process of influence develops, characterized by destabilization and the loss of reference points, the break with the usual environment and confinement in a system, which causes heavy harm to the person. […] The individual loses control of their life and finances. » specifying “not to pass a value judgment in itself on coaching in general but to ensure vigilance on the actors who infringe the rights and freedoms of those who use these practices”, the organization told us that it had received, regarding coaching, 44 referrals in 2019, 130 referrals in 2020 and 94 referrals in 2021.