A Tribute to Queen Elizabeth II as Coach by Penny Terndrup, member of the Meyler Campbell community.

Written by Penny Terndrup, member of the Meyler Campbell community

She wouldn’t give advice. She would ask questions, and listen.

What happens when great people die? How soon is too soon to examine what made them great, beyond the platitudes and heartfelt emotion?

For some time I’ve been fascinated by the roles taken by our late Queen, HM Queen Elizabeth – her identities and her character.  Whether a royalist or a staunch republican, virtually all have noted her achievements and the huge outpouring of emotion has had at least something to do with her personality and skill.  As Harriet Harman said in Parliament shortly after her death, the late Queen’s indominable spirit created the modern constitutional monarchy and contributed in large part to the soft power of Britain in the global community.

There will be plenty of opportunity to examine her leadership – perhaps with some comparing and contrasting with Queen Victoria courtesy of Anne Scoular’s work.  Here though, I wanted to briefly explore and commend our late Queen’s role simply as Coach.

Interviews with several of her fifteen prime ministers both around the Platinum Jubilee and more recently have highlighted how skilled she was, whether what she did would be explicitly described as coaching or not.  Her constitutional role made it vital that she was not directive – there was absolutely no telling involved. David Cameron was clear: “she wouldn’t give advice. She would ask questions and listen”.  He added that at the end of the hour, “world problems wouldn’t have changed, but you would feel better able to deal with them”.  The Queen seemed to believe that “life needed to be in equilibrium” – her concern for how he was sleeping or how the family was. She bought the question of resilience into the room but she would never impose her will.

Teresa May valued “coming from a slightly different perspective” through the questions posed, which would make one think and reflect.

Back in June, John Major told interviewers that “she is a good listener but more relevantly a good questioner. Gently she asks the right questions…often very, very pertinent. It was always extremely useful because it was a completely external view from someone who knew politics.  In many ways, it was cathartic. You could discuss things with the Queen that you couldn’t really discuss with hardly anybody else…. Nobody else was there, just the corgis – and you could speak in absolute privacy.  There’s no private secretary, no notes are made. You can say exactly what you wish, exactly what is on your mind”.  By all accounts it was no wonder that those weekly audiences were very rarely missed by any of them.

More recently Justin Trudeau, clearly extremely fond of the Queen and knowing her for most of his life said that “her thoughtfulness and perspective in the sweep of history” was profound and they “sat down with steadiness”, with him becoming reassured in his ability to do his job and put completely at his ease.

The description servant leader is perhaps never so relevant as here – when those in leadership positions or simply finding themselves in her presence could open their hearts to someone who understood.

So many of the tales finding their way to us now involve describing how she was, rather than what she did with actions being secondary. Dr David Nott, a surgeon then recently returned from Syria, visited Buckingham Palace several years ago. He was unable to reply when she asked him about his experience in Aleppo, gripped by an attack of PTSD. Sensing that he was seriously traumatised, the Queen called for the corgis, who ducked under the table between them.  She opened a tin of biscuits and the two of them quietly fed and stroked the dogs for many minutes.  “The humanity of what she was doing was unbelievable”.

There was a real sense that she knew who she was – that her self-knowledge and level of self-control was extremely high. With that self-control and managing of energy Simon Brooks-Ward, director of the Windsor Horse Show and friend of the Queen and Prince Philip, explained that she had a relationship with horses which was extraordinary: “it was almost horse-whispering … it was amazing to see the Queen around horses”.  Anyone who has worked with horses knows that emotional and psychological self-regulation is fundamental to control of the horse.  Managing one’s own energy directly affects the behaviour of the horse. She had done the work.

How heartening to see the impact of a skilled and understated coach, not there to know the answer or be seen to be right but simply to walk along side, support, ask questions. Until recently, who of us would have given the weekly audience with our “leaders” more than a passing thought as a nod to convention, a necessary ritual?  Over so many years her quiet listening and gentle questioning has helped shape a nation, a commonwealth and perhaps a world.