There are a number of reasons you might want to elicit a person’s metaphors.

One is simply to find out what’s going on for the person (for example, marketing guru Gerald Zaltman, author of ‘How Customers Think’ and ‘Marketing Metaphoria’ uses a Cleanish process to find out about customers’ metaphors for products).

Another is to model an expert, as discussed elsewhere.

A third is in a change process, for example coaching or therapy. The coach uses Clean Language questions to keep on exploring the metaphor, until things change. Typically the metaphor transforms, this transformation is isomorphic with a real-world change, and the client gets what they wanted: a change which fits them perfectly because it originates from their own system. (There is more skill to it than this, which is why we run training courses, but that’s the structure.)

This entry was posted on Monday 22 September 2008 and is filed under Articles, FAQs.

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