Coaching the Coach Case Study

What exactly is "Coaching the Coach"?

Coaching the coach is a practical guide to help managers learn and practice putting coaching skills into use in their day-to-day management style, or within official feedback sessions. It can be a one or two day event, depending on the requirements and can offer valuable insights to help managers to get more commitment and better performance from their staff.

Although there are plenty of "coaching courses" on the market, this course has a more "practical" focus, because it incorporates scenarios with professional actors, to help people relate and connect with "how not to do it", and practice "how to". Ideally the event would be designed specifically to the culture of the company and we would create scenarios based on "realistic situations" showing "manager/ subordinate interactions" in the company.

During the course, we"ll uncover what coaching is, its principles, techniques and benefits. The main focus of the course will be to revisit the scenarios and to help managers to practice using the coaching principles into running a meeting with an under-performing staff member.

There will be feedback and opportunities to try out different styles with various types of staff members, so that delegates can recognise that coaching is not a "one size fits all" approach. If required, delegates can be further supported with individual "Coachable Moments" sessions back in the workplace.

Who would use it and when? The sessions are designed for people-managers or people hoping to move into management positions. It can be used to help managers get more commitment and output from their staff, improve their communication skills and to put management theory into practice. The day also enables participants to bring in their own "situations", which they will be able to practice on the event.


Benefits of Coaching the Coach:

  • Understanding of the benefits of coaching
  • Real experience of using coaching skills in their role
  • Awareness of their own management style
  • The ability to respond and understand their staff's needs
  • The confidence to use coaching within their day-to-day management
  • More motivation and commitment from their staff members


Feedback

"I knew what coaching was, because I had received coaching as part of my job, but this course showed me the difference between the theory and what it was like to do it. It does feel unnatural at first, as I'm so used to coming up with solutions for my staff, but now it's becoming second nature, and I'm noticing a massive difference in the confidence levels of my staff. They tend to come to me now with ideas first, instead of just coming up with the issues".


Coaching the Coach Case Study

The Situation:

The client was a manager at a mortgage brokers call centre. She was very organised and efficient and a good problem solver. She tended to "rescue" her staff whenever they were unsure of what to do. The difficulty was that they never seemed to be able to come up with their own solutions.

The manager wanted some help to try and empower her staff more. She had done some coaching training before, but had found that back in the pressures of the contact centre, she would tend to go into "proactive mode" again and found it hard to put her skills into practice. She wanted to know how she could include coaching in her day-to-day management style.

The Process:

During the diagnostic phase, several observations were made of the contact centre and it was clear that it was a high-pressured environment, where issues arose constantly. Scenarios were written to reflect the contact centre and to show how the managers would tend to go into "reactive" mode whenever a staff member approached them. During the training day, managers were able to observe the situation objectively and recognised that their "solution-focused" approach may help the situation immediately, but tended to keep their staff relying on the managers' expertise, instead of using on their own initiative.

We explored coaching techniques throughout the morning and we then re-ran the scenarios where they took the part of the manager and practiced using a "coaching style" to help their staff use their own initiative.

The Outcomes:

  • The managers were delighted to understand the point where they can use coaching in their jobs. They also recognised that they needed to adapt their style to suit different types of staff members.
  • After the training day, the managers pointed out that they had to consciously use coaching as part of their role, but that over time, it had become more second nature.
  • The result has been that the staff have taken more responsibility and they tend to deal with disgruntled customers themselves, instead of always referring to the manager.