🎙️ EP 10 : When to Coach – And When Not

We have to use our good judgment here. Is our solution (as a Leader) based on objective facts or is it an opinion and a choice? If it’s the first, we should not coach; if it’s the latter, coaching is useful to unearth further ideas and potential things we missed.

That is not the same thing as #1. If there is a standard process to achieve a certain goal, then there is no use in asking around to find it (given we already know it). Digging in our team members for facts that we know is useful in a training scenario, but it is crushing for motivation in most other cases.

Core skill-building and knowledge transfer require teaching and instruction skills; we would not coach on the content itself. Again, we can explore where there is an opportunity for exploration, possibly HOW someone prioritizes their learning or where they might expect to have difficulty implementing it.

That qualification is very important. We rarely deal with a real acute crisis and there is usually enough time to at least ask one or two questions.

That might, for example, originate from culture: if the organization is not ready to accept coaching as an acceptable style, it will be hard to put it in place.

Coaching requires a bit of trust. Without it, we should focus on rebuilding trust first and coaching might be a useful way here. If trust is absent, our coaching efforts will be met with suspicion and rejection. In this case, let us rather focus on rebuilding trust. Using Coaching skills can play a part in that, but it is by no means sufficient.

Why? because trust is usually broken at this stage and other means are necessary to help here. When we connect coaching to fixing problems, we reduce its usefulness.

While that might rarely apply in a Leader/Employee relationship, it is important for us to mention here. Therapy is the right method to deal with trauma; coaching instead focuses on getting someone from where they are today into a more desirable future.

These were a lot of reasons why we should not coach. Let’s get to the more exciting part:

There is no objective, one right option. It’s a matter of opinion. In this case, we can remember that as Leaders will ALWAYS operate from a position of incomplete information. There is always the possibility, that our team member has insight that we don’t have. Not accessing it is not only a waste but outright gross negligent.

HOW would you do it, given the goal that is set? what could go wrong? A lot of coaching as a leader focuses on this area, because very often outcomes are a given thing.

Just the fact that we do go and ask, is building confidence and shows that we trust our team member. That alone has a long-term impact on speed and quality of work.

It is exactly in this scenario, that coaching plays out all its strengths. It is virtually impossible to tell someone to be motivated, to become confident, to become committed. All these things are self-motivated and solutions to achieve them have to come from within. While they might think of mentoring, the effect here is also limited.

Coaching is a momentary investment of giving up control, but it repays. Coaching saves time later because our team members are r more motivated to work on their own solutions. What we typically see is that they will ask us fewer questions and they are more independent. This is the power of giving autonomy.

Coaching is a powerful amplifier for people to be engaged and excited about their daily work. Coaching gives them autonomy, one of the fundamental elements.

Success is in most cases rarely a result of knowledge. Fact is also that team members have more knowledge and depth in the topics they decide. This presents us with a strong case for giving them autonomy.

Coaching from Wins. Leaders often forget that and end up using coaching only when there are problems.

Enjoy!