↗️ What’s your coaching exit strategy?

What’s your coaching EXIT strategy?

Stephen Covey taught us to ‘start with the end in mind’ (in this classic ‘The 7 Habits of highly effective people’). It’s generally good advice.

It’s also something that you can apply as a learning Leader Coach, in the short and long-term.

There are two levels where this is helpful:

Run a performance or growth CONVERSATION with an explicit goal / desired outcome.

Don’t just jump into detail right away, when you have a career conversation with someone. It’s a core coaching skill to *always* agree first on what the outcome of the current conversation should be. Coaching goals are always explicit, repeated, summarised, never assumed.

It sounds like this:
“What should be the outcome of our conversation?”
“What do we need to address in the next 20min?”
“What’s the most important thing to work through for you right now?”

Run a long-term ENGAGEMENT with an EXIT plan in mind.

This is another aspect of coaching that you might find surprising. If you are in a longer-term coaching/mentoring relationship with someone, it’s a great idea to agree what the ‘exit criteria’ for that engagement are. This is powerful, because it forces long-term, ambitious thinking. For paid coaches, it also addresses the inherent conflict of interest of getting paid for more coaching time. It’s a great trust-builder to define together when a paid engagement ends.

It sounds like this:
“How would you know in 6 months that we completed our coaching goals?”
“What are the conditions that would tell you were are done with our work together?”
“What are the explicit exit criteria for our coaching work for you?”

Summary

Great coaches always agree with their coachee on desired outcomes. Then they will keep those goals in mind. This is no different than a great Project Manager keeping desired project outcomes in mind and making sure that individual meetings don’t steer off.

The difference is that in coaching this is always EXPLICITLY done, never assumed. This is challenging for coach and coachee alike, but very healthy for organisations, too. I have seen it too many times when projects and meetings move in wrong directions, as people forgot what they are there for.

It’s a great way to apply professional-level coaching skills in every-day work conversations and meetings!

Maik