15 May Are you thinking of implementing coaching in your organisation? if so here are some top tips to consider and think about before you do
It’s International Coaching Week this week and to mark the occasion I’ve written this blog for anyone looking to implement coaching within their organisation.
Over the course of the last two and a half years I have been lucky enough to work with a number of organisations who have wanted to implement coaching to varying degrees and these top tips are a collection of my learnings and also the mistakes I have seen organisations make. If you are an organisation who doesn’t do much coaching but are wanting to implement some form of coaching, here are some top tips for you to consider and think about.
Coaching continues to be one of the most popular development practices within organisations the world over, but just because it’s popular doesn’t mean it’s easy to do and like most new activities that are implemented – you only get one chance of getting it right. Employee experience is key and you don’t want employees having a bad experience of coaching before it’s already started.
Don’t just implement coaching for the sake of it or because others are doing it – have a clear reason and need for doing it
One of the first questions I ask an organisation who is looking to implement coaching is “why?”. Always start with why, because by answering this question it means you are clear on the reason for doing it. If you have this clarity you will be able to connect the need to the company strategy, goals and objectives rather than it just being one of those “nice to have HR initiatives”. Why do organisations want to implement coaching within their organisations? Usually for a whole host of different reasons and that’s why it’s important to be clear on the right reason for your organisation. What is right for another organisation may not be right for yours.
The next question to ask is “what are you trying to achieve by doing coaching in your organisation?” “Do you have a specific problem you are trying to solve?” You may have some recurring themes, business and/or people challenges you want to address, or you may have specific issues coming out of a recent engagement survey that you think coaching can help address. Some of the answers to this question maybe obvious and some not, that’s fine. Also don’t just think about what you are trying to achieve in the short-term, think about the long-term as well.
Most organisations who want to implement coaching are looking to do so as they want to create a longer term coaching culture. Cultures are complex, multi-faceted and take a long term to evolve and develop. So when starting out it’s a good idea to be thinking about the end goal, but also the milestones you will need to put in place to know you are progressing in the right direction and achieving what you set out to achieve. A quick and relatively easy task to gauge what you could do is by looking at what your competitors doing and how they are doing it. Get some examples of those companies doing coaching well to get some ideas and confirmation about what your next steps need to be.
Get buy-in and identify some early adopters
This tip applies to a lot of people development initiatives and in an ideal world the drive and need for coaching will be coming from the business. You may have a senior leader who has recently had some coaching and who can’t stop talking about the positive impact it had on them, or they may be doing some leadership training and have encountered some coaching as part of that and think it should be a staple in the organisation. Whatever the reason, before doing anything make sure you have the buy-in from your senior leaders. They will want to understand what it is and how it will benefit the business. This will involve being able to demonstrate the ROI to justify the investment required to implement it.
If you can, identify people within the organisation who understand it, who have experienced coaching and are those natural coaches who do it with their teams without necessarily knowing they are coaching. Identify them early on as these people will become your coaching ambassadors.
Create a coaching framework
This is often overlooked when implementing coaching within an organisation but it’s helpful and beneficial to have a framework which sets out your approach to coaching so there is clarity and transparency.
To start with you may want to use coaching for a particular group or audience to address a specific challenge or as part of a leadership development programme. You might want to offer coaching to everyone in your organisation. Depending on the need you may use different approaches, for example if you have limited coaching capability within your organisation at present you may need to rely initially on external coaches. However, over time you may wish to build and develop your internal coaching capability and have a pool of internal coaches. You may decide on a mix of both.
A coaching framework will provide you with a baseline of principles and practices for coaching within your organisation and become your frame of reference for all things coaching to help shape your thinking for now and in the future.
Invest in building coaching skills – don’t assume people can coach
There is an assumption that all managers and leaders can coach because they are managers and leaders. We know this not to be true and whilst some people have a natural aptitude and coaching style, many do not. Therefore it is important to invest in coaching training for anyone in your organisation who is going to be coaching.
Like with all training and particularly when it comes to coaching training there are many different options, levels and providers so think about what would be appropriate for your organisation, be clear on your budget and most of all be realistic of the time investment, as learning coaching skills and becoming a skilled coach takes time, practice and experience.
Be aware of the label trap!!
One of the biggest traps I see organisations falling into is around language and semantics. Some people refer to coaching when they really mean mentoring and mentoring when they mean coaching. Some organisations steer away from using the term “coaching” as it may have been used previously to tackle poor performance and therefore they don’t want any new approach to coaching to be associated with negative connotations.
Given the rise of organisations moving away from the annual appraisal, many are positioning coaching as a “conversation” whether it be one about personal development, career development or performance.
Every organisation has its own language, so choose something that people are going to instinctively understand and get.
Be innovative and creative with your approach to coaching
Like with mentoring there is a view that all coaching has to be 1:1. Whilst a lot of coaching is 1:1 there are lots of other options so don’t be afraid of being innovative and creative with your approach to coaching in your organisation.
Virtual coaching is becoming more and more mainstream within organisations who are geographically dispersed nationally or internationally. Peer coaching is becoming more and more common as part of management and leadership development programmes as a means to share and transfer knowledge and skills. Group coaching is also becoming more popular as different groups of employees come together to share their insights, collaborate and help one another.
Measure the impact and capture the learnings
This is nearly always the after-thought, the bit that gets forgotten about but actually it’s one of if not the most important aspects. Why would you implement something and not measure that it’s doing what you wanted it to do?
There are so many ways in which you can measure the impact of coaching and using different data points to do so. Measuring it will enable you to get the confirmation you need but also the opportunity to course correct if needs be. Plus there are always so many learnings that come out of coaching at an organisational level that are incredibly valuable for improving the employee experience within your organisation.
Katherine is an experienced and accredited professional coach-mentor who is passionate about all things coaching, having helped a number of organisations create a coaching culture and seen coaching work successfully in a number of organisations.
Follow her on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook @talentologyltd
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