What is Coaching and how can it help?

An extract from the most recent Coaching at Work Survey by The Chartered Management Institute states “An overwhelming 93% of managers believe that coaching should be available to ALL employees regardless of seniority.”

A recent CIPD study shows that coaching is increasingly popular as a means of promoting learning and development. The 2004 training and development survey also indicates that coaching is almost universally accepted as a method that delivers tangible business benefits. 96% of respondents valued coaching as an effective way to promote learning in organizations.

Coaching is a powerful, motivational profession, started in the 1980s in America. It grew from the realization that we can all sometimes lose our way amid the stresses and strains of modern life. Often we need an unbiased, outside view to help move us forward.

Coaching is a rapidly growing method for helping others to improve and develop, learn new skills, find personal success and manage life change and / or personal challenges. Coaching draws out rather than puts in. It develops rather than imposes. It reflects rather than directs. Coaching looks at where a person is now and helps them get to where they want to be. It is about unlocking a person’s potential to maximize performance in a supportive and motivating environment.

The coaching process is an effective partnership between coachee and coach, enabling a person to move forward with their life. It is action driven and by raising a person’s self-awareness and encouraging them to take responsibility, a coach can help a person rise to their own particular challenges and go further than they ever thought possible. Coaching takes place through conversation, but is however different from normal social conversation. It is dynamic and focused.

Coaching is about scheduling time to discover capabilities and taking action to achieve by taking step-by-step changes to achieve ambitious goals. It is about unlocking potential to maximize performance.

A coach is not a problem solver, a teacher or even an expert, but a facilitator who will raise the coachees level of self-awareness. Coaching works by breaking down what might seem like an overwhelming goal into manageable bite-sized chunks. This helps a person to succeed and to see results quickly.

The role of the coach is to motivate and inspire, asking searching questions, challenging the coachee and helping them uncover their own wisdom and potential. The job of the coach is to provide support to enhance the skills, resources and creativity that a person already has. Remember your past is not your potential. When a person is truly listened to, they grow in ability and confidence.

The headline findings in the Chartered Management Institute Coaching at Work Survey were:

• 85% reported that coaching increased staff morale
• 80% said coaching increases responsibility on the part of the learner
• 82% said not everyone will make a good coach
• 3% said coaching was a waste of resources
• 5% said it was another fad
• 3% said coaching was too time consuming

We implement coaching strategies through a programme of Coaching Skills Training, coupled with one-to-one coaching delivered by a professional Coach, to Team Leaders, Managers and anyone else involved in people management.

“Minds are like parachutes. They function best when they are open”.

“The journey of a thousand miles must begin with a single step.”

Benefits of Coaching

Benefits to the Business:

• A more productive and fulfilled workforce
• A highly motivated workforce
• Staff feel valued as individuals as they are given the opportunity to focus on themselves

Benefits to the staff:

• Staff can think through challenges and issues which were preventing them from performing to their very best
• Individuals commit to take action to achieve their goals
• They fulfill their potential for the benefit of themselves and the business
• Staff increase in confidence and in their ability to achieve

Coaching will help staff:

• clarify what they want from their job, giving them vision and purpose
• set more compelling and effective goal
• be motivated, keep them focused, keep them accountable, confronting them when they lag behind on their commitments
• improve their confidence, eliminating those things that are draining them of energy
• manage their time
• ask for what they want, be more assertive and set boundaries so that even the most difficult people will seem easier to get along with
• look more broadly at the range of options open to them
• learn how to work through the obstacles in their way of achieving what they want

“Your past is not your potential.”

Is coaching for you or your staff?

Coaching could be for you or your staff if you identify with any of the following:

• I’ve had a particular problem or challenge for a long time, but never managed to solve it
• I’ve got an important issue to resolve but I don’t know where to start
• I seem to spend all my time, just playing catch up
• Things are OK for me - but they could be better
• Things would be great if only…
• I’d like to run my ideas past someone who isn’t going to tell me what to do or be negative
• I feel isolated but find it difficult to talk to friends / colleagues in case they see it as failure
• I’m in a rut – but I feel too exhausted to change
• I’ve lost direction…

“A fool wanders… a wise man travels”

What happens in a coaching session?

During a coaching session the individual discusses the challenges they face, devises ways to meet those challenges and set goals. The coach helps the client to continually focus on their goals and keep them on track until they are achieved. A coach helps people look at the present and realize their future, rather than look at the past, helping people to focus on their own solutions.

“The difference between the impossible and the possible lies in a person’s determination.”

Coaching testimonials