Coaching involves the transfer of knowledge, skills, and abilities from coach to coachee. It is an ongoing professional relationship between coach and coachees. It discovers the hidden talents of the coachees and develops certain competencies and capabilities and skills and abilities through continuous interaction, questioning, and feedback. Finally, it aligns these skills and abilities with the talents of the coachees so that the latter can achieve all-round success. It is a smarter and wiser way of doing the hard work.
Coaching is a gift from God. If you get a good coach who is passionate about making a difference in your personal, professional, and social life then you are really lucky. Coaches usually pay more attention to listening and observation and then shoot coachees with open-ended questions. It ultimately helps the coachees to touch their subconscious mind and come out with viable solutions and ideas.
Coaching Types and Methods
Coaching helps in developing the abilities and skills of the coachees. It makes sure of their personal and professional advancement. There are various types of coaching such as personal coaching, performance coaching, sports coaching, skills coaching, career coaching, corporate coaching, executive coaching, life coaching, and leadership coaching etc., With the rapid growth in technology and mushrooming knowledge workers, there are specialized coaches for specific domains.
There are two methods of coaching such as directive and non-directive coaching. In directive coaching, the coach teaches extensively to upgrade the skills and abilities of the coachees. However, in the non-directive method, the coach questions the coachees and moves them forward toward their goals. In this method of coaching, questioning is the key and it emphasizes on Socratic Method.
There is enormous excitement in making ordinary individuals extraordinary individuals. The money you get out of coaching is temporary but the satisfaction and pleasure you get out of it is everlasting. You can see success from the accomplishments of your coachees. It is beyond imagination and explanation.
Coaching helps in introspection for coachees. It helps in realizing their ambitions. It helps in the personal, professional, and social success of coachees.
Coaching helps in challenging limitations, stretching horizons, and empowering with new values and principles.
Coaching helps shape the next generation of knowledge workers to become successful professionals.
Coaching versus Mentoring
Coaching is different from mentoring. In mentoring, the mentors shape the attitudes, behavior, and personality of the mentees. In contrast, in coaching, the coaches build the skills and abilities of the coachees thus widening their competencies and capabilities. In a nutshell, mentoring involves more soft skills than hard skills while coaching involves more hard skills than soft skills. To distinguish succinctly, coaches accompany achievements and mentors ensure the shaping of the mentees.
Coaching helps in discovering the inherent competencies and capabilities of the coachees and in shaping them as competent individuals. It helps in motivating and building confidence among the coachees through continuous support and guidance. However, mentoring helps in showing the mentees their inherent competencies and thus grooming them.
Coaching is a structured and formal approach while mentoring is not so. Coaching involves physical interaction and constant correction with the right feedback. However, mentoring is all about sharing advice and experiences.
Qualities of Coaches and Coachees
The coaches must be confidential, and friendly, and must be psychologists. They must shoot the right questions to get the best out of coachees. They must be good at giving objective feedback. Above all, they must be good listeners with the right reasoning and analytical bent of mind.
The coachees must be good listeners and should have respect for the coach. They must have a passion for learning and upgrading their skills and abilities and must have the ability to take feedback objectively and constructively.
The Role of Coaches
The roles and responsibilities of coaches are beyond coaching. However, let us briefly put the same as a facilitator, catalyst, learner, domain expert, and above all mentor. They must facilitate learning through constant questioning, interaction, reflection, and feedback. The feedback must be sandwich and issues-oriented rather than individual-oriented. That means it must emphasize on attacking the behavior of the individuals but not the individuals. It must bring out necessary behavioral changes as well as results-driven. They must act as catalysts when they need to bring changes in the thinking level, behavioral level, and performance level. They must be able to build confidence among the coachees and transform them. They must be very strong in their domain so that they can gain respect and win the trust of coachees. Above all, they must also act as mentors and consultants by sharing their knowledge, and experiences and providing advice to the coachees.
Coaching Strategy
The coach must have a clear strategy with a blueprint for the execution of the coaching process which must be aligned with the goals of the coachees. Both coach and coachee must set SMART strategies to achieve desired results. They must set their strategies specifically to avoid deviation and to ensure clarity. The duration of the coaching must be measurable to be clear and to enhance seriousness. The strategies must be achievable so that both the coach and coachees get motivated to take it forward. Besides, the coaching strategy must be realistic and should not be a mere daydream. Finally, the strategy must be trackable and time-bound to stay focused as well as to check for takeaways.
Coaching Stages
It consists of various stages such as direction, relationship, development, execution, and feedback. Firstly, it is vital to set the direction with clear outcomes out of coaching. Secondly, it is necessary to build a relationship between the coach and coachees. The relationship paves the way for better communication resulting in bridging the barriers by looking at the commonalities. Thirdly, emphasize developmental activities to stay focused on the coaching process. Fourthly, execution is the key to effective and successful coaching. Remove the stumbling blocks, if any, during the coaching process by minimizing both internal and external threats and maximizing both strengths and opportunities. The final stage of coaching is the feedback which measures the takeaways out of coaching. Kirkpatrick's evaluation is useful and ideal to find out the coaching outcomes.
Coaching and Questioning
The coaches must use several tools during the coaching process such as usage of inquiry, interaction, reflection, and requests to get the best out of the coachees. In addition, they must learn the art of questioning as questioning is an integral part of coaching. They must ask open-ended questions that help their coachees think broadly in coming out with solutions. Coachees will be able to think and come out with answers when shot with broadening questions as people are usually more committed to their ideas than those of others. Here are the great coaching questions to ask your coachees, or yourself!
What do you want to learn?
What skills and abilities do you like to acquire?
What action will you take to improve your abilities and skills?
What are your professional goals and how much duration do you take to reach them?
What do you mean by success? Has success got anything to do with coaching? How do you think coaching helps in achieving your success?
What are the current challenges you have and how will you overcome them?
These are all are open-ended coaching questions that grill the coachees and dig deep to align their efforts and energies with their goals.
Myths and Truths about Coaching
It is a myth that coaches provide quick-fix solutions to coachees. The coachees must not expect tailor-made solutions for their problems from coaches. What the coach does is spot the potential and passion of the coachees and develop competencies and capabilities.
Another myth prevailing is that coaches are superhuman beings. The truth is that coaches are ordinary individuals with extraordinary mindsets, skill sets, and toolsets to shape the coachees. They are passionate about making a difference in the lives of coachees.
Coaching and Leadership Development
Leadership development is incomplete without referring to coaching and mentoring as coaches coach the coachees through coaching and mentors mentor the mentees through mentoring. Therefore, coaching is included in the content plan of leadership development programs (LDP) as it is considered the key to leadership development. The facilitators and consultants cover various concepts and aspects of coaching during their leadership development programs. Therefore, both coaching and leadership development are two sides of the same coin.
Make a Difference
With the mushrooming knowledge workers, there is huge potential for coaching where people like to unlock and realize their hidden potential. People don't hesitate to spend their money on personal and professional development. Besides, the changing times and technologies resulted in ambiguity and uncertainty and that calls for coaching. Therefore, there is a bright future ahead for all areas of coaching.
Coaching is indeed, a priceless gift. Coaching is an excellent career when both coaches and coachees are passionate. It exists as long as human civilization exists as human beings crave continuous learning and growing.
Coaches must love their profession as Eddie Robinson rightly said, "Coaching is a profession of love. You can't coach people unless you love them." They must have a passion to make a difference for others. They must have a love for their profession rather than money. They will not last but their coaching lasts for several generations. They don't have to regret in the later part of life for not coaching and guiding humankind if they coach timely. Therefore, start coaching from now onwards to make a difference in the lives of others.
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Professor M.S. Rao, Ph.D.
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