Communicators as Coaches to Build Your Organization’s Culture

“Coaching is for professionals”, “I am not qualified to coach”, “So much work – who has the time to coach?”, “I rather tell my team what to do rather than do this time consuming coaching bit”.

Heard these before? Sounds familiar?

The Times of India Ascent (September 2, 2009) front page story on mentorship and coaching highlighted how senior leaders have learnt and shared knowledge during their careers. Quite inspiring.

Surprisingly, a recent study by BlessingWhite paints a different picture on coaching.

Called the Coaching Conundrum 2009, it draws from research that reflects interviews with 60 HR and line leaders, survey responses of 2,041 individuals in North America, Asia, and Europe, and analysis of coaching profile assessments for more than 8,000 managers.

Some of the findings stand out for me, that is, when I relate it to organizations I have worked for and how internal communicators can leverage it for building a growth culture.

a) Most managers love to coach, and most employees like to be coached but only 1 in 2 survey respondents in North America and Asia receive coaching

b) Managers who coach regularly describe tangible benefits (e.g., increased team productivity) and 2/3rds of employees who receive coaching say it improved their satisfaction and performance

c) Organizations and managers talk a lot about coaching skills and processes but a trusting, supportive relationship appears to be the most important ingredient in effective coaching.

It is important to understand the difference between mentorship and coaching before we can embark on how these tools can be build into your organization’s DNA, if not already so.

Mentorship refers to a developmental relationship in which a more experienced or more knowledgeable person helps a less experienced or less knowledgeable person –who can be referred to as a protégé, or apprentice — to develop in a specified capacity.

While Coaching is a method of directing, instructing and training a person or group of people, with the aim to achieve some goal or develop specific skills. Not to be confused with ‘supervising’ which is defined as ‘to have the charge and direction of’.

In the realm of organizations, a coaching culture is easier to build than mentorship and more tangible.

So does one need to be formally trained to be a coach or can you begin coaching anyone, anytime?

I think the latter holds good. There isn’t a reason to wait since you don’t need any specific infrastructure to begin. Before you begin though, you need to understand your objectives.

Are you hoping to grow your employees? Do you think you can create capability in your team?

Can you free bandwidth to take up strategic roles? Is there a something you want your team to unlearn? How can you see your team successful? Have you seen a best practice that can be imbibed by your employees?

So how can you begin and build it into your organization’s culture? What is the relevance of it for internal communicators?

It does not matter if your organization is a private or a public enterprise, a college or a start-up, I believe the opportunities to coach your immediate team members, your peers or other colleagues exist. As internal communicators, you can help your team look at approaches freshly, revise the way communication is perceived or created and build specific skills and competencies. By practicing coaching, internal communicators can also step up as ‘ambassadors’ and demonstrate value to senior leadership.  In internal communication teams specifically in India, I know this is much needed.

Build from a position of strength: To start, it is important to be viewed as a credible resource and someone who is established as a ‘leader’. ‘Leader’ in this context is not someone with authority but someone who ‘gains the respect’ by adding tangible value over time.

Identify coaching opportunities: Understand that each member of your team brings certain strengths and growth areas and it is vital to identity where you can play a pivotal role. It can be something as simple as helping a person to write effective e-mails. Or, how to improve visibility among stakeholders.

Demonstrate value: Remember that coaching does take effort. Be sure of how much time you can commit but once you identify that chunk of mind space, spend them judiciously. Have a plan to define goals, outcomes and milestones. Give feedback often and directly. Link it to performance and benefits. Help your ‘coachee’ see results.

Popularize coaching success stories: Are you aware of senior leaders in your organization who exhibit coaching prowess? Can you make them your ambassadors? Create podcasts and news articles based on their insights and experiences. Encourage them to share their perspectives on what worked and what does not.

Outline guidelines:  Prepare from your experience templates and ‘cheat sheets’ which can help others run their own coaching programs. It can be simple ‘notes capture templates’, ‘plan definition’ charts or even simple ‘feedback forms’ to collate inputs.

Assess changes: It is in your interest to ensure the success of your coachee. Find out obstacles which are coming in the way, give them inputs on overcoming them. Not ‘overcoming’ them on their behalf! That is a trap coaches often fall into in our enthusiasm to achieve our goals. Conduct a survey to ascertain quantifiable value.

Communicate wins: Share progress with other stakeholders so that the ‘coachee’ knows how much distance got covered. By communicating regularly, I am hopeful you can build a culture where coaching is embedded into the organization’s thinking.

Keen to try coaching from today? It’s worth the effort to try to make this happen. Give it a shot and I am sure you will see results emerge from your effort.