Earlier this year one of my friends was trying to convince me to compete in a triathlon. I began to think to myself that I need to try something different and to challenge myself. My friend has done several triathlons and is currently training to compete in an Ironman triathlon. With his encouragement, I decided to go ahead and give it a try. Once I told him I was going to do it, he told me that I needed to sign up or I wouldn’t follow through. I put off signing up for about two weeks because of my busy schedule and I was traveling for work. Upon my return, my friend again asked me if I had signed up yet. My response was “No, not yet.” He commented that if I didn’t sign up soon, it wouldn’t happen. So the next day, I finally made the commitment and I signed up for the event.

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“What comes first, coaching or the need to coach?” This is a very interesting question and one that has been asked before in CMOE’s Coaching Skills Workshops. If this question is one you’ve found yourself asking as well, I hope to be able to answer it for you in this second part of the blog. If you have not yet read Part 1 of this discussion, please click here.

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The unanswered question of all time is, “Which came first, the chicken or the egg?” While an answer to this question has yet to be determined, I will attempt to answer a similar question posed to me recently by a new manager.

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Coaching is best described as,

• Development
• Relationships
• Direction
• Accountability
• Results

Coaching is the tool or mechanism to really keep everything together in your business.

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Many people feel that coaching and mentoring are the same thing. Whenever you ask a group what makes a good coach, someone inevitably says “mentor” or “mentoring.” Likewise, if you were to ask a group what makes a good mentor, you would probably hear someone say that a mentor helps to coach people.

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When it comes to coaching, most of our efforts are spent with those that report directly to us. This begs the question; what needs to be done when you need to coach your boss on a particular issue? Can you achieve the results you desire and can it really be done effectively? Interestingly enough, sometimes the person who needs coaching the most is your boss, and there are ways you can coach your boss without feeling too much pressure.

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Phil Higgins on the Eight-Step Coaching model used by pharmaceutical giant Pfizer

Any successful, professional sports person has a coach, whose role is to encourage, challenge and motivate the athlete to achieve their true potential. In the working environment, the same principles apply. The benefits of coaching include an increase in the individual’s overall performance, greater motivation through an acknowledgment that the individual is being developed, leading to greater retention and succession planning.

Profile of culture and aims of coaching programs:

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In order to successfully position your organization in the marketplace, leadership teams must create a compelling and distinctive value proposition. Customers must believe you are there to champion their needs, not just to make a profit. However, defining a really attractive value proposition is actually the easy part. The hard part is getting the organization totally aligned and in sync with a customer focused value proposition. Everyone in the organization must understand and see that the customer is part of their personal responsibility. This customer-oriented culture relies on front line leaders that help people understand how they fit into the strategic management of the business and why they matter.

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