Choosing a Corporate Coach
It is important to choose the right coach for your circumstances. When one starts looking for coaches whether it be through the internet or word of mouth, one needs to be clear on what kind of coach one wants and what one wants to achieve.
A corporate coach usually has experience in the business world, possibly as a manager or a management consultant. They are commercial and interested in continuously improving individuals, teams, management, processes and organisations. They focus on goals, efficiency and effectiveness. Other coaches may be more experienced in government or the not for profit sector. Some coaches are experienced in all these sectors and will be able to give you their perspective from many angles.
According to Anthony Grant -
“The majority of coaches come from a consulting, management or sales background. Of course, such expert business-related knowledge is important and useful in coaching within those domains. Indeed, many non-psychologist coaches do excellent work with their clients and work in an ethical and professional manner. Such coaches are in high demand, and offer coaching services that most psychologists are not trained to deliver.”
There are many reasons that a decision is made to use a coach. The process of accessing and selecting a coach is varied. Sometimes the internal skills or resources within an organisation are not as attractive as the external ones. Therefore the Human Resources department may select an external coach and the learning and development manager or Human Resources manager will decide on a coach. Some smaller organisations may not have this sort of infrastructure and the line manager may do the job of choosing a coach. Sometimes an individual working in a sole proprietorship or small business decides that having a coach would be useful in a small environment and they would then choose their own coach.
There are many different kinds of coaches depending on the need of the organisation. If a technical skill is what the coach is needed for, then the organisation will look for a subject matter expert. Often the skill required is in the leadership or communication area and for this there are several approaches. Some organisations will contact a training organisation and the RTO (registered training organisation) or consulting body will send through one of their trainers. Trainers in Australia are often certificated in Certificate IV Training and Assessment and this means that they have completed some study in coaching. Others will contact a coaching organisation directly. Many will phone a colleague and get a recommendation for a coach.
If the area of coaching required were leadership, it would be good to contact a coach with experience in leadership training and preferably one who has managed people before. This would be a question you could ask the coach when you contact them to see if they are the right coach for the situation.
If the area of coaching is communication, you would want to contact a coach that has years of experience training this skill or working in teams preferably in a large corporation and a good question to ask the coach is “what sorts of situations have you had to deal with where communication has been a problem?” you can gauge from this whether they are competent in the particular area you have in mind. Communication is a very large area and there are very specific needs. If the need is presentation skills, there are many companies who specialise in this, but if the area were more behavioural, it would be good to find someone who can tell you some success stories of helping someone who finds communication difficult. This area can also be called soft skills.
If the area of coaching is dealing with conflict or negotiation, again, there are specialists in this area and it would be good to ask for examples of where a coach has had this specific experience and again get examples of what they did to resolve the situation. This would give you a window into their realm of experience. Sometimes negotiation is a very specialised area relating to Industrial relations and dealing with unions or legal situations.
Another important element is the industry and establishing whether the coach has experience in your particular environment. The more familiar the coach is with the jargon and nuances of an industry, the faster they will be able to assess the situation and access the right treatment for the problem from their varied toolkit. It is also important that they have a toolkit rather than one solution that they use for all problems. Sometimes coaches are selling a certain solution, they have sales targets, and they may use a solution based on winning sales targets rather than helping the client.
Another type of coach is a performance coach – specialising in improving performance. The line manager or the Human Resources Manager may have called them in for an individual. They would have been informed of where the individual is failing and will be asked to rectify the situation. The hope is that they have not called the coach too late and the situation has caused too much “corporate cancer” and is therefore not redeemable.
There is a difference between a coach and a mentor, but this definition depends on what theorist you are reading. For the purposes of this article, the definition of coaching is “mutual understanding, fact finding, careful through reflection, creative action planning, and compassionate follow up.” (Stowell & Starcevich, p. 56) In some writing, the similarities between coaches and mentors are highlighted as the coachee works under the observation of an experienced worker, who acts as a model whom the coachee attempts to emulate. (Robbins, p. 435)
Another definition of coach is the executive coach often thought of as one used for senior managers.
Another category of coaching is the life coach who can possibly use some alternative remedies. Again one needs to know one’s boundaries and the depth or breadth of techniques one is prepared to try.
Another category of coach is the business coach especially used in small business for systems and procedures and start ups. They may have experience in small business themselves.
It is sometimes difficult to differentiate between coaches as much learning is transferred between the disciplines. The Australian Institute of Sport in Canberra provides much useful information on coaching as a discipline and the learning from coaching sports people that can be used to advance coaching practices in corporate situations.
Critical success factors for coaching relationships are based on:
Partnerships
“A Partnership means a quality relationship, one that is not based on mechanical or thoughtless compromise or the ability to charm or con others into doing things our way.”
(Stowell & Starcevich, p. 3)
They go on to define partnerships further using words like responsibility, integrity, openness and synergy while emphasising that the partners should not “duck out” practise commitment, say what ‘s on their mind but not in a hurtful way and combine talents.
Senge (p.106) supports this with a story about the definition and origins of the word coaching and how the word coaching today still conveys some of the spirit of close partnership and mutual responsibility.
Respect
“The research of Fisher and Ury, developed at the Harvard Negotiation Project, led to the conclusion that you can be both respectful of the person and tough on the issues.” (Stowell & Starcevich, p. 30)
Support
“Support is different from being “nice.” Nice can be interpreted as superficial, while support is an enabler, leading to clarity, action, responsibility, and accountability. (Stowell & Starcevich, p. 126)
Trust the process
“Galileo once said, ‘You cannot teach a man anything. You can only help him find it within himself.” (Stowell & Starcevich p. 161)
In conclusion, one really creates one’s own criteria in choosing a coach. Some may think that for behavioural coaching a degree in psychology is essential, whereas if it is business coaching one may be happy with someone who has years of experience in business.
References:
Grant, Anthony & Cavanagh, M.J., Coaching Psychology how did we get here and where are we going. Australian Psychological Society Insych. June 2007.
Robbins, S.R., 1989, Organisational Behaviour, Concepts, Controversies, and Applications, Fourth Edition, Prentice-Hall, New Jersey.
Senge, P. Kleiner, A. , Roberts, C., Ross, R., Roth, G., Smith, B.1999, The Dance of Change, The Challenges to Sustaining Momentum in Learning Organisations, New York.
Stowell, S.J. Starcevich, M.M. 1996, Win-Win Partnerships, Be on the Leading Edge with Synergistic Coaching, CMOE, Inc. Utah.