A coaching culture is a high performance culture
Organisations have spent decades trying to identify and clone the mythical ‘perfect leader’. Unfortunately, it turns out there’s no such thing! Today, businesses are facing unprecedented challenges from several angles, including increasing demands from employees and leaders. Could coaching be the answer?
In their HBR article ‘The Leaders as a Coach’, Herminia Ibarra and Anna Scoular describe how ‘once upon a time, most people began successful careers by developing expertise in a technical, functional or professional domain. If you could prove yourself that way, you’d rise up the ladder and eventually move into people management’. This has led to individuals becoming ‘accidental managers’, a concept common to many organisations. In years gone by the concept of ‘command and control’ was the name of the game as leaders aimed to direct and develop employees to reproduce their successes.
Traditional styles of management - like command and control - are becoming increasingly undesirable as we move towards a very different model: one in which leaders give support and guidance rather than instruction. Whilst coaching is not a new phenomenon and many organisations work with external coaches, there is a recognition that the role of the leader has fundamentally shifted and is increasingly becoming that of a coach.
The skill of a successful leader is in knowing how and when to utilise different leadership styles – coach mode should not eclipse others but there’s growing evidence it should be at the forefront of the skillset of every purpose-driven leader, and the culture of successful organisations. Leaders that apply coaching techniques challenge the coachee to think differently, shifting their thinking from problem to solution. They help employees to unlock their creativity, which helps them progress and achieve their objectives. As a result, employees realise a greater awareness of what the business needs from them, take greater accountability for their roles, and the collective performance of the team then increases.
As leaders master the art of coaching, the improved effectiveness of teams will help deliver desired business performance. A study by Deloitte evidenced that coaching improves productivity through speed of decision making by empowering employees and manager to make decisions themselves. There’s less ‘demand and control’ but instead more resourceful teams capable of taking ownership of problems and reaching solutions.
A coaching culture creates greater resilience and agility, not just for the leaders themselves, but also in their teams. They’re better equipped at managing challenges and can react to uncertainty without paralysis. Embedding a coaching philosophy across organisations and developing effective coaching skills in leaders enables businesses to operate more effectively in several areas, including onboarding, engagement, performance, and wellbeing, and there is likely to also be increasing psychological safety. Today, leaders who are skilled coaches are a critical component no organisation can afford to be without.
If you’re thinking about how you can up-skill your leaders to advance their coaching skills, get in touch to hear more about our ‘coaching for leaders’ programme. We’re also experienced executive coaches and would love to develop a coaching relationship with you and leaders across your business.
