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The old way of being a boss is over.
Increasingly, businesses are forgoing an authoritarian leadership style for a more collaborative approach.
Instead of honoring bosses who are distant and pass down commands from above, organizations now recognize employees respond well to managers who provide empathy, clear communication, and support.
Employees no longer want to work just to keep their job. They want to be a part of something bigger than themselves. Great managers have the essential coaching skills to create belonging and influence motivation in their teams.
What Are Effective
Coaching Skills?
Effective coaching skills help others achieve personal or professional goals. In a managerial or leadership role, effective coaching skills may support new behaviors or ways of thinking while also facilitating learning and development.
Unlike the skills used in psychotherapy,for example, ‘effective’ skills in the realm of coaching may be more subjective. In particular, the notion of a manager or leader as a coach is a relatively new phenomenon that warrants further study.
Overall, there are many variants of managerial coaching that entail different types of skills. Take, for example, hierarchical coaching and team coaching.
Here are a few critical skills for effective hierarchical coaching
▪ Creating a learning environment
▪ Caring for and supporting staff
▪ Providing feedback
▪ Communicating
▪ Providing resources
Effective coaching skills for team coaching
A more challenging form of coaching conducted by leaders is team coaching. Here, members of the team must work together and be in agreement about goals and targets.
Likewise, there is often a need to ensure team members are given opportunities to leverage their strengths, much like in the world of sports, where players ideally play their ‘best positions’ (Beattie et al., 2014).
Given the challenges associated with coaching an entire group, the best team coaches tend to be those who have undergone formal learning and development in coaching (Hagen & Gavrilova Aguilar, 2012).
Because team coaching requires attention to the dynamics between and within individuals, being able to have a big-picture perspective is a key skill (Center for Creative Leadership, 2022).
Other skills specific to team coaching include:
▪ A clear understanding of organizational dynamics within and around the context of the team. How does the team itself operate? How does it operate in the context of the organization as a whole?
▪ Flexibility and adaptability. The ever-shifting dynamics of a team mean managers and leaders must go with the flow, taking their direction from the team’s strengths and momentum.
▪ Comfort setting clear boundaries. With so many moving parts and inter- and intra-relational dynamics, managers who are coaching teams must be comfortable and skilled at creating firm boundaries – for themselves and for the team.
▪ A long-term view. Coaching teams isn’t always driven by clearly defined short-term objectives. Often, the benefits of effective team coaching unfold slowly and more subtly over the long run.
8 Coaching Skills for Managers and Leaders
If you’re a manager or leader looking to bring a coaching mentality to your leadership, here are some tips backed by research to help get you started.
1. Favor specific praise over group motivational speeches
In a team context, focus on celebrating individuals’ hard work and accomplishments. By recognizing a hardworking employee’s efforts, that employee will get the opportunity to feel valued and appreciated.
Research based on self-determination theory has demonstrated that positive feedback motivates individuals to continue pursuing goals and fosters vitality.
2. Make decisions collaboratively
Managers with effective coaching skills work together with employees to develop ideas and implement plans collaboratively.
When individuals believe that their leader’s decision process is fair and well communicated, they are more committed to a final course of action.
Better yet, including employees in decision-making, goal setting, and strategy development will enhance their feelings of ownership over processes, driving motivation even further.
3. Embrace failure
Remember that failure is part of the process toward success. Effective leaders help their team to learn from their errors to avoid them in the future.
Furthermore, this approach to managing mishaps builds trust between leaders and subordinates creating the psychological safety for team members to admit their mistakes and ask for help rather than sweeping them under the rug (Edmondson, 2002).
4. Capitalize on your team’s strengths
Employ a strengths-based approach to developing your staff. When employees know their strengths and can consistently build on their work from those strengths, managers and their teams can forge better-functioning workplaces.
Such an approach is often referred to as appreciative inquiry. Its benefit is that it cultivates commitment to improving the organization without imposing a problem orientation or sense of doom and gloom on employees. Rather, employees are celebrated for what they already do well and encouraged to apply these strengths in such a way that facilitates growth.
5. Practice emotional awareness
Effective coaches are aware of the effect that their emotions have on their coachees. When things get ‘hot,’ they get ‘cool.’ And when things are ‘cool,’ they ramp things up.
Effective leaders understand the transferability of emotions—a process sometimes referred to as emotional contagion (Hatfield et al., 1993). Therefore, good leaders are careful to manage their reactions to stressful situations and will look for opportunities to generate energy and excitement when a boost is needed within a team.
6. Be respectful and empathetic
Effective leaders demonstrate genuine concern for employees’ wellbeing and life outside of work. They take care not to overtax people’s resources or push people beyond their limits. Indeed, to earn respect, a good manager and coach leads by example and is willing to shoulder the same burdens and stressors they expect their staff to handle.
7. Practice compassionate leadership
The act of showing compassion involves being with someone in their pain. It’s understanding another’s feelings and demonstrating a willingness to act in response to those feelings (Boyatzis et al., 2006).
In the realm of coaching, compassionate leaders feel genuine pain for their employees when they’re struggling and show commitment to helping them reach their goals and find greater meaning in their work (Grant, 2008).
8. Use active listening
Managers with effective coaching skills employ many of the same communication and active listening techniques as professional coaches.
Active listening is a powerful skill that helps cultivate trust and assures team members that their needs are being listened to.
4 Examples of Coaching Skills in Action
Let’s now consider some examples of effective coaching skills in action.
First, imagine a scenario
where an employee has been consistently late and underperforming at work. A manager has noticed this reduction in productivity. Rather than creating fear in this situation, a competent manager will dial up empathy and collaborate with active listening in a critical evaluation conversation.
The manager might help the employee understand how they can use their personal strengths to overcome whatever obstacle is blocking their productivity.
Here’s another work scenario.
Imagine a team is facing a major crisis and needs their manager to approach the situation with a cool head.
Instead of swooping in to “fix” the problem, skilled managers may ask for input and ideas from all team members, generating more ideas and potential solutions. A manager with effective coaching skills can approach any obstacle with a calm, objective focus. A deeper understanding of problems and solution-focused questioning creates pathways to resolutions.
Next, imagine a new employee
who is visibly nervous about their new role. Their manager spots their discomfort and links them with another professional. The two are encouraged to set goals together and hold each other accountable. This coaching skill enables teams to collaborate and create social connections that will build community.
Finally, good coaching skills come in handy in times of conflict between employees. The effective coaching skills of active, equal listening and emotional intelligence can reduce anger, stress, and ineffective communication. Allowing space for each party to be heard and to also co-create solutions helps to unify the team.
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