Coach More, Manage Less

Changing your leadership style and mindset to be more of a “coach” means investing more of your time with your employees. That is a challenge for just about all of us.  With increasing workloads and limited resources, how can you justify the investment? For me, I think it goes back to my personal experience as an employee on one rung of the ladder…and my experiences as a CEO, a different rung on the same ladder (I always answered to someone).

When my boss believed in me, allowed me to make mistakes and grow from them…I was able to contribute more long term with my creativity, productivity and the ability to work more autonomously. I was more engaged and I no longer needed the direction more traditional managers feel they need to give to employees to get results.

“Coaching is working together toward improved performance, so everyone wins. Coaching is a healthy, positive and enabling process that develops the capacity of people to solve today’s business problems.” Thomas Crane wrote this over a decade ago when The Heart of Coaching: Using Transformational Coaching to Create a High Performance Culture was written.

“Coaching” has become a common term too many people use interchangeably with the word “manage.” There is a fundamental difference between the two words. Let’s do some exploration. BTW, as an Executive Coach, many of the same skills I need to be successful with my clients are the exact same skills leaders need to be successful as a coach for their employees.

So, just exactly what is the mindset of a coach? How would you answer the following questions?

1) Do I look at employees as being inherently good, who want to make a contribution to my company?

2) Do I believe my employees are doing the best they can with what they know and the resources they have available to them?

3) Do I believe people are trustworthy first, and must prove themselves otherwise?

4) When people make mistakes, do I practice forgiveness and teach a better way?

5) Do I believe people to be competent until they show me otherwise?

If you answered yes to all five questions, then you have the capacity and heart to lead like a coach.

The traditional manager operates in a “tell” mode whereby he or she provides the solutions to problems and questions. They tell what “great” looks like and provide the action steps team members to achieve the desired results…a very hands on and top down approach.

Coaching is an entirely different mindset. Rather than “tell,” a coach will ask the right thought provoking questions to explore and develop the thinking of the employee. I can’t remember where I heard it but it’s a good time to repeat a favorite coaching quote: A good coach works their way out of their job every day.” Coaching is about developing autonomy whereby the team member doesn’t need to rely on “being managed” to be successful; they develop independence in the employee, not dependence. Great coaches model behavior and “walk the walk.” They show their employees through their own behavior what “great” looks like.

Coaching is scary; it means taking risks that many find difficult to take. It means letting go; both of the notion that achieving outcomes requires tight controls, and that employees perform best when parameters are clearly drawn. But it is only through developing our employees and colleagues, trusting them to do the right thing, that allow for leaders to shift to being proactive. It is through this shift that leaders themselves evolve from good to great, whereby they can shift from tactical operations to strategic visioning. And the best part of this shift is…your team becomes capable of achieving even more.