Coaches should be experts

Coaching got a bad reputation, and that's mostly because plenty of coaches lack an understanding of their clients' jobs and industries.

The result is that they limit their coaching to the one thing they are experts in, which is psychology and accountability. While useful, this is only a small part of what coaching is about, and will only be of use if the coachee's problem is motivation.

However, very often, the coachee's problem is not motivation but rather a lack of skills or knowledge. For example, a manager's limiting factor might be poor delegation skills or blindspots in how their industry works.

In this case, a more complete type of coaching is recommended.

What is coaching?

First of all, forget everything you know about coaching, for the term is used for anything and nothing. For me, to coach someone means to guide them into doing what they need to do to become more effective at what they do, and it consists of a mix of:

– Providing feedback and identifying opportunities for growth. The more specific, the better (for example, instead of “You should work on your presentation skills, say, “You should improve your diction and, in particular, get rid of the hmmm sounds”).

– Teaching how to do something well. This includes teaching what it means to do a particular task well and explaining not just what separates good from bad but also good from great.

– Roleplaying and playing hypotheticals to pre-empt mistakes, resulting in fast learning and setting the coachee up for success.

– Setting long- and short-term objectives. A coachee should end the session with a better and clearer to-do list than when they began it.

– Creating momentum by splitting large tasks into actionable bits.

– Providing accountability by demanding and reviewing progress.

Teaching frameworks I use when coaching

Here are some teaching frameworks I use when coaching.

– Bad, good, great. Given a task, role, or objective of the coachee, I explain what a bad performer would do or care about, what a good one would do or care about, and what a great one would do or care about.

– What’s too little, what’s too much, and common mistakes. This is a great framework for delegating tasks and objectives. Explain what a successfully completed task would look like, then mention what would be too little, then what would be too much, and finally, the common mistakes of people working on that task.

– Roleplay and hypotheticals. There’s nothing better than asking the coachee what they would do in a situation and providing them with some immediate feedback. It allows them to practice in a safe space and discover possible mistakes or misunderstandings without having to go through the effort and pain required by failing in the real world.

Interested in working with me?

I usually work with business leaders, managers, and entrepreneurs who want to grow their careers and organizations and believe that their bottleneck is not motivation but rather a lack of skills or context.

With my usual coaching clients, we meet over Zoom once every week or every other week for 45 minutes, for 3-6 months. For some clients with specific needs, we only meet for 2-3 sessions.

Email me for enquiries, stating your current position and career goals.