Performance Coaching

The Handbook for Managers, HR Professionals and Coaches

Angus McLoed PhD

• Publisher: Crown House Publishing
• Year: 2003
• Print ISBN: 9781904424055
• eBook ISBN: 9781845906337
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: Business General
• Index: Business

Fast, accessible and clearly written, Performance Coaching is comprehensive and rich in real examples of real executives achieving real success in real-life situations. Even experienced coaches can find key tips and tools that will enhance their performance. " A practical book with wonderful tips, ideas and perspectives." Kriss Akabusi MBE MA

Chapter One

Introduction

This book is accessible to managers wanting a resource where they may learn and access information easily. Human-resources (HR) professionals will find information helpful in deciding whether to establish a coaching or mentoring function, whether to insource, outsource, or use support strategies that could include e-mentoring (using an intranet or extranet). The book should appeal to both the novice coach trying to get a practical handle on coaching skills and to the more experienced coach wanting to widen their knowledge and to refresh the use of tools that have become rusty.

In trying to achieve an accessible book for all managers, I hope that I have provided an adequate structure, a functional contents list, and a detailed index to satisfy all but the most demanding and methodical expert. I apologize now for the word “coachee”. Although I dislike this word, I have been unable to find something well regarded and more acceptable without introducing a new term. The word “client” will not do, since, in the corporate context, the client is always the party that pays.

Where a newly introduced tool or idea is mentioned in the text it is shown in bold, and this signifies that a box containing related information is nearby. This allows any reader who needs more information to access it while allowing other readers to continue reading, without having to break their concentration. I hope this also allows more expert readers with specific skill sets to skip sections (when they are already familiar with specific tools).

Other emboldened text, but italicized, is there to highlight linguistic tips that appear in the text. Linguistic tips are referred to in their own index for ease of reference.

Necessarily, many of the issues given as examples are incomplete: they are there merely to illustrate ways of approaching an issue and are not a complete transcript of all interventions. As a consequence, not all the issues raised in a given example are complete.

Many of the tools that are illustrated in the examples can be used in different contexts. It’s hoped that, by reading through examples, you will become familiar with the tools and language of coaching and will build on your successes to use the tools fluidly. The choice of which tool to use in any given situation becomes more obvious with familiarity and practice.

Following these introductory sections, Chapters Two and Three are set out to be highly accessible to managers and novice coaches wanting easy access to practical coaching. Examples reflect typical issues seen in coaching practice. These offer a readable way of introducing the language and tools of coaching. Chapter Two looks at the most typical issues in coaching and Chapter Three follows this format to highlight typical drivers for change.

HR professionals with coaching experience may like to go directly to Chapter Four to gain insights into how coaching is applied in organizations.

In Chapter Five we look at a selection of methods taken from bigger developmental models that either are, or can be, applied to coaching. I have been highly selective in choosing those that I use or have seen to be highly effective. This is necessarily an individualistic offering. I also introduce my own STEPPPA coaching model (“STEPPPA” is an acronym whose meaning we will discuss later).

Chapter Six looks primarily at the development of the coach, drawing upon a number of philosophies and methods that underpin the practice of executive coaching.

Chapter Seven is unapologetically a place where I have put other background information that has not appeared elsewhere. This includes some additional information about questioning methods, and methods that are not invariably part of the coach’s resource, such as storytelling, totems, and archetypes.

Chapter Eight considers some of the pitfalls of coaching and problems that may arise in coaching practice, including psychological projection and sexual attraction.

Chapter Nine is a brief resource about mentoring, and particularly e-mentoring, taken mainly from my experiences with Ask Max, our Internet-based mentoring service. I also mention telephone mentoring as an adjunct to coaching.

The appendices contain valuable information about the mechanics of setting up the coaching space, relationships between coach and coachee and between mentor and mentee, feedback sheet, code of ethics, and a brief history of coaching and mentoring, as well as a resource for additional reading and Web-based information, including some of the courses offered by institutions. Unless stated, I do not endorse any Web-based resource or any training course in this work.

Some of my readers will find issues that are close to something that they face themselves. The solutions to those issues were specific to the individuals concerned and not likely to be the best solution for anyone else. Coaching, as opposed to giving advice, encourages the development of coachee-specific solutions that are motivating and appropriate for them. This also highlights the separation between coaching and mentoring: coaching inspires internally motivated solutions; mentoring invariably offers externally derived solutions. In this book, I offer a variant on mentoring that I think offers the best of both worlds, and integrates them.

My books are designed to be picked up and read from any page, so the indexes are constructed to make the reader’s life easier. If the structure of the book does not delight you, then do please look at the contents list and indexes! I hope you will enjoy reading this book.

Sources of inspiration

I was drawn into coaching from counseling. For years previously, I was a sound ear to many; on numerous occasions hearing the life-stories and traumas of people I had not previously spoken to. This was long before I had a clue what to say to them. One time, someone I had never spoken with, not even by way of an introduction, provided me with a ten-minute medical history!

My approach then was to listen. Often I would then mentor them by offering solutions. It therefore came as a miracle to me that people can make improved progress if you let them find their own solutions. A workshop within our course called “Power of Silence in Coaching” produces miracles that are testaments to the cathartic potential of coachees, if only coaches will provide a space for that. I was naturally pulled further into person-centered intervention and undertook co-counseling training. NLP (neurolinguistic programming) has also contributed heavily. NLP provides great tools for change but tools do not make a good coach. The principal instruments, used elegantly, provide this. As the father of modern coaching methods, Tim Gallwey (1999) said, “Principles are more important than tools.”

My linguistic background was enhanced by the work of David Grove (“clean language”) and then of Penny Tompkins and James Lawley (“symbolic modeling”—Lawley and Tompkins, 2000). These three people have wonderfully presented us with simple and effective models for exploring the metaphoric world and finding compelling solutions.

Taken together, I provide a source of expertise in the principal instruments of coaching that will underpin any other skillset or toolbox you may wish to apply, whether illustrated here or not. When the principal instruments are coupled with coaching mindsets and the many tools illustrated, you will witness stunning change and performance that may make your heart swell.

Defining coaching

Many people have failed to define coaching because when they look at the market they find many varieties of “coach” and many techniques. Some of these techniques seem radically different in approach. People also discover that many coaches work from just one discipline in their work, while others, myself included, work from a range of disciplines. They may find provocative coaches, transactional-analysis coaches, life coaches, emotional-intelligence coaches, and so on. How can one make sense of all these approaches? I hope to help. We shall start by introducing the core elements that underpin best practice in all coaching methods. It is easy to imagine that a new set of tools sold by one or other brand will make you a coach. They will not. Without a foundation in principles, an appropriate mental attitude, and linguistic competencies, these tools are all highly limited.

Whatever their discipline, coaches are generally using two or three of the principal instruments to assist coachees to a defined target. Therefore, we will start there.

Principal instruments of the coach

The principal instruments of coaching are silence, questions, and challenge (McLeod, 2001). These are used to assist the coachee to meet their defined targets. Of the three instruments, silence is the most effective.

Silence

When a coachee makes a discovery, this psychological breakthrough in perception, or catharsis, is wholly internal. Even if the coach is speaking, the contribution of the coach to the actual event is insignificant. Silence is therefore the dominant of the triad of the principal instruments. Silence enables the coachee to think and feel (experience) without being sidetracked by a coach’s agenda.

The real work of coaching is done in the coachee’s episodes of thinking and feeling in which the coach plays no part other than silent witness (McLeod, 2002a). The coachee may be re-evaluating what they thought they knew, exploring a fresh perception on what they thought was real and fixed, developing new insight on a situation, understanding the depth and source of their motivation, and so on. The art of the coach is not to know when to be silent but when to break that silence.

I coached a sales trainer who is widely respected on the world stage. Bob had become stuck. Having decided on an important task he found himself demotivated to accomplish it, let alone start the job. He told me that he had become frustrated because the target was important to him but he kept putting it off. Over the course of the next ten minutes Bob explored his situation with me. He willingly entered his on-stage sales-trainer state by getting out of his chair and imagining/experiencing himself before one of his large audiences, ready to demonstrate his influencing skills to them. From that state of being, I asked Bob to offer his “stuck-self” (still metaphysically in the chair) some advice with his problem. He provided that advice immediately. Shortly afterwards, I asked Bob to return psychologically to his chair and then to listen to the best possible advice available from a leading trainer. I simply read back his exact words in the same tone and pace. There was a silence laden with spine-tingling suspense and “atmosphere”. Bob was transformed. His concentration was internal and acute. His neck colored w...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Praise
• Title Page
• Dedication
• Table of Contents
• Acknowledgments
• Preface
• Chapter One : Introduction
• Chapter Two : Coaching Issues—New Skills
• Chapter Three : Drivers for Change
• Chapter Four : Coaching Contract and Practice
• Chapter Five : Developmental Models
• Chapter Six : Coaching Development
• Chapter Seven : Other Coaching Tools and Interventions
• Chapter Eight : Coaching Pitfalls and How to Avoid Them
• Chapter Nine : Mentoring and E-Mentoring
• Glossary of Terms (in the context of performance coaching)
• Appendix One : A Brief History of Coaching
• Appendix Two : Mindsets for the Coachee
• Appendix Three : Mentee Feedback to Ask Max
• Appendix Four : Code of Conduct and Methods for E-Mentors
• Appendix Five : E-Mentor Questionnaire: An Example
• Appendix Six : Web Resources
• Bibliography
• Further reading
• About the Author
• Linguistic tips
• Tools
• Main Index
• Copyright