Company coaching: smart training for your employees
Over the years, life coaching has grown in popularity. Its success has allowed it to spread globally and it now forms the basis of a new current of psychology at work based on self-development.
But life coaching is not only about personal development. Corporate coaching is catching on and companies are not hesitating to hire corporate coaches to motivate, inspire and improve the productivity of their workers. Indeed, highly motivated and productive employees will help raise the bar of corporate productivity.
But what is the task of the business coach? What are the procedures behind corporate coaching? What is the difference with training courses for employees?
Find out in our article!
Company coaching: definition and function within the company
When we think of the figure of the coach, the coach of a football team immediately comes to mind. His function within a football team is to enable his team to win matches and position itself at the head of the league. But to achieve this, each coach employs a strategy and modus operandi customised to the team he is coaching. In fact, his task is to know the individuality and potential of each player in order to exploit them advantageously to win matches. It is, therefore, a matter of working on individual personalities to achieve a satisfactory group result.
The link with the figure of the business coach is therefore simple
What, then, exactly is the meaning and potential of corporate coaching?
A company coach is a professional figure who is hired by a company's human resources department to assist those in managerial roles within the company and who need to be accompanied along the path of their personal and professional development.
Professional development is not about acquiring new skills or soft skills useful for performing one's job, but focuses on focusing on and improving skills already acquired and consolidated by the person in question.
Do you remember the coach of the football team? Well, the goal of the business coach is to turn a good striker into the bomber of the league. His role is not to teach him how to play football, but to turn him into a player who is 100 per cent efficient.
In the corporate environment, it is common to encounter situations in which managers are up to the required task, but are unable to move forward due to problems with, for example, collaboration and communication with colleagues, employees, customers or suppliers. The company coach will adapt his or her working methods to the person in question, who will present different skills, goals and tasks and, above all, behavioural peculiarities.
Company coaching therefore intervenes in the improvement and development of already existing skills. Company coaching will not serve the transmission of new competences.
The company coach should therefore not be confused with a business consultant or trainer.
Is corporate coaching reserved for managers?
Not necessarily. In recent times, Team Coaching, i.e. corporate coaching for a work team, is developing. In this case, the work of the company coach is aimed at a group of employees in order to improve their cohesion and teamwork for a successful outcome.
If the team is part of corporate management, then Team Coaching becomes Corporate Coaching.
Corporate Coaching ≠ employee training
As we have seen at length, the goal of corporate coaching is the improvement and professional development of a company's employees. Training, on the other hand, focuses on learning certain skills that company staff do not yet possess.
A training course can bring new competences to the workplace or develop certain soft skills.
However, the methods used during training courses can match typical business coaching methods. We can, therefore, identify a meeting point between training and corporate coaching.
Prerequisites for effective corporate coaching
The client must be aware that the coach is not a consultant and therefore it is not up to him to pass on skills and knowledge that the manager does not already possess . Furthermore, the company coach is not a psychologist or therapist whose task is to solve pathological problems.
Another element that the client must be sure about is the real capabilities of the coachee. The corporate coach simply provides for the full development of these skills. The company coach cannot remedy situations in which the relationship between the company and the manager has definitely deteriorated and the relationship of trust no longer exists.
The client-coach-coachee relationship
Let us analyse the three figures that become part of the corporate coaching process
The client is usually a person who is part of the HR function or corresponds to the manager.
It is up to the principal to take the first step, i.e. the meeting with the coach. In this meeting with the coach, principals explain to the coach the reason for his or her call and why they have decided to adopt a corporate coaching process for one or more management figures in their company. The coach, on the other hand, will talk about the procedures and strategies he intends to put in place.
Also in this phase, an initial version of the coaching pact is drawn up, which includes the organisational strategy that the coach will adopt and the requested financial compensation.
In the second phase, the coachee, i.e. the person who will receive support from the company coach, comes into play. The client will have to inform the coachee of the decision to request a company coach. In order to achieve true coachability, this phase is crucial. Indeed, it is seldom the coachee who realises the need for a coach. Rather, it is the human resources that require the coach's intervention. Therefore, it is best to clearly explain to the manager the reasons for hiring a coach: communication must be smooth and sincere to allow the manager to understand the company's desired path and the results that are required, while at the same time recalling the company's shared themes and values.
The client, i.e. the human resources manager, will talk with the coachee, i.e. the manager, to decide on the development areas and skills to be strengthened so that the corporate coaching tool is truly effective and can bear fruit. In this phase, the areas on which the company coach should act in cooperation with the manager are agreed upon.
In the third phase, the meeting between the client, the coach and the coachee takes place. In the first part of the meeting, the principal introduces the coach to the coachee and the company coach explains the methods and procedure for carrying out his work and above all verifies that there is a certain level of coachability.
In the second phase of the meeting, the principal leaves the room and leaves the coach and coachee alone so that they can get to know each other better and begin to establish a confidential relationship. At the end of the meeting, the coachee, if in agreement with the objectives decided upon by the coach and the client, puts his or her signature on the coaching pact that was previously signed by the client and coach.
The most important point for the success of business coaching is the definition of a precise path in which the work activity alternates with the coaching sessions.
In accordance with the principle of self-determination, the goal to be achieved must be agreed upon not only by the client and the coach, but also by the coachee. The goal cannot be imposed by the company or the coach on the coachee, because otherwise the manager will only feel an unpleasant feeling of unnecessary stress that will not motivate him/her to proceed towards professional development. The coach must not be perceived as an agent sent on a mission on behalf of the company, but must be seen as an ally and confidant to be relied upon.
Communication between the coachee and the company is a fundamental piece of business coaching. Indeed, the aim is to create a relationship in which the coachee commits to improving his or her skills in the areas indicated by the company.
In some cases, the company requires a specific definition of goals and indicators to measure the progress of the manager being coached. Since corporate coaching is a practice that takes place within the work environment and entails costs for the company, this may be a legitimate request, but the coachee's free consent should always be sought.
Article translated from Italian