In the past, good leadership meant having the delegation skills and technical knowledge to get the job done. However, in today’s complex world, managers can struggle to have all the answers to the questions and problems they face.
Fortunately, a new trend is emerging. Managers are moving away from a controlling approach; opting instead to facilitate conversations that support others in their own problem solving.
This leadership style means the leader acts more as a coach, exploring issues via questions, rather than coming up with all the answers.
Encouraging individuals to come up with their own solutions does more than just allow the leader breathing space, it helps shift both the mindset and perspective of the team members, helping them apply their own problem-solving thinking in similar situations.
To use the old saying, teaching the individual how to fish, rather than giving them one.
Organisations that adopt a leader-as-coach culture focus on supporting employees to tap into their own potential, and develop their knowledge and skills relating to both tasks and to people.
A workplace coaching approach follows Sir John Whitmore’s GROW model, with a focus on asking, rather than telling. This acronym stands for Goal, Reality, Options, and Way forward and it is a simple framework used to construct coaching cover stations.
Quite simply, the Goal refers to the outcome or result the individual wants to achieve. Reality entails exploring what’s really going on in a given issue.
Options considers what approaches might address the current situation.
Way forward, is the action the individual is going to take to achieve the desired outcome.
Say, for example, a team member comes to us overwhelmed by the volume of work they need to get through.
Rather than attempting to fix or make the feeling go away, a coaching-orientated leader might ask the following questions:
What do you want to achieve here? (Goal)
What is actually happening? What might you be missing here? (Reality)
What do you think you can do here? What else might you do? (Options)
Ok, so now we have had that conversation, what action are you going to commit to? (Way forward)
As managers, the more we ask, rather than tell, the more we empower our staff to tap into their own problem solving and leadership skills, thus not only addressing any immediate concern, but also helping our staff to develop their own leadership capability.
BE PANNELL, PhD is associate Professor Counselling and Coaching
Discipline Lead Sydney - Counselling.
Be recently ran the Springboard Team Coaching Program
Be Pannell from ACAP explains how equipping our leaders with coaching skills helps everyone's game plan.
Leaders with coaching skills out in front
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