6 Coaching Traps Managers Make and How to Avoid Them
Managers have a lot of responsibilities, and adding coaching to the long list can actually reduce time and effort required for managing and supervising. But sometimes getting started with coaching is frustrating for the manager and employees alike because traps and miscues make coaching less effective than it could be. Here are six traps I see most frequently when observing managers coaching employees and what to do to improve coaching approach and skills.
1. Manager belief: “If I can do it, so can they.”
Truth: “Excellence is deviance from the norm.” Robert Quinn
Managers tend to not acknowledge that they were exceptional performers. This leads them to believe that their level of competence is the standard, the norm. While we can develop performance to a higher level, it is important that we don’t dismiss average performance as poor simply because it doesn’t meet the standards that we set for ourselves.
2. Manager belief: “They aren’t doing the job the way I did it!”
Truth: “The hardest thing to accept as a coach is that the players on the field may do things differently than I did them – and that doesn’t make them wrong.” – Mike Singletary, Hall of Fame Football Player
One of the most common traps I see managers step into is that they believe that they know the best way to do the job. The truth is that they know the best way to do the job – for them! That doesn’t mean that their solution will work for everyone. There are many things to consider: the learning style of the coachee, where they are in their development, from which mindset do they operate, do they feel like they have all the knowledge, skills, and resources they need to act (just to name a few).
3. Manager belief: “I need to have the perfect coaching question.”
Truth: The quest for the perfect question interferes with our ability to deeply listen as our focus is on our own performance. It can also lead us to ask long, rambling questions that no one can understand.
I see this often when I’m helping managers new to coaching. It’s understandable. The managers I work with want to do well, too. Instead of focusing on trying to get the question just right, I help them shift to really listening, allowing for silence (as they form their thoughts), and giving themselves permission to practice and learn as they develop their skill.
4. Manager belief: “I have to have the answer!”
Truth: Relax. You are there to be a partner in their learning; not their teacher. Find the appropriate answers, approaches and plans together.
Managers are on the line for results. They are the ones who are supposed to have the answers. The problem with that is when employees over-rely on the manager for answers. In a sense, they are abdicating responsibility to the manager. The coaching process helps build the awareness and responsibility in the employee in a supportive, developmental way.
5. Manager belief: “I don’t need to prepare for my coaching sessions.”
Truth: It’s hard to be at your most effective. Ideally, keep a coaching log where you can record the goals, aspirations, learning styles and action plans of your coachees. A brief review ahead of each session will make you more effective and increase your confidence. It’s also demonstrating that you care enough to be prepared.
Being prepared and keeping a log helps the manager to assist with development in a structured way, as opposed to a shotgun approach where every week it’s a different goal! It also helps the coachee recognize and see that they are making progress.
6. Manager belief: “Relationship doesn’t matter.”
Truth: Relationship is everything. No trust, no change.
A couple of years ago, I worked with a manager who insisted that she had neither the time nor the inclination to have a relationship with her team. After two months of frustration, poor results, requests from employees to transfer to other divisions, poor customer satisfaction scores, she finally conceded that maybe she would have to change her approach. Her concern was that she would spend all of her time building relationships and then she wouldn’t have time left to do “her work.” What she came to realize, however, is that since she relied on others in getting her work done, she was more effective once she had relationships.
© 2011 Bobbi Kahler. All rights reserved. Developing Leaders, Creating Possibilities: Kahler Leadership Group
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