Coaching at the workplace

Very busy recent weeks brought this topic to the top of my mind.

We use the term “coaching” almost on a daily basis in different contexts and sometimes that dilutes what it actually means.

This week I attended a training where we were talking about coaching being applied to specific work processes. So the role of a coach is actually given to a manager, and the role of a coachee to the team member. The idea was great: we use coaching method to help the person to develop better and to understand how to drive business in the right direction, to form the right habits, to be more independent and authentic. However, if I think about execution and actual workplace reality there are a few obstacles:

1) in coaching the client should have a request – certain outcome that they want to achieve as a result, maybe a change that is desired, or clarity on processes, or approach of a situation. So initiative is on the client’s side. That drives the whole motivation for a change. In the workplace example unfortunately, that is not always the case. Often an employee may not have any desire to change and might even go in the defensive mode.

2) ideally a coach should be a third party in relation to the issue discussed in order to stay neutral. Would that be the case when the coach is actually the manager? Hardly. If the employee is not successful that would fully reflect on the manager, plus there might be extra pressure of deliverables.

3) pressure to deliver the result would drive manager’s behaviour and would make the whole process more of a “how do we get to the result?” conversation, rather than pure coaching.

Summarising the above, I do believe that coaching at the workplace (by manager) is possible when the request comes from an employee: can be development, career, specific area/skill set etc. However, when it is driven top-down with the aim to get to a certain result that is defined upfront by someone else that is not a real coaching, as much as we can try to make it look like it. That is more of a guided discussion.

What do you think about coaching at the workplace?