Employees Want a Coach

The need for managers to be good coaches is a topic frequently seen in articles ranging from employee engagement to business best practices to trends to watch. Surveys like O.C. Tanner’s 2018 Global Culture Report indicate that increasingly, coaching is what employees want. (79% of millennial workers want a coach or mentor rather than a traditional boss.) They aren’t interested in annual performance reviews or being compared to co-workers. They want feedback. They want guidance as they seek to improve their skills, contribute to their team’s success, and advance both personal and organizational goals.

If you’ve ever been on a team from sports to quiz bowl, you know the difference a good coach can make. Alyce Johnson, former manager of staff diversity and inclusion at M.I.T., breaks down the role of coaching into four components:

• Providing Direction
• Improving Performance
• Opening up Possibilities
• Resource for Removing Obstacles

Let’s take a look at them.

Employees need to have a clear understanding of their department’s goals as well as those of the organization. They can see how their work contributes to the success of the both. A good coach will clarify the connection between personal and organizational goals, and through conversation and check-ins will help the employee stay focused. When taking on new tasks or learning new skills, the employee benefits from a coach that provides needed technical direction.

In her TEDx talk, Harvard Business School professor Amy Edmondson speaks of the importance of building a psychologically safe workspace. An environment where employees feel comfortable trying new ideas and where mistakes are seen as learning opportunities, not failures, is critical to improved performance. No one wants to risk creative solutions if they fear negative repercussions.

Johnson describes the manager/coach role here as helping provide this kind of environment and increasing employee self-confidence. The coach needs to be aware of the employee’s current capabilities, provide feedback, help the employee see what is needed, and create opportunities.

A good coach helps employees become participants in problem solving and decision making. How? It’s all about feedback flowing both ways and about engaging in genuine conversations. Asking good questions is an art and responding to the answers in a way that indicates you are really listening shows you respect what your employee has to say. You can challenge their point of view in a constructive way that provides new perspectives, adds information, and expands the employee’s understanding of the situation. Good coaches make people feel like valued members of the team who have something to offer.

Johnson’s fourth dimension of the coaching role involves removing obstacles in the path of their employees’ success. Obstacles can be other people outside or inside your organization. People who don’t deliver on schedule can prevent employees who depend on that input from meeting their deadlines. Or maybe you have team members who don’t pull their weight. Another challenge is lack of necessary resources or training. Whatever the case, while the employee may not have the authority to challenge people who are the problem or access resources or training, their manager does. (If not, they know who does and can ask for assistance.)

As Johnson notes, sometimes a good manager/coach is a sounding board. Active listening can help a stalled employee figure out how to deal with the problem on their own.

Some people are born coaches. They seem to have an innate ability to develop positive relationships with people that are both affirming and empowering. Others in a managerial position might need to work on skills required for effective coaching that brings out the employees’ best.

No matter where a manager falls on this continuum, they need support to do the job. The right technology can make providing ongoing communication and feedback easier. A manager may have a number of teams and employees working on a variety of projects and goals. Keeping up with their progress, recognizing opportunities and need for additional training and resources, knowing when to step in or when to encourage others to step up is easier if they have a tool that keeps records of conversations, that serves as a hub of communication for everyone in the organization.

• Discover how coaching fits into performance management.
• See how continuous feedback makes coaching more effective.
• Catch this webinar replay to build your coaching and leadership toolkit.

2018 Global Culture Report

What is Coaching? by Alyce Johnson

Building a psychologically safe workplace  Dr. Amy Edmondson’s TEDx talk