The role of a manager in any organisation is to add value to the decision-making and judgment of people, hence coaching skills are becoming part of every manager’s toolkit.
Managerial coaching refers to an effective managerial practice that helps managers to be developed so that they also develop others to realise maximum performance and productivity at organisations. There is no doubt that coaching has evolved as a professional practice and discipline. It is a critical and essential skill for every manager to have coaching skills.
Managerial coaching is a concept that attempts to provide a fine distinction in terms of who the coaches are, the skills and behaviours of the coach, and what the coachee is receiving as part of the coaching process. In actual fact, its main mission is to unlock employee’s potential to maximise their own performance.
Managerial coaching in organisations can be linked to a variety of goals in the organisation, including improved performance management, long-term business success, employee engagement, productivity, career growth, and many more. It is an irrefutable fact that if a manager is a good coach that can automatically cascade down to the employees and the organisation at large.
Purposes of managerial coaching
- Better engagement and higher productivity
It is a fact that managerial coaching leads to better engagement, higher productivity, and enhanced customer service. It also helps an employee improve performance, overcome challenges, reach aspirational goals, and build self-confidence.
Responsible managers who are coaches help their team members to be more self-aware. In that process, the manager embarks on a journey to discover themselves in a better way. Every time the manager asks their team member a question, it triggers several thoughts and feelings in their own minds.
- Building stronger relationships
Coaching, as a prerequisite, needs rapport between the coach and the team member, and at the heart of rapport lies trust. The coaching relationship is such that it solidifies that trust by reinforcing the connection between the two individuals, which happens at several stages.
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When a manager listens to the team member without any judgment, the team member’s self-esteem increases as they feel valued, respected, and empowered at the end of the day being beneficial to the organisation.
- Helps in acquiring new skill sets
Coaching and mentoring provide opportunities to develop and refine specific skill sets that are essential to being a good manager. This can include anything from learning how to be a better communicator to understanding how to provide high-quality feedback.
These are all skills that will allow managers to better support and develop their team. While acquiring new skill sets is something managers can do on their own, having a leadership coach or mentor can accelerate the process and give them access to firsthand knowledge that might not have been available to them.
- Act as confidence boosters
People who lack self-confidence rarely thrive. They see more risks than opportunities, they don't perform particularly well in new situations, and they often have low self-esteem. A lack of confidence will inevitably lead to poor performance, low self-awareness, and an inability to provide helpful guidance to direct reports. Coaching and mentoring sessions are a great tool to build self-confidence. Why?
These relationships give managers a feedback loop, which allows them to have an accurate sense for where they excel and specifically which areas they can improve in. First-time managers may also experience a lot of self-doubt. This is completely normal when learning a new set of skills or being in an unfamiliar role. But, if left unaddressed, it can cause long-term problems for both the manager and the rest of the company.
- Increased level of engagement
Managerial coaching engages participants with its unique one-on-one feedback and lots of encouragement. When employees become engaged with their workplace, they can contribute more effectively to the team and the organisation. This engagement also helps to increase retention rates and productivity, benefiting their careers as well as their overall organisation.
Most managers need to be developed in order to get better at coaching. Coaching will be most effective when the coach understands that his or her role is to help people to learn at the same time maximising the performance and productivity of the organisations.
- Improves communication
Communication is the act of expressing (or transmitting) ideas, information, knowledge, thoughts, and feelings, as well as understanding what is expressed by others.
The communication process involves both sending and receiving messages and can take many forms. Coaching enables leaders to realise that their communication isn’t always as clear as they think.
Coaches will highlight areas of communication that need improvement and practice those areas with the leader. Moreso coaches can also teach leaders how to communicate with individuals of different personality types, cultures, or ages using their past experiences as examples.
Managers need to understand the importance of becoming a coach. If coaching is seen as a push from HR or executives, there’s a risk that managers will comply but with little conviction. Instead, they should be educated on the benefits of coaching as a personal skill as well as why it will benefit both themselves and their team.
The whole company should be educated on the cultural strength of coaching, with the executive team leading by example.
Every manager should be a positive role model and empower their teams by focusing on their strengths and developing their individual expertise.
Managerial coaching has become increasingly popular in organizations during the past two decades. On the one hand, organizations are making significant efforts to build internal capability by training managers to coach.
On the other hand, managers, by acting as a coach, are taking more responsibility for helping employees achieve excellent performance.
