The Power of Leadership Coaching

Coaching, especially in leadership, is about fostering self-awareness and driving behavioural change. It involves peeling back the layers of our habits to gain a deeper understanding of ourselves, leading to positive growth.

For instance, as a leader, you might have developed the habit of pleasing others, which has served you well in being reliable and supportive. But as you progress in your career and face new demands, this behaviour can become a barrier. To grow, you must embrace discomfort, take risks, and potentially risk being disliked.

Here, coaching becomes pivotal. It helps you to recognise these patterns, providing the tools to shift long-standing habits. Through coaching, you can transcend the need to please and develop new strategies grounded in awareness and choice.

Coaching as a Leadership Tool

Coaching not only supports your personal growth but also serves as an invaluable skill in leadership. It unlocks the potential of others, encouraging growth at every level of an organisation. As a leader, when you adopt a coaching approach, you move beyond conventional management by both challenging and supporting your team, fostering innovation, insight, and performance.

Coaching is about getting out of your own way, focusing on the individual being coached. It requires an open and curious mindset, trusting the process, and recognising that everyone has the resources they need to grow. It’s not about providing answers but enabling others to find their own solutions.

What Coaching Is (and Isn’t)

Effective coaching is a conversation that supports someone in accessing their internal resources. It’s not about telling or directing them on what to do. Instead, it involves asking open questions, quieting judgment, and creating space for independent thinking. It operates from an "I’m OK, you’re OK" mindset, where the coachee is seen as capable of growth.

In contrast, poor coaching comes from a mindset of "I’m right, and you need my guidance." This approach fosters dependency and prevents the coachee from developing confidence in solving their own challenges.

The Trap of Telling, Not Coaching

As a leader, it's easy to fall back on old habits of instructing or advising, especially when you have experience with the issue. But this approach stops your team members from developing their own problem-solving skills. Kenneth Blanchard’s metaphor of “the monkey” illustrates this well, when leaders take on their team’s problems, they become overloaded, while their team fails to grow.

To avoid this, you need to recognise when you are falling into “rescuer” mode. Under pressure to achieve results, you may revert to giving directions rather than coaching. But for coaching to be effective, you must set aside your ego and allow your team to find their own solutions.

Real-Life Example: Coaching for Growth

Take Aisha, a director who was overwhelmed by her role. Her team passed all their problems to her, leaving her stressed and overworked. Through coaching, Aisha learned to set boundaries and delegate tasks. By coaching her team rather than solving their problems, she empowered them and regained control of her workload, improving both her performance and well-being.

How coaching transforms leaders and teams

Another example is Kate, a director in a large service organisation, she felt unsupported after her CEO and line manager left. She struggled to connect with her new CEO but was determined to make an impact. Through nine coaching sessions over a year, she improved her relationship with the CEO, understood her stakeholders better, and empowered her team. Despite not securing a leadership position, her rapport with the CEO improved. After a restructure and redundancy, Kate credited her coaching for helping her transition with confidence and land a bigger role as COO in a values-aligned organisation.

Similarly, Tom, a Managing Director, inherited an underperforming business and faced pressure to turn a profit. He restructured his director team, which was initially met with resistance. Through coaching, he addressed his team's concerns, leading to better communication, trust, and team alignment. Within three months, the restructuring was implemented, and nine months later, the business became profitable.

If you are a leader, reflect on your approach to coaching.

Are you enabling growth in your team by letting go of your need to provide answers?

Are you supporting your team members in developing their problem-solving skills?

If you need help please get in touch with me [email protected]