Point and Shoot Coaching
Tags: Xcelerator, Life, Leadership, Leadership Development, Coaching

Point and Shoot Coaching

2 ways you can breathe new life into coaching conversations

Maxine Dorkin

Image: Unsplash

The invention of the auto-focus camera lens revolutionized the world of photography in the 1970s. Before then, photographers grappled with the remarkably difficult manual lens and had to perfect this mechanical art. Though we live in a time of high-grade camera functions which reduce this intricate art to an automatic mechanism, there is a wealth of knowledge we can draw from the intentional, guided art of the manual lens. As leaders in the 21st century, our manual focus and intentionality is amplified through effective coaching conversations. It demonstrates the value we place in the people around us.

Developing team abilities and nurturing interpersonal collaboration within organisations has become imperative for organizational success. As a result, a wealth of research has been invested in learning how capability can be harnessed. A critical skill for all leaders is the ability to have effective coaching conversations.

Coaching allows us as leaders to take control of the lens and use it to amplify the values and skills that we would like to encourage in our teams or those around us.

Any leader who values legacy would agree that one of the most important roles you have is that of a coach and a mentor. It is an opportunity to leave an indelible mark in the organisation.

“Leaders don’t create followers; they create more leaders” — Tom Peters

Here are two ways you could make your coaching conversations more effective in terms of employee performance.

Amplify Strength

Coaching is the art of facilitating performance, learning and development and if used appropriately, is a powerful tool to encourage and inspire growth in the people around us. Our natural inclination, however, is to look at what is not working well. Coaching conversations are then spent largely discussing what a person is failing to deliver, and any mention of what went well seems to be an afterthought. Unfortunately, this doesn’t always produce the intended result. It takes intention to look at what is working well and discipline to turn the dial down on what isn’t.

The art here is to invest more in the point of growth. Experts from the Harvard Business Review have found, based on a study of manager — employee dynamics, that “we do not learn and grow the most in our areas of weakness”, on the contrary, our brains build most on our pre-existing abilities. Furthermore, Research by the Corporate Leadership Council found that when managers focus on the weaknesses of an employee their performance declines by 27%, whereas when they focus on the strengths of an employee performance improves by 36%.

What would be most beneficial is a developmental conversation which highlights one’s strengths and how to best practice these abilities. Dont assume that people know their strengths- ask them what they think are their core competencies (give the strengths names!) and how they think they impact the project they are working on. Ask them which strengths they would like to develop and how they can do so.

Amplify Solution

When it comes to troubleshooting and working through challenging periods in your organisation, there is a natural inclination towards problem diagnostics. Who was inefficient? What system was ineffective? Which department overlooked a tiny detail? Jackson and McKergow, in their book The Solution-Focus, offer a critique of this approach in saying that “there is rarely any sense in emphasising a problem or starting with what’s wrong”.

There is more value, however, in having the solution take centre-stage.

The future of problem-solving is one that is proactive rather than reactive and the way we coach the people around us must reflect this.

Often, as leaders, we can fall into the trap of elaborately describing what we do not want and not communicating what it is we want. This can be as simple as asking “What is the ideal resolution for this problem?” and allowing people to define the outcome they are working towards. The idea here is to shift your team’s energy away from excavating the problem and towards building the solution. A great example of this would be the GROW model which our participants have found particularly useful throughout the Xcelerator program.

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About the author: Maxine Dorkin is a Leadership Facilitator with the African Leadership Group. She is passionate about bringing the best out of people and growing teams. She is a Registered Therapist and Coach currently completing her Phd in Industrial Social Work with a focus on Innovation and Workplace Interventions.