TrainManagersHowtoEffectivelyCoachTheirTeams.docx

Because teams are more than the sum of their individual parts, coaching teams is different from coaching individuals. Team coaching is not just coaching several individuals on a team at the same time. It speaks to the music an orchestra creates and to its individual musicians.

Manager team coaching is gaining momentum for three reasons. First, time and, thus, cost savings result if managers can coach their teams as full groups as effectively as coaching each person individually.

Next is the substantial evidence of the power of individual coaching. Talent development professionals know the return on investment and outcomes from teams whose managers are skilled coaches. More than ever, the benefits of coaching can have an impact on every level of an organization with managers who are skilled team coaches.

Finally, teams produce more than three-quarters of the work in companies, and teams are diverse. A manager with team coaching skills can resolve and prevent conflicts, increase motivation and even work passion, and interact optimally with each team member and the team as a whole while attending to individual differences.

To get an idea of the impact managers who are skillful coaches can have on their teams, replace the word "coach/es" with the word "manager/s" and replace the word "client/s" with the word "team/s" as you read the International Coaching Federation's definition for professional coaching:

"Professional coaches provide an ongoing partnership designed to help clients produce fulfilling results in their personal and professional lives. Coaches help clients improve their performances and enhance the quality of their lives. Coaches are trained to listen, to observe, and to customize their approach to individual client needs. They seek to elicit solutions and strategies from the client; they believe the client is naturally creative and resourceful. The coach's job is to provide support to enhance the skills, resources, and creativity that the client already has."

Learning to be a team coach is like learning to swim. Getting in the water and swimming is part of the learning process; it would be difficult to learn to swim without actually doing it. The learning curve for swimming starts with instruction on safe and dry land where participants learn the foundations. Next, participants learn a model that shows them the steps involved in swimming. The last step involves going into the water and practicing to eventually achieve and maintain fluency.

Not surprisingly, skillful coaching requires skillful communication. Training managers to become competent team coaches starts with them learning a common language for use within their teams and throughout the organization to help people communicate more effectively at work. While being applicable, easy to understand, and fun, the common language should resonate with each team member, the team leader, and the company.

The Creating Team Coaches model is based on decades of synthesized research and a novel approach of keeping it simple. The methodology is grounded on the premise that the reason many initiatives to create a common language don't stick is because the nomenclature is awkward and sometimes even cryptic or overcomplicated.

Regardless which common language you choose—whether it's a version of DISC or DiSC, MBTI, or any other communication coding—it will help managers help their teams.

Helping team members understand each other's communication preferences and how people work best together using a common language is one of the important steps of team formation that managers should not overlook. Research shows that teams that consistently meet performance goals spend half their time in the forming and norming stages of team development getting to know each other, developing team norms, and adopting technology. Managers will benefit from taking time to attend to these important team dynamics as coaching opportunities with their teams.

A team coach should consider teams over various developmental stages based on the team's contexts, such as a project development perspective or a cyclical perspective. Managers must pay attention to what individual team members need to optimally work together. To become skilled team coaches, managers must take the time to listen, observe without biases, and learn what their teams need to be successful. In addition, team members need to feel safe to speak freely and openly with each other and with their manager.

Creating psychological safety can help manifest team cohesion, and creating a common language can empower the communication necessary for the sincere discussions and active listening required for feelings of safety and cohesion to form. The team can begin to create a learning culture in which it openly discusses mistakes without placing blame as a way for the team to improve over time.

The second step maps the tenets of individual coaching—such as powerful questioning, perspective shifting, and creating structures—to team dynamics. To be successful team coaches, managers need to be able to transparently observe and respond to their teams as a collective group and as individual members. They must learn the art and skill of coaching individuals in front of the rest of the team in ways that benefit that individual and the entire group.

There are no industry-sanctioned certifications for team coaching; however, some well-adopted best practices can serve as a model for teaching managers to coach their teams.

Simulations. Simulations are an important part of learning to be a team coach by providing a safe place. This intentional practice helps managers learn how to communicate with another person in that individual's preferred style while maintaining their own authenticity, thereby improving interpersonal and team communication. Talent development professionals will benefit from providing an ongoing opportunity for managers to learn from and with each other by practicing team coaching together.

Creating awareness. Team coaches help team members see situations and goals through the same lens. When members accurately perceive a situation the same way, they can collaborate more effectively to achieve their goals. Team coaches need to be skilled at facilitating the conversations required for team members to get on the same page. Note that such discussions often involve conflict.

Managers who are skilled team coaches help team members to embrace conflict as an opportunity to learn more about each other. Conflict resolution occurs through awareness, and awareness is achieved through clear communication, powerful questioning, and perspective shifting.

Team coaches help teams co-create and operationalize the specific actions necessary to achieve their goals by talking about it as a group. Each member is accountable for the overall outcome, regardless of individual performance.

Team coaches also help team members talk as a group about individuals' expectations and how they can support each other to keep the pace to performance. Likewise, team coaches ensure that each team member's voice has been heard and that members give and receive constructive feedback from each other along the way.

During individual coaching, coaches don't offer advice; they instead ask questions to help the client gain his own awareness. Team coaching is different when the coach is the team's manager. Managers not only consult with team members by offering advice; they also mandate certain behaviors.

To be an effective team coach, managers must use more questions than statements to elicit critical thinking and discussion among team members. Helping teams design actions and create accountability for achieving goals is a typical activity for managers. However, doing so using a Socratic approach helps managers become effective team coaches.

This final step brings managers into the water to practice swimming—coaching teams in a safe space. It's important to create a space in which managers feel comfortable making mistakes and learning from them. Explain and demonstrate how the space in which managers will practice is safe, and provide a variety of observers as managers practice team coaching to offer unique perspectives and insights.

Managers can get their feet wet first by practicing team coaching with teams that are not their own. Such teams should represent groups in various teaming stages and contexts.

Learning to coach teams among a cohort of managers can be the most efficient way for managers to learn. Peer coaching can be helpful for managers to practice with each other and discuss team coaching progress, but a group of managers learning from and with each other about team coaching can be much more powerful.

Talent development professionals and managers will benefit from creating or adopting a set of measurements to monitor the impact of their team coaching over time and to forecast future team performance.

A new team development stage has emerged for many teams as a result of the rush to virtual in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic. Because many employees unexpectedly started working virtually, they must now also become innovative teams and figure out how to keep up productivity and well-being.

In addition to maintaining productivity, team members want to feel as connected as they do when physically together in a shared space and not isolated apart in their individual homes. Managers who are competent team coaches can help their teams through this adaptation process and even improve their teams' effectiveness.

These rapid changes create new stressors and anxieties, such as feelings of being cooped up and having cabin fever. That stress and anxiety can hinder the performance of newly forming teams and existing teams now meeting in virtual venues. In such situations, every leader and manager should do three things:

Plan extra time and extra patience to get things done. There will be stalls due to technology issues caused by user and vendor errors. It's important that people don't feel rushed in these team meetings and that they feel comfortable using the new technology and know how to communicate in the new venues.

Talk about it. Working in physical isolation is a different way of conducting teamwork for many, and it is imperative that employees learn about best practices for virtual teamwork. In a hurry to get things done, managers should not skip the crucial initial steps of team development. They must take the time to create new norms and keep the conversation going. Psychological safety is paramount.

Invest in coaching. If your team managers are not skilled coaches, train them or consider hiring experienced professional coaches to help individuals and teams learn to thrive.