BUSINESS COACHING AND MENTORING

What is Business Coaching?

'Business coaching' can seem like a vague term. So, let's demystify it for you.

Firstly, business coaching doesn't take place in a training room packed full of participants. Neither does it involve a tutor trying to pass down new information and knowledge about a particular topic.

It is instead a one-to-one conversation – or, more accurately, a series of conversations – which helps people come up with action plans for changing their current situation, developing their abilities, motivating those who work for them and any other areas where they are looking for improvement.

Our definition of business coaching is below. You may also find our blog entry, What's The Difference Between Coaching And Mentoring?, of interest too!

Whether you are running a small business or are a high-flier in one of the world's leading brands, business coaching is hugely beneficial. It is the skill to have in today's rapidly changing business climate.

Becoming a business coach can also be an extremely lucrative career for you. For more information, please check out our "Becoming a Business Coach" page by clicking here.

The Three Main Types of Business Coaching

Executive Coaching

Corporate executives, company directors and senior managers have a lot of responsibility on their shoulders.

They have to make big decisions that can ultimately make or break the company.

And quite often, these decisions can be difficult, even unpleasant, such as having to lay off a large number of employees to reduce costs.

There is often a perception of corporate executives being uncaring, cold-hearted individuals who are quite happy to make decisions in the boardroom and pocket exorbitant salaries.

The reality is that most do care about their workers (how much they should care and how friendly they should be with their employees is the topic of this article) and hate having to make those tough decisions. Quite often, managers can often care too much, and are in fact afraid to make hard but necessary decisions, and instead try to compromise with workarounds that seldom turn out very well in the long term.

A good executive coach understands that big salaries do not take away feelings and that the pressure and psychological impact of having to make such decisions will weigh heavily on most leaders. They will also understand the demands that come with being at the helm of a large company, and the stresses that exist in having to keep such a large organisation on track and on course for a prosperous future.

Executive coaching sessions aim to develop these leaders to achieve their full potential. Not only is coaching ideal for managers and employees, but an increasing number of business owners see the value in utilising the services of a professional business coach.

The sessions are designed to fit around you and your work commitments. They usually take place at your offices, which minimises the amount of time spent away from your day-to-day duties.

Performance Coaching

Performance coaching, as its name may suggest, deals specifically with a person's performance at work.

It aims to get them to perform at their peak level, realising their full potential to drive a business forward.

Underperformance is a big headache for businesses. For those employees on a fixed salary, the amount they receive will be the same whatever their performance and output level – at least in the short term until management has had enough.

With costs the same, owners and managers are eager to get their workers operating at the top end of the performance ability chart.

This underperformance and lack of effort can also spread to others in the business, dragging down the whole team as those around them begin to do the same, particularly if they are seen as able to get away with it.

However, despite the numerous benefits, many managers still struggle to provide business coaching for their employees.

Life Coaching

Instead of focusing on business targets, life coaching focuses on goals outside of the workplace.

This could be anything from earning more money to getting fitter and losing weight.

Personal aspirations are closely linked to work.

Earning more money would come about as a consequence of getting a raise or being promoted, both of which are linked to job performance.

Losing weight may seem like a purely personal goal which would have no impact on what you do at work. But, if it makes you happy and improves your mood, you will probably be more productive than before. It may also give you more belief that you can achieve difficult goals, which will help you as you set and pursue other objectives to achieve at work.

This is just one example of the many positive outcomes that coaching can bring to your professional or personal life.

What Makes a Good Business Coach?

A good business coach will have several characteristics which make them good at the task.

The best coaches realise the need for continuous improvement of their skills, and fortunately, even someone who does not possess certain qualities or is lacking in particular areas can become more proficient through attending business coaching courses which help with their development.

A good coach does more than just support, encourage and inspire. There needs to be a purpose or reason for coaching. By determining and setting goals, an employee has a target to work towards. And the implementation of a deadline can often provide the necessary motivation for actually getting on with things, rather than procrastinating and putting things off.

Business coaches also understand that often success comes from people working as a team. In the same way as it is for sports teams, by emphasising and developing teamwork within the business, the coach will help instil the feeling among workers that the goals of the business come before individual achievements.

What are the Benefits of Business Coaching?

There are many benefits of business coaching, and it can be used for many things. Here are just a few:

• It brings back focus. Becoming overwhelmed by tasks and responsibilities is natural. Business coaching can work to cut through this and help focus on the things that really matter.
  
  
• It gives crystal-clear goals for the short-term and long-term. Mentoring through executive coaching can help define and build clear goals for the present, as well as for the future.
  
  
• It brings up the tricky subject of accountability. Setting goals is only part of the business coaching process. The next step is to develop a process of accountability that will ensure these goals are met.
  
  
• It creates meaningful brainstorming opportunities. One of the best things about business coaching is that it can bring in a coach who is external to the business to brainstorming sessions. A business coach can provide a sounding board for ideas, as well a potential creative force that can help people see things they may not have discovered on their own.
  
  
• It provides personal development. Powerful executive coaching goes beyond simply giving an individual ideas and focus. A truly exceptional mentor/coach will provide similar gifts of inspiration and focus to individuals. After all, a coach is not there to provide all of the answers.
  
  
• It increases accuracy and reduces mistakes and wastage. Employees will have the opportunity to discuss possible reasons that may be affecting the accuracy, quality and/or quantity of the work they produce. By working with a manager to address whatever is negatively affecting the employee, the amount and quality of their work should increase, which is obviously good for the company.
  
  
• It provides the opportunity for performing regular review meetings. These sessions are essential. Not only do they ensure that employees are not going off at a tangent on the projects they have been tasked with, but they also show that managers believe the work that the employee is doing is important enough for them to take time out of their busy day to talk about. Nobody wants to be micromanaged, but a manager who does not simply delegate work and let an employee fend for themselves, and is available for guidance, discussion and constructive feedback, will inspire more effort from those they have delegated projects to.

How Effective is Business Coaching?

There is growing evidence of its effectiveness and how widespread it has become. Here are some results from a recent survey carried out by Vision Quest consulting:

From the client's perspective

Vision Quest Consulting surveyed clients that had experienced executive coaching.

• 100% increased their ability to deal with business challenges by 75% or more
• 88% improved their job satisfaction by 75% or more
• 80% improved their ability to stay focused under pressure
• 78% increased their productivity by at least 50%

From the company's perspective

We found companies that use coaching see the following improvements:

• 53% increased productivity
• 39% increased customer service
• 32% increased retention of senior people
• 23% reduced costs
• 22% increase in bottom line profits
• 77% improved working relationships
• 67% improved teamwork
• 52% improved conflict resolution

How does coaching compare with training?

IPMA research found that:

• Ordinary training typically increased productivity by 22%
• But when combined with coaching productivity increased by 88%

How widespread is coaching?

In a Hay Group survey of 170 HR professionals from around the world:

• More than half reported their organisation had introduced coaching in the past 18 months
• 88% were planning to broaden the scope of coaching in their organisation
• 70% believe coaching is more effective than training courses as a means of changing behaviour and improving the performance of senior executives and high flyers

Another poll by Hay Group of over 350 HR directors found that coaching was well established across the UK as part of leadership and development schemes, with a third of companies investing in coaching for senior managers. One-quarter of organisations are launching coaching programmes for middle managers.

Building a Business Case for Coaching

Building a business case for coaching to be implemented within an organisation will depend on whom the request is coming from. For example if the request is from the CEO, then chances are that the coaching programme will go ahead. However, if for example the request is coming from the Head of HR, they may need to 'sell' the vision, justification, rationale and benefits of the coaching programme. For this, they would need to present a business case for coaching.

If this scenario is familiar to you, there are a few questions you may want to consider, before building the business case for coaching:

• What objectives/issues/problems are you looking to address, e.g. what are you looking to enhance/fix/solve?
• Who will be coached?
• Who will do the coaching - internal/external?
• How will you match coaches to coachees?
• What training will the coaches complete?
• How will the coaches be supervised?
• What codes of practice will be followed?
• How will you ensure confidentiality and record information?
• What will be included in the coaching agreements/contracts?
• How will you 'sell' the idea within the organisation that coaching is positive?
• Over what time period will the coaching programme be scheduled?
• How will you evaluate the results?

Coaching Programme Objectives/Outcomes

Organisations are built on mission statements, values and objectives. With this in mind, you need to understand where the current focus is and also where the future focus will be. Based on this, you can then establish the objectives and outcomes (be specific) of your business case for coaching:

• What are the current challenges the organisation faces? strategic, departmental, behaviours, individual
• What diagnostic tools will you use to elicit these?
• By when?
• What does success look like?
• How will success be measured?

Start Small for Big Returns

One of the key aspects business can learn from sport is that of practice. Take Formula 1 for example; they do countless hours of testing the new season car before release. Football, they go on pre-season tours for fitness, then 'friendly' matches, all before the season starts. Tennis, most tour players will enter Queen's club tournament before Wimbledon starts. Get the picture?

In business we tend to start big! Yes we have carried out due diligence, planning, analysis, preparation etc, but how often do we practice in a "live" environment?

This is where pilot programmes are invaluable. They will enable you to assess the cost benefit/return on investment (ROI), find out what's working well, what's working less well, obtain tangible and intangible results and provide valuable feedback, thereby allowing you to make any necessary 'tweaks' to the programme, prior to the launch.

Start small:

• Start with maybe 3 coaches
• 3 coachees per coach
• Deliberate, specific objectives to meet
• 6 sessions per coachee
• 3-month pilot programme
• Use diagnostic tools before the start: 360°, Psychometric etc.
• Survey during the programme to obtain results of what they are doing differently as a result of the coaching
• Use the same diagnostic tool after the programme, to check for changes
• Use the results in your business case for coaching

Presenting the Business Case for Coaching

A business case clearly articulates the rationale for making the investment. It could be made verbally through a presentation, or in writing as a work proposal.

The points below are for consideration when writing the business case for coaching:

• What specific remit/objectives will the coaching programme be based on?
• State the purpose, aim and vision of the programme
• Who will sponsor the programme and how can they help influence decisions?
• Dispel any misconceptions about coaching by "inoculating" against them
• Duration of the programme
• Size of the programme: coaches; coachees; internal/external; support; supervision
• How will coaches and coachees be selected?
• Training coaches to be coaches?
• Set standards, quality control, contracts, ethics, venues, length of session, cancellations
• Risk factors: what would make the programme fail; how to mitigate these?
• Visible and hidden costs of doing the programme
• What are the costs of not doing the programme?
• Results from the pilot programme
• Who's involved, roles, responsibilities?
• Diagnostic tools for pre/post programme: 360°, Employee Opinion Survey (ODMAP), Psychometric, questionnaires etc.
• Monitoring and reporting
• Evaluation

Evaluating the Coaching Programme

Typically, effective evaluation of development programmes for organisations and/or projects has been quite difficult to achieve. The main reason for this is because the "before criteria" have not been clearly established. The "before criteria" are defined and specified as: the purpose, aim, rationale and objectives of the development programme. This could be, for example when looking at time management, prioritising and delegating:

• Time lost due to managers completing tasks that could be delegated
• Poorly delegated tasks, resulting in poor performance
• Time lost in unproductive meetings
• Time lost due to poor email management

Calculating ROI in Coaching

The amount of money wasted over a pre-determined time period (in this example 6 months) is calculated as X hours x an hourly rate (average salary) = A.

After coaching takes place, the new amount of money wasted is calculated in the same way = B.

The cost of coaching needs to include both the coach's and coachee's costs during the coaching sessions = C.

Let's take the example above and assume that, of five managers (coachees) researched, it was determined that collectively they 'wasted' (or, unproductively used, if you prefer) a total of 5 hours (hrs) per day (pd). The time period is 6 months, therefore a total of 650 hrs in lost time; i.e. 5hrs pd x 5 days per week x 26 wks in 6 months = 650 hrs.

Managers' average salary has been calculated at £20 per hour.
Therefore, £20 x 650 hrs = £13,000
A = £13,000

Coaching has taken place and reduces loss time by 50%. Same calculation as above
B = £6,500

The internal coach earns £20 per hour on average, therefore each coaching session costs: £40 (coach + coachee).
Therefore, 5 managers (coachees) x 6 sessions each x £40 = £1,200
C = £1,200

Intangible Benefits

Through diagnostic tools, e.g. 360° feedback, interviews, questionnaires etc, you will be able to elicit other benefits too.

These could be:

• Increased confidence in delegating work
• Increased effectiveness of employees being delegated to
• Enhanced communication skills, e.g. clarity
• Motivation, leading to increased retention rates
• Productivity
• Creativity

Following the above recommendations will enable you to provide an engaging and robust business case for a coaching programme within your organisation.