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Searching for Greatnessfinding it withinBy Eric Hanson and Robert Skylis

I know I have a good sense for rhythm because I love to listen to music. The sounds and vibrations of music seem to move me easily. I find that if I concentrate, I can pick out and identify a number of instruments as they move through their notes. Those sounds pick me up when I am down, and the feeling I get from listening truly is enjoyable.

Dancing to music on the other hand, isn’t quite so enjoyable. Although I love music, I just find that getting out on the dance floor and moving in a crowd of people is constraining. I find that the closer I am physically to a lot of people the more uncomfortable I become. Now constrained in this environment, I am unable to move.

The difficult thing for me to accomplish in dancing is that I also feel awkward keeping pace with my partner. This maybe due to the fact that I have never

learned what the dance steps are or do not understand them. Because of this, I lose awareness of the music and begin to focus on how my body is moving.

Usually I see that I am out of step, stumbling or tripping upon another which causes me to think that I am a clumsy failure. I am more embarrassed than satisfied; returning to my chair. I try to forget my dancing experience and so mostly, I do not engage in dancing.

I was thinking about this recently as Tom and I spoke. Tom, and I had several previous meetings in regards to increasing engagement with his team. What I was about to discover; he was right where I usually am on that dance floor, but with his team - feeling stuck. awkward and embarrassed.

“No one has ever become poor by giving”

Anne Frank

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About Tom

Tom had come into his position after many years of successful research. He was accurate in his work, thoughtful in his approach and came to be known as a broad strategic-thinker.

Rising through the ranks from supervisor in his early years to department manager and finally to director level, he was close to the apex of his career. Others described him as a very good manager and that he seemed comfortable with people.

When he was asked to head up a new division he was elated. Sure he had to move his family, sell his house, and get comfortable with his new role. Those decisions are always difficult to make, but he thought that it would be worth the price.

In his new role, he was responsible for starting up a new team. Of which he seemed to have no trouble attracting top talent. Seven very bright PHD’s, all of which had published material. One was recognized as developing a successful product.

It was in the second year of his new assignment when we began to engage in a coaching relationship. The team was doing OK, he thought, but they were not collaborating in the way the Tom thought they should.

The Problems

Projects were behind, meetings seemed unproductive, and arguments seemed to be rampant on the team. As Tom began to share with me, those were in the early days. Now the meetings seemed quiet, people were not sharing, project deadlines were still behind and some of his team were not bothering to come to meetings at all.

After further discussion with Tom, we decided to run a leadership 360 to get some feedback from his team into his style. I also asked him to take our talent assessment which would give us some valuable insight into his skills, motivations, and behaviors.

I wanted to see if the feedback from the 360 correlated to the talent assessment. It was my suspicion that Tom, although considered a good manager and a great fit for his new role, was stuck on the dance floor. Just like I was describing earlier, Tom was being asked to join the dance, with his

team but not being able to. He felt awkward and unsure of how to move on this new dance floor.

From the 360, we found that his team thought Tom to be dictatorial and many comments pointed to the team having to do things “Toms way” or else.

From his talent assessment, Tom had a strong sense of who he was, what he wanted and seemed comfortable with the direction life was taking. He had high levels of personal accountability, could deal with stress well, and was able to stay focused on tasks easily.

This was no surprise to me, Tom’s office was tidy, but the thing about Tom was that he had a penchant for taking notes. Always keeping record of his discussions, thoughts, and ideas for moving ahead. Tom was never without a journal or pad of paper.

Yet, the talent assessment also showed that Tom was a bit deficient in leading and correcting others. Conflict was not his gig, and he shied away from strong forceful language, becoming timid, reclusive and unwilling to redirect others.

Jim, one particular team member, was highly skilled, very theoretical, and knew his science inside and out. Perhaps a classic scientist, Jim was quiet, reserved, and rarely talkative. To Tom, Jim was becoming one difficult team member. Conversations with Jim were like pulling teeth. Information about projects, or ideas remained locked in a can, sealed so tight it might take a forklift to pry it open.

As I watched the interaction with Tom and Jim during one on one’s, the communication between them went nowhere.

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Finding Greatness

Tom would ask a question and Jim’s basic responses were one or two words. “I don’t know”, “maybe”, “I don’t have anything on that”. That was the way in which the conversations went. Jim’s body language was generally slumped, he looked at the floor all the time, and never showed animation.

Tom on the other hand, would jot down notes, or doodle during the conversation. Tom’s style was clear to me. He was not going to push for more information, nor would he ever raise his voice above a mid audible level. He usually sat cross legged, looking between his notes and Jim, trying to get some eye contact going.

This is the dance many Managers face. It is a kind of dance that goes on between professionals at all levels. It is awkward, unproductive, and one is left with a feeling of hopelessness.

Not knowing the dance moves in this situation nor how to get in rhythm with team members, will cause sleepless nights and lots more gray hair. But the

more important thing that will happen and I was seeing it in front of my eyes, is that the Manager loses his sense of being effective.

Goals and objectives become to far behind to catch up. Managers begin to lose confidence or the value of who they are, and start in a steep failure spiral. Resources become scarce and the Manager is moved into a position where he can better contribute. His career is terminally sidelined.

To get out of this failure spiral, Tom is going to have to search inside himself and find his greatness again. As his coach, I am glad I know the dance.

For those who do not know how to dance, U2 Can Coach has been written.

U2 Can Coach

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“You must be the change you wish to see in

the world.’

Mohandas K. Gandhi

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About Coaching

The term “coaching” has been around for many decades. Traditionally, coaching has played a vital role in sports; however, business coaching has its roots in professional venues where coaches were called “advisers” who were “advising.” In the mental health field, medical and physical fitness arena, as well as in the self-help field, we can find many professionals who could be called a coach.

Professional business advisers such as accountants, financial experts and bankers have taken a sports coaching template and applied it to business.

Coaching-for-business became popular in the 1990’s and today takes on many forms in many disciplines and career choices. Today, there is an assortment of coaches. Executive Coaches, Management Coaches, Team Coaches, Sales Coaches, as well as Personal Effectiveness Coaching, Financial Coaching, and Religious/ Spiritual Coaching that one can turn to for help.

Even new schools such as Coach Federation and Coach University, with specific curriculum and

certification programs, are designed to teach people how to become coaching professionals.

What Coaching Is

Coaching or mentoring in business today is a conversational process between the Coach and a Protégé. Coaching conversations within a context serve to enable employees, professionals, or groups to aim for their full potential.

Coaching is not a directive or authoritative process where a manager tells their subordinate what to do or how to do it. Coaching is not training per se, as most individuals who begin coaching have already learned the job, or have certain skill sets in their particular field. The process of Coaching employs a technique of questioning, exploration, clarification and gaining personal commitment to think, act, and become more of the potential that exists. Or one can say that the Coaching process is designed to “draw out” the inner potential of an individual. When that inner potential becomes present and is acted on, there is a greater tendency toward amplified performance.

Some of the areas that people need coaching for in business are Personal Ambitions, Goals or Individual Performance.! Others such as Behavior, Motivation, and Individual Skill Sets are areas that can also be coached and tend to enhance performance at work.

In this brief handbook we will explore some of the techniques that can be used to coach people in the workplace. This list is not exhaustive, as there are many avenues to take while in the Coaching process.

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Keys to Effective Coaching

Desire to Help People People, who decide to make coaching part of their life's work, typically have a deep desire to help others. A coach is one who believes that people have more talent and abilities than what they use. They want to help people achieve more with natural talent.

Uncover Hidden Talent

Top professional sport coaches have the ability to see a person’s development and also see what is not being used…..yet. Executive coaching, life coaching and professional mentoring are the same; uncovering hidden talent is really looking for the good inherent in others. And then finding a way to draw that good, to the surface, so that it can be used.

Create a Trusting Environment

Coaches are instrumental in inspiring their protégé into becoming the best they can be. By developing trust in an open and trusting environment, a coach will share that they have their protégés best interests at heart. When the protégé feels this at a “knowing” level, they will make the necessary changes and im-prove naturally. When trust is present, the protégé allows themselves to be vulnerable, exposing fears and self-limiting beliefs without feeling unrealistic criticism by their coach/mentor.

Improve Personal Communications

Questioner: The basic strategy is to ask direct questions as questioning is the main coaching technique.

Have you heard of or do you believe that our answers lie with in us? If you agree, then the way to help one find those answers is to ask relevant questions, directing protégé self discovery.

Outstanding coaches know how to ask open-ended questions that empower the protégé. When sensing this, a protégé naturally makes changes and moves toward personal goals.

Listener: The best strategy is to listen more than talk. Listening, another key competency for coaches, puts them in the optimal position to create protégé self discovery. In addition to listening, a great coach is able to hear what is not being said verbally and using this to redirect potential failed experience.

Be Encouraging

Encouraging your protégé to take small steps, is another critical component to coaching. A protégé who takes risks will build self confidence.

Confidence promotes one to develop. Ultimately, if successful, the coach helps the client to see themselves in light of what they can do and what they can become.

Being An Accountability Partner

A protégé will seek out a coach who is both skilled and knowledgeable in their area of need and who can be used as a sounding board. Protégés need objective feedback to avoid “blind-spots” and assistance in clarifying the next steps which will help them stay on track with their goals. A coach will provide motivation at the right moment; encouragement, along with the right amount of accountability will assist the protégé in reaching their goals. For example, let's say that the protégé wants to be seen as one who can lead and inspire others across departmental lines. If that is the goal, then learning to build positive relationships is a critical next step.

If the protege is uncomfortable or does not know how to take the initiative to improve relationships, the coach can step in and act as an accountability partner. For the coach, this means being direct and clear, redirecting the protégé towards being accountable to the goal achievement.

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“Confidence is contagious. So

is lack of confidence.’

Vince Lombardi

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Roles of Coaching

Teacher

Teachers share what they know. They instruct on how things are done. They set up a learning plan based upon predefined criteria that is required by a governing board. Teachers then present information in such a way that there is a transfer of knowledge over time.

For a coach, you can set up a learning plan based on the defined language or competencies of the job descriptions. We recommend benchmarking the job in order to uncover that language as it helps you to formulate a development plan that has a measurement system included. As a coach, share what you know, give the protege the information and steps they need to excel at work, if this is their goal.

An additional idea in regards to development plans is to share important information through third parties such as books, research papers, testimonials, and industry magazines. You can also send the protege to an expert to have a conversation. Just remember that as a teacher your job is to help in the learning process. The more experience you can give

your protégé the more they will grow in light of what they wish to become.

Guide

You do not have to know all the answers. Facilitating a discussion does not mean that you talk 100% of the time. Facilitators have the ability to ask important and relevant questions. Those questions open the door for discussion, self discovery, and action. When you feel it is important to make a statement, then do it. Yet, if you can turn that statement into a question for the protégé to answer, they feel responsible to discover the answer. The protégé will see clearly how their own answer is actually the solution.

Facilitation is generally recognizable in business meetings where many people are in attendance. A judge in the courtroom facilitates the trial, and an event planner facilitates the company Christmas party. However facilitation can be done with a smaller group, in a training seminar, or experiential type of activity like white water rafting.

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The opposite for courage is not cowardice,

it is conformity. Even a dead fish can go

with the flow.

Jim Hightower

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Mentor Mentors introduce new concepts, new ways of doing things. They offer or suggest certain activities or steps that the protege might go through in order to learn. They might tell the story of their learning process and suggest that the protege do the same thing.

Often, a mentor will introduce the protege to a business client. Let’s say, over lunch you have a meeting to discuss the client’s business and how they structure and support business objectives. In explaining this, the protégé learns. Often protégés watch professionals in seminars and community meetings or even on TV in order to give the protégé a model in action. This can give the protege great insight into how a technique can be accomplished and give them a picture of how to do what you are suggesting.

Leader

To lead is to be out front. Quite often the leading aspect of coaching is about directing the conversation, giving it a focal point, and bringing it into a successful experience for the protege. This may mean keeping an eye on the clock, looking for an overload of information, or being more enthusiastic at the right time to pick up the energy of the interaction.

The leader also takes the initiative to follow up and follow through with the protege. It may be that when the protege is not progressing, offering encouragement is vital in the process. Telling stories, using examples, offering advice helps the protégé in the process.

As we have described it, there is more to coaching than meets the eye. It is one example of managerial self-improvement. In this guide book we can not cover all the tools and techniques. We can give you a general template to use. The important thing is to get started and learn while you are coaching.

A Coaching Process

In the work of coaching, it is helpful to understand the process. This road map provides a clear beginning point and some idea of a destination point.! Once you have the map in mind, you can participate in the journey with the protégé. We recommend the following steps:

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Initial Meeting

Building the Relationship

Planning and Commitment

Working the Plan

Final Review

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The Initial Meeting The initial meeting step is an important step. In this meeting, a more formal discussion is made with the protégé, discussing the process and setting clear agreements for the process; agreements such as roles, responsibilities, timing, personal boundaries, and expectations need to be clarified for both participants to have a successful experience.

This step may last a single session or may continue over a number of ones in order to gain agreement and commitment.

Building the Relationship

In this step you will work towards building a stronger relationship by understanding the situation, each individual’s particular issues, and specific learning styles. This is a “get to know you better” session.

Helpful tools such as a behavioral analysis like DISC, skill assessments, and personal motivations are useful. These tools are like having a “how does this person work” manual. Similar to the one you have when buying a new car.

Using these tools will give you a better understanding of the “do’s and don’ts” of communication and how to manage and motivate the protégé. More important, the end result of this meeting is that you, as the coach, “understand the protégé”.

Planning and Commitment

This is the point where you create or develop a learning plan. Learning comes from experience, study, and review and so the types of experiences that you want your protégé to have should be thoughtful and appropriate. A learning plan could be a simple list of things to read, people to meet with, or field experiences to have. A plan might also consist of more formal education such as training modules, classes or experiential seminars.

A coach sometimes schedules shadowing sessions, which is going out in the field to experience first hand their protégé‘s current challenges. This way a coach can more accurately determine appropriate learning experiences. What is important is that the coach invests time to think through how learning will occur.

Learning experiences offer focal points of discussion, gives the protégé’ ideas to work with, and puts some structure to the process.

Using your creativity, there is an extensive amount of material available, if you look. A visit to your local bookstore or library should help you find excellent resources. You will also need to communicate your plan to your protégé, getting their commitment for the process.

Help your protégé set up a simple learning schedule that we call an Individual Development Plan that you will use for your follow-up contacts; these meetings can be informal or more formal with goal setting and reporting. The key thing here is to motivate the protégé and ensure their commitment for what you want them to experience.

Working the Plan

Now let the protégé experience the process. You both have determined help is needed in facilitating meetings. The protégé seems to be having difficulty in getting his team to share ideas and they feel the team is not committed. You recommend that the protégé begin by stating the purpose of the meeting and then instead of making statements about agenda items, ask only questions. You recommend that this be done for the next three weeks, and then you will discuss the results.

Your job is to make a recommendation and then let the protégé figure out the details. In our opinion it is not the responsibility of the coach to have all the answers, and it is up to the protégé to figure out the tactics. Your next steps may be only to observe, check-in with the protégé briefly, or to say nothing for three weeks. Just let what has been agreed upon happen.

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For everyone of us that succeeds, it's because there's somebody there to show you the way out. The light doesn't always necessarily have to be in your family; for me it was teachers and school.

- Oprah Winfrey

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Follow Up and Review

Follow up meetings are the ongoing, one-on-one contacts that occur over an agreed upon time-frame. Meetings such as these can be done face-to-face or over the phone, taking a minimum of ten minutes or up to an hour--this is up to you and your protégé.

These meetings should be designed to help the protégé share what experiences they have had working with the material you have assigned. A protégé can also describe the actions that have taken place, new understandings or awareness' or even situational barriers.

Follow-up meetings gives the coach an idea of the protégé’s progress and helps determine what the next step will be. During these meetings you will likely engage in what is known as a “coaching conversation”. The coaching conversation will be outlined in our next section. At some agreed upon point-in-time the coaching sessions will cease; the coach and the protégé agree that coaching is complete. At this point a formal progress review is made with the protégé high-lighting the successes and further opportunities for development.

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Helpful Tool!

A helpful tool that you can use is to have your protégé keep a record of their success. In doing so they can share these with you, and your conversations will be richer, more lively and to the point!

- Eric Hanson

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The ConversationSPIN and Encouragement

SPIN is an acronym and model from a successful sales book written by Neil Rackham in 1988. The premise of the book is based on the fact that in a successful selling situation, the Buyer does most of the talking and the Salesperson, most of the questioning.! Throughout the conversation it is the salesman’s role to build trust and rapport and the SPIN format helps them do that.

With some slight adaptation to the model’s language and an additional element, we can use this same idea in a coaching situation. This conversational framework will aid you during the coaching conversation and during the follow up sessions.

This format can be used whether it is a few minutes in the hall way or during a longer coaching session.

The conversation model follows the following process and we will outline each step on the following page.

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“We are in community

each time we find a place where we belong.”

Peter F. Block

Situation

Potential

Intention

Next Steps

Encouragement

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The Coaching Conversation

Situation As you engage with the protégé during a coaching session, start with questions about the current situation. They might sound like:

• How has it been going? • Tell me about the current situation you are facing? • How has the technique we talked about working

for you?

The main idea here is to get the conversation started. Situations at work are always changing. Customer interaction, employee problems or the business climate is always shifting. Beginning with what’s the current situation is an excellent starting point in any conversation.

Potential

During the discussion, your protégé will talk a bit about their experience. They may have had success, and maybe have not. If no problems are identified in the situation, then talk about what is next for them or why that might be important, etc.

The key to the “Potential” step in the conversation is to allow the protégé to express the problems, con- cerns, or barriers that they see to change into opportunities for skill development. Help them clarify the problem through questioning if needed.

You can use these “thought” starters:

• So how do you see the issue? • What, in your mind is the main problem? • Describe for me your concern? All weakness has strength. All problems have solutions. All concerns offer opportunities. If we believe these then as a coach, we can help the protégé REFRAME the situation.

When they do this, they will be in a better position to create the next steps and be accountable for taking them. So let them talk. When you feel they have clearly identified the problem, begin a line of questioning that helps highlight the inherent potential or at lease identifies any new problems. Not focusing on the problem but focusing on solutions is critical.

• Is there another way of looking at this? • Is there a bigger picture?• What is the potential for you in the problem?

Through this part of the process you are helping the protégé clarify the big picture. Help them see themselves in that picture. Help them to acknowledge that the “Potential” far outweighs the current situation.

Intention

The next step in the conversation is for the protégé to clarify the intention of what they want to accomplish. Intention is defined in Webster’s as “a determination to act a certain way”.

Similar to a goal, an intention provides a focal point for them to return to. Where a goal is more like an “end reward”, intention has no end-result. It is a continuation of a determination to act in a certain way.

An example might be to intend to stop all criticism. When the protégé realizes that they are being critical, they can return to their stated intention, and just cease it.

Maybe the intention is to be friendlier or use a coworker’s name in the conversation. Perhaps it is paying more attention to the details of the interactions. These little things make a big impact.

The important thing is that the protégé verbalizes their intention, writing it down and keeping it in their wallet as a reminder

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Next Steps

In this part of the conversation, you simply ask the protégé to identify specific steps, activities, or opportunities where they might experience their intention. This can be listed on paper, on a goal sheet, or just talked about.

As a coach you can give a couple of examples, if you like, but it is best to have the protégé say something like, “I will stop criticizing”:

• In meetings• Around the office • While on the phone

This will help them develop the ability to see themselves in light of their “potential” as they create the strategies for improvement. Through this part of the process you are helping the protégé clarify the big picture.

Help them see themselves in that picture. Help them to acknowledge that the “Potential” far outweighs the current situation.

Encouragement

As you conclude the conversation, use encouraging statements. These help to solidify the session and give the coach an opportunity to create a positive experience for the protégé.

Encouragement can be simple grading statements such as: “That’s it” or “You got it”. They can be “good”, “great”, or “fantastic”. The key is to use these positive terms.

We have found that people like to be told three things:

• They are appreciated and they are believed in • They are trusted • They have the skill to do it

And so using encouragement as a coach, you could also say something like:

“ Jim, I appreciate your willingness to change, and I trust you will do this because I believe you have the skill to get it done. I have seen you do this”.

We have outlined SPIN + Encouragement as a coaching conversation in a nutshell.! Using a framework such as this, you will have more opportunities for success as a coach.

As a coach, you do not have to get the framework down exactly, it is just a guide. However, increasing your skills as a coach develops your leadership skills too.

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Suggested Reading

Emotional Intelligence, Why it Can Matter More Than IQ Daniel Goleman Bantam Books ISBN 0-553-37506-7

Love ‘Em or Lose ‘Em, Getting Good People to Stay Beverly Kaye and Sharon Jordan-Evans Berrett-Koehler Publishers, Inc. ISBN1-57675-073-6

Interpersonal Skills at Work John Hayes Routledge ISBN-10: 0415227763

QBQ! The Question Behind the Question. What to Really Ask Yourself. Practicing Personal Accountability in Business and Life John G Miller Denver Press ASIN: B0006RTPMQ

Accountability Rob Lebow, Randy Spitzer Berrett-Koehler Publishers ISBN-10: 157675183X

Igniting the Leader Within: Inspiring, Motivating, & Influencing Others Michael F. Staley Fire Engineering Books ISBN-10: 0912212713

Principles of Self-Management PhD John C. Marshall, Bob McHardy Selection Testing Consultant International Ltd. ISBN-10: 0968228720

The Agile Manager’s Guide to Goal-Setting and Achievement Walter J. Wadsworth Velocity Business Publishing ISBN-10: 0965919323

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