SOS Call For Coaching

‘What you need to know before paying a bomb for the coaching certification’

‘Abundance,’ – when you read this word, what are the thoughts that strike your mind?

Some of you may think about water if you hail from a place that has a perennial water shortage or plenty of water. Some of you may think about wealth, open space, or even unconditional love. No two human beings think alike as we all process situations and stimuli with our mental schema. This schema is formed based on our social conditioning, upbringing, exposure, education, experience and so on.

In the field of L&D, coaching is one such word that could probably provoke many different thoughts, feelings, and emotions. If you are thinking why the SOS call, it could be because you’re not following discussions on this topic on social media. Some of the discussions are around ‘Why do coachees ask for solutions?’, ‘Coaching Vs Mentoring’, ‘Coaching not for Indians’ etc. We have veterans from the industry participating from across the world.

There are never-ending discussions on these topics. Mostly advice on how to convince the coachee or what can the coach do differently. There are plenty of certification programs on coaching that contribute to this confusion. The market offers certification workshops on executive coaching, life coaching, laser coaching, transformational coaching, workplace coaching etc.

The root of the issue is far deeper from these discussions on symptoms. The issue is with the basic understanding of coaching itself and the certification practices.

Understanding Coaching

Let’s try and understand coaching. Workplace coaching is about skill development where the coach has a clear agenda. Whereas an executive coach never carries an agenda and the focus is on making the coachee think better. If you look at these two methods of coaching from a top angle, you find them at the extreme ends of a continuum.

All the other methods of coaching can be plotted in the continuum between these two methods. A manager can choose to use any of these methodologies based on the situation and who is the coachee.

What they don’t tell you

Few key aspects that the executive coaching certification organizations won’t tell you upfront before you pay a bomb and attend the workshop

• The participant can’t be an executive coach to their team members, family members, or friends
• Executive coaching is not for building skills in others
• Executive coaching is not THE only method of coaching
• Executive coaching is not a universal solution to all your client’s needs. If the client wants advice then he is not asking for executive coaching.
• You need some basic skills like listening with intent and probing. Especially probing because without it there is no scope for you to become a coach. If you think your knowledge of open-ended and close-ended questions is good enough, then you may not reap benefits from your investment. Have you ever tried influencing others through questions? If not, serious reading, discussions, and practice before attending the workshop will help.
• You should be coachable to become a coach.
• You should apply the concepts to yourself first before trying to coach others. This means, try changing something about yourself before coaching others. A coach who smells of cigarettes or a coach who doesn’t respect others’ time will have the least probability of influencing others towards a change. Ask yourself what positive changes have you managed in your own life before setting out to coach others.

The Practice

We have already discussed that executive coaching is not about building skills. But carrying out executive coaching is a skill. The master coach who conducts the certification workshop has to be an expert in workplace coaching because he can’t apply the executive coaching approach to develop the executive coaching skills of the participants during the workshop. This may sound confusing. Let’s try and demystify this.

In executive coaching, there is no need to observe the coachee while performing a task. During the certification workshop, the master coach should be able to observe the performance of the coach, identify the gaps, diagnose the reason for the gaps, and provide feedback and an action plan to the participants during the workshop. Think about the situation if the master coach himself is not exposed to workplace coaching. The workshop could be a disaster. Unfortunately, there are many master coaches, across the globe, who don’t like the phrase ‘skill building’ because of their existing mental schema.

SOS

• Caveat emptor – beware about what you are paying for.
• Attend the workshops with clear expectations. Demand for the learning objectives of the workshop in advance and ensure that the master coach meets those objectives. The workshop agenda and goals are not the learning objectives.
• Check for basic skills and knowledge that you should have before paying for the workshop.
• Ask for the master coach’s credentials. His current and previous designations are not the credentials. He should have experience in both structured workplace coaching and executive coaching. Ask for the master coach’s accomplishments as a workplace coach and executive coach.