Coaching is private consulting, in the context of the roles and responsibilities of
a manager. Successful coaching expands the number of prospects and possibilities
for action. Especially large companies that are undergoing massive restructuring
after mergers or change processes currently depend more and more on coaching.
The reasons for a personal coaching can vary. Sometimes it is tricky to support
management decisions, sometimes it is former employees who now have new roles
as leaders, and often it is a personal learning process. Also, it may be about a leader
who has to cope with resistance or obstacles. It always involves a degree of personal
development and strengthening for the participant’s day-to-day professional life.
As coaches, we pay attention to how things are connected: where and how inner
beliefs, perceptions and behavior patterns develop, and the role of the corporate
culture in that development. We help participants to activate their inner voices and
help them to weigh arguments and emotions. To this end, we brake, accelerate and
hold a mirror up to them, provide feedback, and invite them to try something new.
Coaching has nothing in common with monologues and didactic lectures. It
involves working together intensively, makes participants thoughtful, extends their
field of view, and clarifies and strengthens their personal solution-finding expertise.
A popular request made of executives is: “Act as a coach for your employees.”
I question this requirement. Why? Because I have the impression that many managers
and consultants use this line because it sounds modern and chic, without applying in
practice what coaching really is (see above). On the other hand I do consider it wise
that a leader orient his or her thoughts and actions on the methods of a coach.
But it remains true that managers can never act as coaches in the true sense.
While they may use coaching tools, such as circular questioning, a real coach needs
to be independent. In short, a leader can never be a coach for his or her employees.
The coach as a “functional entity” must therefore come from outside, as they must
be unbiased and incorruptible. Here, only an external perspective can help.
The six steps of employee coaching are:
Presenting the problem. The employee tells his or her view.
Elaborating on the problem. The leader asks: Who else sees the problem as well?
In what situations does it occur and when does it not? How has it been managed so
far? How have you succeeded in coping with the problem so far? What should stay
the way it is?
Developing new ideas. The wishful thinking scenario: what is bad about it? The
worst-case scenario: what is good about it? How would you recognize that the
problem had been solved? What would you have to do to make the problem worse?
Developing measures. From the findings of the analysis, the manager and
employees develop proposals for change together. Each proposal is reviewed for
its potential consequences. (What happens if...?) If the consequences are undesir-
able, then new measures have to be found.
Implementing the action. The employees give impulses, while the manager stays in
the background. Important: small steps at the beginning, close monitoring of
change, adaptation of the measures to the system.
220 4 More Than Just Talking or: The Instruments of Systemic Leadership