How to Lead by Coaching

2 min –

Learning the skills of Coaching and Facilitation are key to producing results, relieving stress, and moving up the career ladder as a manager or leader.

The most successful managers learn coaching skills and move away from ‘doing’ the day-to-day work. Often, leaders who get newly promoted to a management role ask, ‘what am I supposed to be doing if everyone else is doing the work?’.

3 Keys to focus on:

1.  You need to be engaging each member of your team for high productivity. Did you know that in 2019 in the US, 52% of workers were ‘not engaged’? That means these people are psychologically not engaged with their jobs. They put in the time, but not the energy or passion, which leads to low rates of productivity. As a leader, you are responsible for helping each person find what truly engages them in their role and encouraging them to cultivate more of that mindset.

2. Try focusing on coaching and training each member of your team for excellence. A mark of a great leader is someone who helps their team become so successful that the leader can replace themselves from within the team, thus creating the opportunity to move on to their next leadership role.

3. It’s always best to facilitate time-efficient and effective meetings where good decisions get made. How many meetings are you in where people are distracted, sending emails/texts/reading something while in the meeting? If this is happening with you as a leader, you need to weed out the pointless subjects and focus on topics that are either crucial or compelling.

Learning the skills of Coaching and Facilitation are the keys to successful management and leadership. Without these skills, your leadership career and successes will plateau with no possibility of further advancement.

You don’t need to become a certified or credentialed coach, but you do need to understand:

➤ How to engage and motivate your team

➤ How to support them to become excellent

➤ How to work with them so that they love their roles and contribute maximum productivity

Learning and implementing these Coaching and Facilitation skills are vital to your ongoing success as you continue on your leadership trajectory.