My advice is to take control of the ‘coaching process’ – to make it easy for your manager to provide the coaching you need. Here’s some ideas on how to do that.

Define the purpose of the coaching

A start point is to define the purpose of the coaching session i.e.:

• What you need to know or learn
• Why you need to know or learn this

It’s far easier for a manager to respond to a request which specifies what the person needs to know, rather than ‘can you give me some coaching’. It’s also more likely a manager will want to find the time for the coaching when they understand why it’s important.

Here’s an example:

Hi Claire. I wanted to ask you if you would have some time to talk through with me how you have built your network of contacts. I need some help on understanding how to identify contacts and how then to approach those people. I recognise I need to start building a network so that I can promote our business more effectively but I’m not sure where to start. Would you be happy to spend some time talking this through with me? When would be a good time for you?

Use effective questions

What and How questions

Seek to understand what another person does, or would do, in any given situation:

• How did you build your network of contacts?
• What do you do to identify suitable contacts?
• What happens when a person you contact doesn’t seem interested?
• How do you maintain the relationship with contacts you have made?

Why questions

Seek to understand the reasoning or rationale behind the actions the other person has taken or the decisions they have made.

Why questions need to be used with some caution. A questioner who overuses why is running the risk of pushing the other person into being evasive, aggressive or just uncooperative.

A more effective way to access the information or opinion needed is to re-phrase the question using what, how, or when or a statement made in a questioning tone of voice:

Instead of ‘Why did you do that?’ try ‘What’s the main reason you took that approach?’

Instead of ‘Why did you not follow up that contact?’ try ‘What were the reasons for not following up that particular contact?’

Instead of ‘Why do you say that?’ try ‘How does that…?’

Summarising and closing

It is useful at the end of the coaching session to summarise what you have heard, to check that you have fully understood, and to describe what you will now do as a result of the session. And, of course, you will also want to thank the person for their time and input.

Most managers are long on work and short on time. Though most would like to coach their staff more often they find it difficult to make this a priority. This technique is all about making it easy for your manager, or anybody else, to give you the coaching you need.

As an example, a client has recently asked me to develop a ‘Leadership Skills’ training programme and to outline a plan for ensuring that the learning from the programme would lead to the delegates improving their leadership behaviours.

This is a summary of the plan I have designed for them:

The Plan

Step 1: Define what ‘Leadership Skills’ means at Agency A.

Step 2: Develop performance standards that describe what leadership skills look like in practice.

Step 3: Assess the delegates’ current skills and competency against the performance standards.

Step 4: Prioritise and define as learning objectives the outcomes from the assessment.

Step 5: Design and deliver the training. Introduce the leadership skills performance standards as part of the training. Deliver the training in three sessions with the delegates implementing the skills learnt in each session as workplace projects.

Step 6: Provide coaching to delegates as they implement the skills in the workplace projects.

Step 7: Deliver a review workshop that includes:

1. The identification of any ongoing learning needs and how these will be met.
2. Communicating how the performance standards will be integrated into the performance review system.

Step 8: Ongoing coaching of the delegates by their line manager and management of performance against the leadership performance standards.

Summary

The key is in anchoring the training and learning to performance standards which are then integrated into the performance review system. This means the application of the learning from the training into the workplace is a ‘must do’ rather than, as is sometimes the case, an optional activity. Supporting the delegates in their practice of the skills is, of course, vital.