Coaching for Results
How to Create Outstanding Performance
Sarah Cook is managing director
of The Stairway Consultancy Ltd.
She has 20 years of consulting
experience in leadership development,
coaching, and customer experience.
She has designed and delivered
global development programs
resulting in higher levels of customer
loyalty, employee engagement, and
improved business performance.
She can be contacted at HYPERLINK
mailto:sarah@thestairway.co.uk
sarah@thestairway.co.uk.
Cook Coaching for Results.indd 1
via Coaching
Sarah Cook
Abstract: Coaching has been shown to bring about sig-
nificant improvements in individual performance in a
business setting. This article provides a fast-track to the
principles of effective coaching in the workplace to help
others fulfill their potential. It covers the benefits of
coaching as well as the styles and skills of coaching and
different models of coaching that can be used.
Keywords: Coaching, coaching skills, coaching styles,
coaching skills assessment, performance coaching,
high performance, outstanding performance, mod-
els of coaching, TGROW models of coaching, CIGAR
model of coaching, STAR models of coaching, CLEAR
model of coaching
Introduction
Welcome to Coaching for Results.
Coaching has been shown to bring about significant
improvements in individual performance in a busi-
ness setting. In this article, youll find practical tips
and advice on how to help others learn and develop via
coaching.
Whether you are new to coaching or already have ex-
perience, this article is intended to provide a fast-track
to the principles of effective coaching in the workplace
to help others fulfill their potential.
This article is divided into three sections:
1. What is coaching in the workplace and what are its
benefits?
2. The styles and skills of coaching
3. Models of coaching.
Coaching is a skill that can be readily developed and
applied. Throughout the article, youll find tips and tech-
niques that will help you understand the principles and
practice of coaching.
I hope that you find the advice and tools in this article
practical and helpful in becoming a better coach.
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 Coaching for Results
What is Coaching in the Workplace
and What are its Benefits?
Think of any sporting hero and youll find
they have a partnership with a successful
coach. The good news is that coaching is
also recognized as a proven performance-
enhancing technique in the workplace. In
this article youll find out more about how
to become an effective coach.
There are various definitions of coaching:
an on-going professional relationship
that helps people achieve extraordinary
results
helping people to unlock their potential
the process of accelerating an individuals
progress to achieving personal and orga-
nizational goals
the partnership between a manager and
an individual, whereby the manager helps
the individual to learn
Having a coach and using coaching tech-
niques to help others is now becoming
more common in the workplace. Coaching
is no longer used exclusively by executives
and the talent population; people at all lev-
els in the organization are seeing the ben-
efits too.
In both the sporting arena and the work-
place, coaching is forward-looking and goal
orientated. The process of coaching helps
individuals define desired outcomes for
themselves, engenders awareness of the
options open to them in achieving their
goals, and helps them take responsibility
for developing appropriate strategies and
actions to achieve them.
A global study by the International
Coaching Federation in 2012 shows that
people who are coached report on average
a 70 percent increase in performance, a 75
percent improvement in relationships, and
an 80 percent increase in self-confidence.
Coaching is a tool that can be used at
any time and in any place; via telephone,
e-mail, and face to face. The beauty of
coaching is that it can be applied to many
settings and undertaken in a short time
frame to bring about change and deliver
high performance.
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The Styles and Skills of Coaching
Helpful Beliefs When Coaching Others
If you are intending to coach others, before
beginning a coaching intervention, it is
helpful to consider the beliefs that will be
helpful in your interaction. This is because
what you believe can dictate the approach
and style of coaching that you adopt.
Beliefs that help lead to positive out-
comes in a coaching relationship center on
aspects such as:
The most effective coaching is coachee
ledit is not about the coachs agenda but
rather what the coachee wants to achieve
thats important.
Everyone has the capacity to learn and
develop.
The coach does not have the answers
coaching is about facilitating self-directed
learning.
The responsibility for change and devel-
opment lies with the coachee.
The coach is there to help, not to judge,
the individual.
If you are going to act as a coach, it is
useful to challenge yourself around the be-
liefs you hold about coaching and the as-
sumptions you make about the coaching
relationship.
The Styles of Coaching and When They
are Appropriate
These assumptions will probably be vis-
ible to the coachee in the style of coach-
ing that you adopt. Coaching styles sit
on a continuum. There are three main
styles of coaching which can be seen on a
spectrum from Tell at one end to Ask
at the other. Here is a brief description of
the styles:
Telling
This is where the coach likes to retain con-
trol. The coach set targets with the coachee.
The coach directs the conversation and
provides solutions and answers to the
coachee, providing their input about what
the coachee needs to do.
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 Coaching for Results
Guiding
Here the coach retains some control, but
allows the coachee as much freedom as
they feel comfortable with. The coach typi-
cally discusses and explores issues with the
coachee. They balance the conversation
between asking questions and providing
some direction where needed. The coach
helps the coachee to evaluate options, pro-
viding advice and input; they guide rather
than direct.
Enabling
The enabling style of coaching is where
the coach asks lots of questions to help the
coachee identify and manage their own im-
provement steps. The coach typically uses
open questions to encourage the coachee to
think things through and to come up with
their own solutions and the way forward.
The coach acts as a sounding board for the
coachee but doesnt provide solutions. Its
the coachee who takes responsibility and
accountability for their own performance
improvement.
There are benefits to each of these styles
of coaching. When to use which style is
contextual. For example, if the coachee is
new to a task or situation or there is only
one way of doing a task, then the Tell
style may be most appropriate. Guiding will
work well in situations where the coachee
has knowledge or basic skill and needs to
improve their confidence and competence.
Empowering will work well when the
coachee is competent but not confident in
a particular area and in encouraging the
coachee to take ownership and responsibil-
ity for their own development.
Often inexperienced coaches believe
that the quickest and easiest approach to
adopt when coaching is the Tell style.
The downside of this approach is that the
coachee does not take responsibility for
their own learning. The coachee becomes
reliant on the coach to tell them how to do
something and they are less likely to ex-
plore options and take ownership for their
own performance.
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Using a directing style of coaching
also implies that the coach is the expert.
The purpose of coaching is to help en-
hance performance so that the coachee
increases their own expertise. We would
therefore counsel coaches to avoid the
telling style where possible and to check
with the coachee if they do need ideas
and suggestions from the coach. In most
cases our experience shows that coaches
rely on their own resources and solutions
to move forward, so asking questions, ac-
tively listening, and reflecting back what
is said are more powerful techniques than
telling.
The Skills of Coaching
Coaching is a process that encourages the
coachee to explore and discover, to take
ownership and responsibility for their ac-
tions. An effective coach therefore builds
good rapport and trust with the coachee.
They demonstrate effective communica-
tion skills, particularly active listening
and questioning skills. They both support
and challenge the coachee to stretch the
boundaries.
Establishing rapport and trust is a key
skill of the coach because this is the foun-
dation of effective coaching. If the person
who is being coached does not build rap-
port with their coach, they are not likely
to trust them, share their confidences, or
move forward toward their goals.
Trust and rapport help generate a safe
and supportive environment that is re-
spectful and open. To help achieve this it
is useful for the coach to agree with the
coachee on a contract or way of work-
ing. This is a set of behaviors and/or
ways of working that both parties agree to
demonstrate.
When organizations employ e xternal
coaches, it is usual for the coach and coachee
to hold a chemistry meeting to establish
whether they feel comfortable working with
each other. The coachee may see three or
four potential coaches before they select the
one they believe they can work with best.
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