The School of Coaching Blog Archive

Myles Downey will be speaking in Doha on ‘Top Performing Teams’ at the Diplomatic Club on Sunday 20 June 2010 from 4.00pm till 6.30pm which will be followed by a buffet dinner.

Myles will be discussing how to get the best performance from employees. Defining ‘what is coaching?’ and explore the possibilities of what coaching can bring to you, your colleagues and your organization. This will be an interactive event with Myles discussing coaching techniques developed from years of coaching top business leaders globally to support unlocking the potential of your employees and achieving extraordinary business performance.

The EMCC (European Mentoring and Coaching Council) held it’s annual UK conference last week and, as I indicated in my previous blog, there was a panel discussion involving David Megginson of the EMCC, John Blakey, author of ‘Where were all the coaches when the banks went down’ and myself. The title of the session was ‘What does performance coaching mean in a post recession economy?’

The buyers of business coaching are most often the HR department – and this is where coaching strategy sits too.  Nothing fundamentally wrong with that but it does mean that much of what is commissioned has a developmental focus – and almost never a performance focus. 

The ‘questions from the floor’ included some real questions and also a share of statements – most of which were in support of embracing the performance agenda.  These observations almost always ended with “particularly in recessionary times” or words to that effect.  Almost as if to say that when money is more abundant it is ok to fritter it away in the hope of some impact, sometime, maybe.  If coaching is not performance focused, good times or bad, then what is it being used for ,– making better people.  That is not the domain of coaching (although it may be a by-product).

The questions showed interest and concern in what ‘performance’ means and how it might be measured; three-way contracting (player/organiszation/coach) and which party sets the agenda; the need to be more rigorous in the contracting process and the need to be more cognisant of broader systemic or organiszational issues.

I believe that the discussion brought the performance aspect of coaching into greater prominence.  However, on reflection my observations, – perhaps challenge –, about coaches not having key skills (what I would have previously called ‘non-directive’) were not taken up.  It would suggest that the coaching community is not ready for that debate yet.