clients
Seeboard Powerlink Seeboard Powerlink

Within Seeboard Powerlink (SPL) two senior executives attended The School of Coaching Open Programme. They have since introduced business coaching into the organisation within the inhouse management programme.

Background
SPL manages the power supply for London Underground. The Private Finance Initiative underlined the paramount importance of meeting their customer’s expectations – an imperative which required raising the performance of the workforce as a whole.

Half of SPL’s workforce is in Operations & Maintenance, fundamental to servicing their customer. The Plant Manager therefore attended the School’s Open Programme to evaluate the potential business benefits to SPL. These became apparent within his role almost immediately, so the HR manager attended the Open Programme for his own personal development and to understand further how SPL could benefit from adopting Coaching in the workplace.

Solutions
We are now supporting SPL in embedding coaching modules within the SPL management style, through the inhouse People Management Programme. This is being done in a structured way that provides a lever for efficiency improvements.

Embedding coaching modules within this framework ensures that relevant managers understand the concept of business coaching, are trained to use the coaching model appropriately, and are aware of the support available in the organisation.

The Programme started in February 2003 with inhouse core modules delivered by external trainers.

Line managers attend the inhouse core modules as part of their core management skills training.

They then have a review interview with their senior manager and HR manager about how they have benefited from the modules.

Relevant managers whose potential is identified through these interviews will start attending the optional Coaching module in late 2003/early 2004. This is being designed in consultation with The School of Coaching to provide training, practical sessions and feedback within a one-day and two half-day sessions.

As participants complete this module, they will start to coach within their own team. The Plant Manager or HR Manager will act as Business Coaches within their designated operational area, providing supervision and professional personal development for individual coaches.

Members of the Business Executive are fully committed to the concept of Business Coaching and have demonstrated this through having their own

To evaluate the benefits of the coaching programme, all managers attending either the School’s Open Programme or the SPL Coaching module will submit regular reports to the HR Manager on the impact of coaching on business performance in their area. For example, in HR this will include benchmarks such as KPIs for turnover and absence rates, and staff satisfaction indices.

Outcomes
The benefits of coaching became apparent within the Plant Manager’s role from the first Open Programme module. Subsequently, the techniques learnt on the Open Programme have been used within both the Plant and HR departments.

Within the Plant section, there has been greatly improved ownership of the business and of problems, and growth in the confidence of managers.

Overall, team coaching has helped teams arrive at effective, workable solutions through identifying common goals.

The success of the programme also means the Business Coach is well equipped to support and supervise other managers in terms of coaching – a skill that adds value across the business.

 

"The program delivers a structured framework, enhanced through powerful techniques that are truly transformational. The experience, confidence and knowledge attained during and beyond the term is life changing and can be incorporated at home and in the workplace."

Gary Warner, Plant Manager, Seeboard Powerlink

 

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