1. Is a good coach and

           2. Empowers the team and does not micro-manage.

Being a coach means: exploring the options about a goal, working with someone to figure out what is important to them and how they might go about putting that into action. It can sometimes cross over into teaching and instructing – drifting over into ‘telling.’  Not where a coach should be heading.  The coach needs to be in the 'coach role' and use a questioning methodology to explore the goals and how to get there, it doesn’t involve telling; so the coach needs to remember what their role is.

Being a good coach means: working through all of the questioning, probing and exploring through a series of conversations and listening to the results and modifying the next set of exploratory questions.   It means providing insight – sharing experiences. Which suggests that they have some experience of life, business, being a manager and that those experiences are relevant to the person they are coaching.  

Coaching also involves holding the person to account for their actions. Especially if actions are dropping off the radar and not getting done. The coach will have a positive mindset and encourage the employee to re-evaluate if that goal was important and why there is no willingness to make a change.

Item 2: How would you go about releasing control and empowering the team? Should you just empower some individuals and see how that works out?  Or do you go for the big bang approach and just say “Right – from today on, you are all empowered to make the right choices, plan and do your work to the standards and quality you think is right.” Would managers be able to cope with this level of employee freedom? What’s the worst that could happen?

Or, should that second statement be – the manager needs to empower the team to do certain parts of their work. The employees don’t need micromanagement for tasks that they have a superior, more practiced knowledge of the job to be done. Step back Ms/Mr Manager and let the employee do what you hired them for.

What’s your thoughts on empowering teams? Have you tried it?  

For a workshop for managers on how to take a coaching approach, email us to find out more: carol@onedaytraining.co.nz