Team Coaching ... working with leaders to establish
leadership edge. |  |
The objectives of team coaching are initially to develop the team's self-awareness and appreciation of how the individuals can most effectively work together. Secondly they will work collaboratively on the most significant issues affecting their formation and performance as a team. This will leave them with processes and understanding for them to be a self-sustaining team. Contexts for team coachingTeam Coaching can be useful in a number of situations, including: - Moving from group to team
- Becoming a high performance team
- Project team
- Organisational change - impact on the team
- Team/Organisational well-being
"Teamwork is increasingly important at senior management level - in today's ever more complex world it's not enough to work hard individually in specific sectors, we must also take cross- cutting issues sufficiently into account." Catherine Day (Secretary General, European Commission) "Synergy is the highest activity of life; it creates new untapped alternatives; it values and exploits the mental, emotional, and psychological differences between people." Stephen Covey (‘The Seven Habits...' and ‘The 8th Habit...') The Team Coaching Process As far as any team coaching programme can be ‘typical', it is likely to consist of a number of elements- A preliminary meeting with the whole team
- Team and individual assessments and feedback
- A workshop to explore team working
- Follow-up activity - the precise nature and components to be as agreed/requested by the team.
- Some may want a follow-up workshop, some may want individual coaching
An example can be found in Coaching at Work magazine vol 3 Issue 4 Some teams or team members may want additional development in coaching skills. This could take place before or after the main workshop.At the heart of team coaching ... Team Coaching is not the same as team-building or facilitation:Team Coaching | Team-building | - Continuous period over a number of months
- The team creates and owns the agenda
- On-going support leads to sustainability
- Discovering how we do things
together and learn together
| - Single, isolated activity
- Agenda given to team
- Team must find its own sustaining impetus
- Discovering how to get on together
and understand each other
| Team Coaching | Facilitation | - Coaches engaged with team
- Focus on development and growing the team
- Intellectual, emotional and practical
support though changes - Learning process is shared
- Coaching adds extra dimensions of
creating and analyzing feedback,
focusing on performance
| - Facilitator is detached from the team
- Focus on process
- Process support to enable the changes
- Learning directed or incidental
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Key Elements- Coaching contract
- Professional standards
- All team members willing to participate
- Team is the client, not any individual member
- Open and honest with each other, sometimes challenging
- Results depend on client undertaking agreed action
- Coaches will draw up outline programme in consultation with team
- Team will agree any assessment or measurement tools to be used
Key Steps- How will the team measure success?
- What are the team strengths
- What are the key issues for the team
- How to ensure the team takes responsibility for the outcomes - from the outset?
... transforming potential into sustainable performanceLast updated 5th July 2008 |
