Due to the increasing complexity and speed, we have to find new solutions together every day. This results in the need for a coaching culture. But how do you build one?
In the future, we will see a different way of doing business. This will require new skills, new processes, new structures and new ways of thinking.
Many things will become so complex that the time of manuals will be over. We will all have to find new solutions together every day. This results in the need for a coaching culture.
A culture in which we can all be students and teachers at the same time.
HR staff specifically will be responsible for creating such a culture, because coaching always starts with the individual employee. But how you can foster the creation of such a culture now, you will learn in the course of this article.
But what actually is a coaching culture?
In a coaching culture, employees are involved in the development of themselves and others. It is a support system that focuses on empathy and respect. Coaching cultures require leaders who themselves aspire to lifelong learning. Because, unfortunately, it's not enough to coach other people; coaching also requires coaching yourself.
Now, it's still not really clear what constitutes a coaching culture. So let's talk about the term in a little more detail:
Namely, to understand this term, we first need to understand the term culture. Now, unfortunately, there are hundreds of definitions for this one, but I for one believe that a practical definition will take us furthest.
Therefore, I will define culture with reference to companies and organizations as follows: A culture describes the atmosphere in a company.
If a company has a functioning coaching culture, then everyone is responsible not only for their own work, but also for the success of the entire company. But what does such a culture look like?
A coaching culture can look different depending on the size of your company. But it should never be limited to just hiring coaches or asking employees to take responsibility for any coaching they may do. It encompasses much more the area of mindset and much less any fixed structure.
First and foremost, therefore, creating a coaching culture is about each individual understanding that it is their job to make others around them and themselves better.
But how do you support the creation of such a mentality?
Such a coaching mentality always first requires an understanding of the values your company wants to convey through its products or services, as well as the kind of people needed on your team to do just that. It's about communicating a "why," giving their company not just a purpose, but a meaning.
Therefore, before you want to create a coaching culture, you need to think about what purpose you want your products and services to fulfill.
Let's summarize briefly:
A coaching culture can be understood as the present atmosphere of constant coaching and it prevails whenever your employees have a coaching mentality and want to constantly improve themselves and others through this.
But what are the advantages of such a culture?
What are actually the most important results of coaching employees in your company? What happens when people start coaching each other on a daily basis?
A coaching culture can bring many benefits to both companies and individuals. Let's look at just a few of the most important:
That's because with general coaching, you create a level of trust that makes it easier to develop new ideas and concepts based on positive language and appreciation. This means your employees are more likely to stay with your company.
Moreover, general coaching not only allows you to find new solutions together, but also to solve problems more efficiently than before - all thanks to new skills your employees acquire through coaching each other.
But how does a coaching culture create all these benefits?
First and foremost, a coaching culture helps produce a sense of community; after all, we all become students and teachers at the same time - we need each other. And that's exactly why coaching is such an effective way to create something new together, relieve stress, and increase employee retention.
Coaching allows us to work at full strength by helping each other, not just ourselves - that's how coaching impacts productivity.
Coaching also builds confidence, which helps employees find their individual strengths. They are able to focus on the tasks they do best, which increases efficiency.
Coaching also fosters creativity and innovation by increasing ownership - after all, it takes some knowledge to be able to coach other employees. A coaching approach also helps teams look at things from many different perspectives, which increases problem-solving skills and thus improves teamwork.
A coaching culture creates customer satisfaction by allowing customers to work with the best possible solution based on trust and commitment.
In addition, a coaching culture creates employees who are open to change, because change is also coaching! Coaching allows us to see things from a different perspective, which means resistance to change decreases. In a coaching culture, people not only coach each other in their specific areas, but coaching becomes part of everything they do.
Let's summarize:
Through a coaching culture, your employees learn from each other how to work together more effectively. They will acquire new skills and learn modern approaches. This will improve the overall performance of your company.
All well and good, but how can you now implement a coaching culture?
For this purpose, we at jacando have worked out 10 steps to help you.
Business will take place in a different way in the future.
This will require new skills, new processes, new structures and new ways of thinking. Many things will become so complex that, as we know, the time of manuals will be over. We will all have to find new solutions together every day.
Therefore, the following 10 steps are intended as a suggestion for any company that wants to create a coaching culture:
But mentality alone is not enough. You need places and times to meet, to coach. You need to ensure, through special premises and fixed appointments, that your employees coach, support and update each other.
To create a coaching culture within an organization, you need to communicate coaching values. Classic coaching values include, as an example: openness, honesty, reliability, loyalty, courage and initiative.
To do this, let coaching itself become part of your employees' job description. By doing this, you create a direct responsibility for everyone to coach others. In this way, coaching becomes a daily work practice and has a lasting impact on productivity, motivation and creative thinking.
If coaching is to be successful in the long run, you need to develop direct coaching roles in your organizational culture and the only way to do this is to create specific coaching roles in different areas of your business or organization. For example: HR coaches, sales coaches, and project management coaches.
All companies are structured similarly. That's why you should always start with a coaching culture at the individual level, scale up from there to the next level of the team, and only then target the entire company. Creating a coaching culture only works bottom-up, so involve good potential coaches among your employees in your plans early on.
You can't coach everything. If coaching is not applicable to certain circumstances, it is pointless and people's attention will wander. We are all masters in our own field. That's why we also know that there are always areas where coaching doesn't work so well, such as when coaching less experienced people or when coaching by phone or online. That's why you should always be clear in advance about who you want to coach and what media you will use to do so.
To create a coaching culture in your organization, it is important that everyone has the opportunity to cultivate coaching skills at least once a year. Develop training programs so that the coaching skills of managers and employees can be developed on an as-needed basis.
The coaching mindset must become part of the daily work culture because coaching is about supporting, guiding and inspiring team members. Coaching should be present in coaching programs, coaching management roles and coaching performance systems. In this way, the greatest possible impact can be achieved on all work processes.
It is critical to incorporate peer coaching, self-coaching, and career coaching into everyday work through regular events so that everyone has the opportunity to participate.
Now that you know how to create such a culture, we should also talk about who is responsible for creating it:
As coaching is used in all departments of an organization, each individual must play a role in creating such a culture. The coaching process works best when there is commitment from upper and middle management. After all, only they can enable their employees to participate in any coaching sessions.
But employees should also be aware of the coaching process so that they can participate in coaching conversations with their managers and colleagues.
Only when managers and employees pull together can coaching create a sense of community throughout the organization.
To help you achieve this, in parallel to the 10 steps to creating a coaching culture, we have also compiled tips on how to make the creation of such a culture even more successful.
For the creation of a coaching culture to be successful, you should work out rules and norms on how behavior should be shaped during this coaching. If you define this in advance, the subsequent effectiveness of all your coaching activities will be higher.
Make coaching an integral part of your performance appraisals, employee reviews, and employee evaluations.
Everything that has not been targeted does not exist in modern companies. Therefore, determine what quantifiable goals your coaching will pursue.
Observe those KPIs that you want to improve through coaching measures and measure their change. Only then will you know whether your measures were successful.
As a coach, you are a leader coach and never a supervisor or manager.
Only when coaching becomes a commonplace in your organization will you have succeeded in establishing a coaching culture.
Coaching can be so much more personalized than mentoring because it focuses on the needs of the individual rather than the support that comes from their position within a company. Such a culture can be the next step in your company's development.
Because through a functioning coaching culture, they reap all the numerous benefits. But in order for this to succeed, you need qualified people who are able to coach effectively in all circumstances, regardless of whether the coaching conversations are formal or informal.
That's why recruiters should also look for coaching skills when interviewing potential candidates. So, you recognize the importance of strategically aligning your HR strategy in terms of creating a coaching culture and the role you play as an HR leader in terms of your company's future.
All in all, we can only suggest that you start with the 10 steps to creating a coaching culture. After all, these have been developed from the many years of accumulated experience at jacando.
If you need more tips or want to learn how our software can help you create a coaching culture, feel free to contact us at any time.
Not only is building a coaching culture an important transformation process, but also leading the HR department into the digital future. And that's not so easy. Read more in the whitepaper:
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