Effective leaders are the building blocks of success for any organization for achieving productive business results. Great leaders can prove to be great coaches who can lead the individual employees, teams and business units to reach the pinnacle of success. The seasoned leaders already have the necessary ingredients for becoming successful mentors or coaches like patience, strong determination, confidence, communication skills, leadership skills and other such qualities. For any given organization, the main challenge is to train the leaders to be effective coaches. The coaching skills of a trained leader have a great impact on the performance of the employees in an organization, and they can make their performance good or make it bad. A leader-coach is no different from a sports coach who will motivate and inspire his/her team members to achieve victory in all business endeavours.
“The goal of coaching is the goal of good management: to make the most of an organization’s valuable resources.”- Harvard Business Review
Some of the qualities that a leader-coach must have been
The best strategy
Devising a working strategy to improve the overall performance of an organization is imperative for the leader-coach and while doing so, he/she will teach mental models and frameworks that will increase the intellectual capability of the team. The leader-coach will brainstorm with the peers in working out, what is good for the company? What worked out best? What were the hindrances? & so on. A leader-coach will teach the subordinates to have coordinated efforts in reaching common objective to achieve overall excellent performance.
Increased energy levels
A good leader-coach will always be pumped up with energy and will have a strong passion for his/her area of work. Filled with positive vibes, the leader-coach will always hone positive attitude and endless affinity towards work among the peers. The success of a leader-coach is reflected in the sense of optimism and confidence instilled in the teammates.
Should be humble & self-aware
Humility is a trait which comes in nature of the leader-coach and the leader-coach should put the success of the teammates as a front-runner when compared to the personal interests. They care more about the improvement of the teammates instead of development of self. Being self-aware makes them focused on their core objective of achieving impeccable progress for their team. The leader-coach also know how to side-line them self when it is the turn of a fellow teammate to be in limelight.
Unparalleled expertise & skill
The leader-coach must be a jack of the game if the leader-coach wants to guide the subordinates to achieve success. Having explicit skills, the leader-coach is seen as a torch-light leading to the jewel of fame, whom every subordinate will follow with complete faith. The leader-coach must have deep knowledge of the core elements of the work and with this high authority, he can guide the teammates to excellence. With one’s experience as a top performer, the leader-coach will set the benchmark for performance for his peers and pushes them to achieve optimal results.
Interested in individual member growth
A successful leader-coach would help individuals in the team to achieve their individual goals and to identify their strengths and weaknesses so that they can contribute positively to the team’s success. By giving them challenging projects in their fields of interest the leader-coach will expand their professional knowledge and help them grow both personally and professionally. In each walk of the individual team member, the leader-coach will go hand in hand being there for the team member in his/her failure or success.
Commands loyalty and shows care
The leader-coach sees the true potential of each individual of the team and makes other subordinates to acknowledge these strengths and coordinate with them to make them the strength of the team. All the team members are taught to respect each other’s views and contributions to the team and work together as a coherent unit. A leader-coach creates an amicable environment for individuals, where there is fair play and each of the person’s dignity is respected.
How will the leader-coach train his/her peers?
The leader-coach will decide whether a coaching conversation is effective or mentoring or a direct approach has to be adopted which may suit the team members.
- Needs to identify the perfect mental condition required to be present in the team member to be receptive to difficult conversations.
- Help team members in identifying their blind spots or resistance that is preventing them from giving their best performance.
- Use techniques of coaching which is effective in solving people’s problems and to change their minds.
- Learn the technique of listening from three centres in the nervous system which will let you share strong reflections and ask powerful questions creating a deeper reality which will have a permanent positive effect on the minds of the teammates resulting in increased organizational productivity.
- By practising strong presenting techniques, the leader-coach can have a control over his/her emotions while coaching the peers.
- He/she will devise a development plan for achieving improvement of the subordinates.
Hence, we can infer that being a leader-coach requires a whole lot of efforts from one’s side and only highly effective leader-coaches can lead a team to succeed professionally and contribute to the improvement of the team and the progress of the organization.
Using a unique feedback technique at the beginning of the coaching session, the leader-coach will make it clear regarding the desired results expected from the session to his/her teammates.
