The benefits of workplace coaching

Research carried out by the Institute of Leadership and Management (ILM) showed that 95% of learning and development managers say coaching has delivered tangible benefits for their organisation. Which is probably why 90% of organisations over 2000 employees use business coaching. They listed the key areas improved by coaching to be:

• Better communication and interpersonal skills
• Increased confidence and motivation
• Improved conflict resolution
• Better management performance

What do these benefits mean in practice?

What kind of business results can we expect to see from the key areas of improvement listed above? Here are a few business benefits that we often see after workplace coaching is provided:

• Absenteeism falling
• Improved staff retention
• Grievances dropped
• More effective meetings (less wasted time)
• Achieving sales targets
• Lower number of complaints

In terms of ROI, PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) carried out research that identified that on average organisations estimated an ROI of 7 times their initial investment by implementing workplace coaching. In fact, quarter of those organisations actually reported ROI 10-49 times their initial investment.

But that’s still not a monetary figure specific to our organisation…

Let’s take one of the potential results from above – achieving sales targets. Now let’s say that the company in question were making £100,000 in sales each month. After workplace coaching they have been able to raise this to an average of £105,000 each month (a 5% increase).

We could automatically attribute this improvement to the coaching programme and claim an ROI of £5000 per month, or £60,000 each year. However, we need to take into account other factors that may have influenced sales and accept that the coaching may not be entirely responsible.

For this example, let’s estimate that the coaching is responsible for 50% of the sales increase (£30,000 each year). Even if we can’t identify any other contributing factors to the sales increase our figure needs to be conservative to be considered reliable

Now, to be doubly sure that our figure is realistic, let’s say we are 70% confident in our estimation (70% of £30,000 leaves us with £21,000). At this stage we are pretty confident that our coaching programme has directly allowed us to increase sales by £21,000 each year.

Finally, we need to subtract the cost of the coaching itself. Let’s say a team of 4 sales staff went through a number of one to one coaching sessions at a total cost of £1000 per person (£4000 for the team).

£21,000 – £4,000 = £17,000

We can estimate that one to one coaching has provided a return on investment of £17,000 this year in terms of sales figures (this is before we even consider the other benefits and areas of ROI).

Of course, this is just a conservative estimate and the success of coaching is not best judged by trying to use exact monetary terms. However, it’s a handy calculation to have up your sleeve when asked to put a figure on it.

A qualification in coaching and mentoring can provide a great number of benefits towards your career progression. Having a good understanding of coaching tools and techniques, as well as the ability to apply them in the workplace can be an incredible power to wield. Here are 5 great things that a coaching and mentoring qualification could do for your career:

1. Improved Motivation – Coaching and Mentoring is most often associated with helping other individuals to work through big decisions and issues. However, the skills of a good coach can be just as easily used to coach themselves. People who practice self-coaching are far clearer on their goals and outcomes, and for that reason are far more motivated to achieve them. Try it for yourself, use the OSCAR Model to self-coach yourself through an issue that’s currently on your mind.
2. Ability to Manage Stress – You may have noticed that people who can utilise self-coaching seem to exude a calmness that the rest of us struggle to achieve. Being able to self-coach helps you to solve your own problems, rationalise more effectively and decrease your dependence on other people. In this way, coaching allows you to greatly reduce stress as it makes you aware that, ultimately, only you can control your own stress levels.
3. Greater Job Performance – Coaching models such as OSCAR can greatly enhance your ability to make good decisions. A structured approach to decision-making also means that the right decisions can be made far more efficiently, saving a great deal of time and resource. What does this result in? You become far more efficient in performing your job role!
4. Improved Management Performance – Managers who successfully adopt a coaching approach with their team members are better managers. By using a coaching approach with your team members you have a far greater chance of them feeling valued, respected and knowing that their efforts are appreciated. What does this mean for you as a manager? People are more willing to work towards your goals and priorities, as you are the manager who shows that you appreciate them.
5. Greater Recognition and Respect – As we’ve seen in points one to four, by utilising a coaching approach you’re more motivated, less stressed, performing at your best and helping others to do the same. People will start to notice your calm demeanour and the clinical efficiency with which you execute your workload. Naturally you’re going to get greater recognition and respect. You look like a rockstar to your colleagues and that promotion can’t be too far around the corner!

Many of us would like to take our leadership training online, but in doing so there are a few pitfalls we need to watch out for.

1. Thinking that online and classroom training are the same thing. Now this one sounds obvious, but very often companies will take their classroom workbook and paste it into static, dull web pages. The organisation now offers eLearning, tick in the box. Well, I’m not sure you can truly call that eLearning, and this is a big part of the reason that eLearning sometimes has a reputation for being boring. Would you sit your classroom participants down and just ask them to read the workbook all day? Hopefully the answer is no! Online learning needs to make up for the absence of a real-life presenter, this can be done with more exciting media such as video demonstrations and interactive activities.
2. Getting the price wrong. This is an easy trap to fall into, and it’s important to understand from the very beginning that people are looking at eLearning in order to cut-costs. Classroom-based training is expensive and companies look to eLearning as a cheaper alternative. Don’t price yourself out of the market, do some research and take a look at what others are charging in your industry. Technology is becoming more and more available and easy to use, you don’t need to throw huge sums of money into eLearning anymore and attempt to transfer the cost the client.
3. Point, click, point, click. Another common theme seen in eLearning is point and click interactions. Whilst these types of activities have their place and can be very effective, don’t make it the entire experience. People soon tire of clicking through page after page of text and multiple choice questions. Break it up with video, podcasts and different types of activities.
4. Low quality media. If your online training is going to involve video (and it likely should) then make sure you invest in good quality equipment and someone who knows how to use it. Poor video and audio quality will turn people off immediately, no matter how great the content is.
5. Not bothering to storyboard. Good eLearning spends as much, if not more time in planning than in development. If an eLearning module hasn’t been storyboarded it shows. To produce powerful, engaging eLearning you need to spend a lot of time thinking about the user experience. If you’re going to just jump into the studio and film because ‘you’re an expert on the subject-matter’ then you will be missing the most vital component – crafting an engaging experience for the user. Online and classroom experiences are very different. Take a look at other online courses and think about the methods they use to engage users in this training format. A little time planning will go a long way!

This isn’t by any means an all-inclusive summary of ALL of the pitfalls that you might come across when taking your management training online but it’s certainly some of the major ones we’ve encountered.

Which characteristics make for an authentic leader? Here’s five that we think all true leaders possess.

5 characteristics of authentic leaders:

Trustworthy: We need leaders that can be trusted – that show integrity, credibility, reliability and congruence. Leaders who that say what they mean, mean what they say and do what they say they will – keeping their promises.

Human: They are approachable, not hiding behind their role or status. They are capable of a degree of intimate connection and are in touch with their own emotions as well as those of others. They are not afraid to show their emotions when appropriate.

Humble: Authentic leaders are self-aware, they know their strengths and limitations. They recognise the need to work with those who have complementary strengths. They own up to their mistakes and offer a sincere apology when appropriate, particularly, when they break a promise. These leaders recognise that they are on a journey; that they are still learning.

Principled: They know what they believe, what they value and the principles that they will live and die by. This doesn’t mean they are rigid and unable to compromise – they should be able to flex and give on many issues when the situation demands it. But they know where their line is drawn, there are certain principles on which they will not compromise even if it means that profits, popularity or prospects will suffer as a result.

Other-Centred: Authentic leaders are not self-absorbed or self-centred, but basically secure in themselves, comfortable in their own skin, and as a result are able to keep their focus on serving others. They are not self promoting but recognise their role is to enable and empower others to be the best they can be for their own good and the good of the organisation.

Take a moment to think, are you portraying these characteristic and coming across to your people as an authentic leader?