Supporting a coaching culture

Many organizations today would like to “create” a coaching culture or “implement” a coaching culture. A coaching culture generally is expected to drive positive business outcomes, enhance employee engagement, collaboration and satisfaction, develop strong leadership and support innovation. Sounds like a great idea, right?

The only difficulty is that creating a coaching culture is not like creating a remuneration system. You cannot design the culture, make an implementation plan and roll it out. When we speak about culture, we are talking about “the way things are done around here”, and that cannot be changed by design. The system is too complex to be influenced in a target-oriented way. I am not saying that you cannot influence culture through a well thought out program, but you cannot “create” it. Maybe, we should be using language like: “furthering” or “supporting” a coaching culture to get out of the trap of setting a goal that cannot be achieved.

So, how do you support a coaching culture? Obviously, there is a ton of literature on this topic and a lot of experience out there in the world (many of which does fall into the trap of thinking that “interventions” can “cause” a coaching culture), so I don’t want to claim I can replace all of this with a little blog post. But if you are interested in a Solution Focused perspective, read on.

Ask yourself what it is that you really want

Before embarking on designing a program for the implementation of a coaching culture, have a good look at what it is that you really want to achieve. Ask yourself: “Suppose we had a great coaching culture, what difference would that make?” and “Who would notice and what would they be noticing?” Include probable outside stakeholder answers in your deliberations.

Look at what you already have

Don’t reinvent the wheel. Many organizations are already well on track toward a coaching culture. Find the “positive deviance”. Who in the organization is already on board with what you want? Talk to these people. Collect everything you have.

Make what you have visible

Let’s say one department is already carrying out their meetings in a “coaching” way and they really like it and are successful. Invite them to showcase their ideas in any forums that you have in your organization.

Create a coalition

After you have found the people who like the idea and are already doing it and work with them to create even more visibility. The more people who are part of the kind of culture that you want connect and talk to one another, the stronger this culture will become. This way, you are growing an alternative “way we do things around here” organically and in line with how cultures develop naturally.

Work with pull, not with push

Coaching has a bad reputation in some fields. It is seen either as remedial or as esoteric or is confounded with the Instagram coaching brigade. Actually, sometimes it is not even a good idea to use the word coaching – you can always just invent another word 😊. When you are working with the coalition make sure that this group stays very open and invites everyone in. The least you want is a small, elite club – you want the idea to spread. Offer workshops (maybe even given by these people), low-threshold events like “coaching coffees”. When someone is taking a coaching course, ask them to share their experiences publicly, etc.

Evaluate regularly

Get together regularly to see where you are: What are you noticing that is working? Where are the biggest gaps? What could be next signs of forward movement?

At SolutionsAcademy, we work with organizations to support a coaching culture, and while we do have great courses (for example the EMCC accredited “Coaching Skills for Managers and Leaders”), we know that making everyone take our wonderful course is only a partial solution. We love partnering with people to facilitate organic growth – so if you know someone who needs us give us their number 😊.

Also if you just want to hang out with us, learn about our ideas around coaching and coaching in organizations, why not simply come to one of our free coaching meetups and exchanges?

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