Coaching Leaders [3 of 5]
The best coaches are committed to listening. They learn to be genuine interested in others. They learn to importance of giving their undivided attention to coachees. These three characteristics are the foundation of excellent coaching.
To establish a coaching relationship that empowers someone, the coach must believe and recognize that people have embedded creativity, a high level of intelligence, and even that they almost always have the knowledge they need to succeed. What most coachees need is for a coach to help them access all this. And without deep listening, and even practicing the art of asking penetrating, poignant questions, it’s almost impossible to see what exists inside a person–for you or them.
Here are a few things that listening does in a coaching relationship:
Listening well helps people think more clearly, work through unresolved issues, and discover solutions that may already be inside them.
Coaching need to listen beyond what someone is saying in words. Listen for assumptions, and then help a person identify the false ones. Assumptions and beliefs that shape action, and they are contained in almost everything we say. Pay attention to these and address them, point them out, help a person identify them through question asking. Once again, to see what lies behind words requires observant, attentive listening.
Listen to where people make observations, weigh in their opinions, and where he or she jumps to conclusions. This helps the coach understand a person’s values, which can open a door to all kinds of insights on why or how a person functions like they do.
Listen for gaps and inconsistencies in a person’s thinking process.
Listen for defensiveness, and where people are trying to protect themselves, distort reality, or even make excuses. Again, insights are found here as to where a person needs to change.
Asking questions that help people become aware of how their assumptions, beliefs, and attitudes may be helping or hindering them in getting the result they want can create opportunities for moments of genuine, even profound insight. Questions, often more than just giving answers, can penetrate a person’s illusions and delusions. They can force a person to think deeply in a way that nothing else can.
Listen to what someone has clarity on, and whatever they don’t have clarity on. Ask questions and engage that dimension of whatever issue at hand, striving to help someone create clarity. For instance, if someone is annoyed or frustrated with someone at work, as they talk it out with you, sometimes they realize that they need to give that person the benefit of doubt, or that they were not perfect in the situation either and they need to extend more understanding and compassion, or that they can see more why that person did what they did and that they didn’t intend to frustrate them.
To become an effective coach, you must build the foundation of listening in a coaching relationship. Trust will form. Relational capital will be built. And the greatest insights a coach can offer someone in effort to see real transformation happen almost always come from giving a coachee one’s undivided attention and listening in the most perceptive and attentive way.
Read MoreCoaching Leaders [2 of 5]
When a coach sees the incongruence of intention and action, it’s an opportunity to offer specific and significant feedback. As a coach, I always look for inconsistencies in what someone says they want to change and what inconsistencies exist (we call them deficits, weaknesses, limitations, etc.). But when those issues are identified, it isn’t just about giving critical feedback or advice, or transferring knowledge. Rather, it’s primarily about the coach coming alongside the coachee to help them become who they want to become. And there’s a HUGE difference in those two things. And to do this well, coaches must master the art of listening well (another blog coming soon about this, or read Chapter 3 in my book Relational Intelligence).
In light of all this, one of the biggest warning signs for a coach is not to come off as judgmental, or overly critical, or being perceived to think you have all the answers for the coachee–these traits can undermine one’s relationship with a coachee like nothing else. No one likes being on the other side of that.
Yes, entering a coaching relationship can expose someone’s shortcomings and deficits, or highlight incompetence, or even subject the coachee to the pain and difficult challenges of trying to change. But when a coach begins to see all of this, he or she must partner any critical feedback or improvement orientated advice with genuine affirmative feedback, which builds relational capital, as well as constructive feedback, which actually builds people up and empowers them rather than allowing someone to walk away just feeling criticized or judged. The best coaching always empowers and enables.
Read MoreCoaching Leaders [1 of 5]
An effective coaching relationship can’t begin without a conversation that helps the coachee clarify their vision and/or life purpose, know their intended goals (for life, work, etc.), and then articulate their expectations of a coach. In addition, there must be an established agreement where the coachee willingly invites the coach to challenge, encourage, and support them. effective coaching cannot happen without being given permission to actually coach. And if a coach doesn’t see the coachee’s determined and clear commitment to change and grow, that must be addressed because if this dynamic isn’t present, effective coaching cannot happen. Openness, willingness to change, and relational permission are absolutely necessary for a coaching relationship to work.
Coaching isn’t just about offering your advice, or critical analysis, or giving all your solutions and wisdom to someone else’s problems.
One reason why coaches need to know someone’s intentions is so they don’t just judge the behavior of a person without realizing what that person is striving towards, or what their desired outcomes are. Although the coachee’s behaviors may be inconsistent at times with their intentions, if a coach understands their intentions, they become equipped to come alongside that person and affirm their striving toward their desired intentions, even though they have inconsistencies. This helps the coachee feel supported and understood, a powerful dynamic at work in effective coaching.
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15 Leadership Development Practices
Too much leadership training (and discipleship) zeroes in on the mind, or on transferring information and content. Although this is one dimension of human development it must not remain the sole focus if we want to optimize growth in developing leaders.
I’m convinced that mentors and coaches need to offer a more holistic developmental approach. The best mentors and coaches have a development map that includes clarifying the path of how people grow in character formation, self-leadership practices, clarifying their mission/purpose/calling, mastering the craft of communication, fostering one’s own creative potential, etc.
To get more info on how to develop a more holistic developmental approach with your leaders, sign up for my newsletter and I’ll send you a two page summary I’ve developed: “15 Things I Do To Develop Leaders”
Read MoreOrganic Leadership Development
Human beings develop through a dynamic, organic process.
Just like other organic matter, they are alive.
People don’t grow via the force-feeding of ideas or information, but when a rich soil is cultivated with the right amount of sunlight and water.
That way, the life that’s inside has an opportunity to bloom, flourish and grow.
If you’re a mentor and developer of others (or want to be), ask yourself the question: What am I doing to cultivate the right kind of soil?
For starters, it begins with building stronger relationships that involve trust, vulnerability and honesty.
In addition, mentors and coaches need to be discerning as to whom they invest in, as they strive to find people who are aware of their deficits, or at least open to hearing what they may be. Why? Because if someone you’re investing in isn’t aware of their own deficits (in leadership, in character, performance, or whatever), their desire for growth will be minimal or perhaps even non-existent in that arena.
And when the deficit is identified, always help set and clarify the goal for improvement and growth. These are the kinds of conversations that cultivate the right kind of soil.
Read MoreMotivating Younger Leaders
In his book, Drive: The Surprising Truth about What Motivates Us, best-selling author, Daniel Pink describes “intrinsic motivation” as the key to fueling sustained passion and meaning. Mentors and coaches often wonder whether they’ve selected the “best” or “right” development themes. But there’s a secret that the best mentors know:
what people choose as a development theme doesn’t matter near as much as helping a protégé choose something they truly care about to develop.
Another way of describing this is: pay attention to what God is doing in their life and what arena of growth is surfacing. Then lean into that as you partner with God’s Spirit to cultivate transformation.
Coming alongside protégés like this will help you inspire their ongoing passion, maintain motivation and foster exponential growth in those you’re investing in. It’s almost always good to guide younger leaders, but ultimately, the best mentors refrain from forcing their agenda on their protégés.
Read MoreEnhancing Deliberate Practice
Coaches and mentors have a significant role when it comes to “deliberate practice” and mastery. Malcolm Gladwell popularized what the renowned psychologist Anders Ericsson reported in his studies on mastery. It was the idea of “deliberate practice.” In essence, it was shown that deliberate practice is a consistently more significant indicator of success than any type of inherent genius. It requires steady, consistent repetition over time until new behaviors take root as new habits. The theory is that 10,000 hours of deliberate practice leads one toward becoming an expert. Why ought this matter to coaches and mentors? Because, if our protégés are not practicing in the right way, or learning a skill in the right way, it will take them down a path that will later require an immense amount of un-learning.
Aristotle described this same idea when he said: “We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence then, is not an act but a habit.”
If you want someone to be an excellent speaker, or leader, or coach, or youth pastor, or entrepreneur, do everything you can to ensure that they are practicing in the right way. Offer honest feedback, informed and insightful evaluation, and a holistic approach to development of them as a person.
Read MoreEffective Leaders Embrace Opposites
In Ecclesiastes, Solomon tells us, “It’s good to hold on to the one and not let go of the other, because the one who fears God will be able to avoid both extremes.”
In leadership, the best performers understand paradox. Take the idea of virtue for instance. Even the most noble virtues have their shadow side. Being honest without compassion becomes cruelty. Having devoted tenacity without remaining flexible ushers in rigidity. And courage with the absence of wisdom and discretion produces recklessness.
Another example involves confidence, which will turn to arrogance, mismanaged power, rigid forcefulness, and even denial if not combined with humility.
Or consider people who are great care givers but who burn out because of all the good they do. It’s almost always because they have neglected taking care of themselves.
Right and left brain thinking is yet another great example in leadership. Must of leadership development is orientated around left brain thinking, and part of the task of leadership growth is learning stretch and use the right brain. Learning how to move between both hemispheres of the brain enable leaders to more effectively face and overcome complex problems.
To create a map for yourself in learning how to grow in embracing opposites, consider your greatest talents. On the other side of them lies a shadow side (always). Identify what some of your shadow sides are and begin to be intentional in how you “hold on to one without letting go of the other.”
Read MoreGrowing Research & Interest in Relational Intelligence
Increasing amounts of research stress the importance of relational intelligence in leadership among younger generations. As I’ve spoke about and interacted with many people about relational intelligence across the country, it’s become more and more evident that church leaders aren’t always aware of the negative consequences that arise from the deficits of relational intelligence in their community and on their staff. However, I have also discovered the rising levels of interest for people to pursue improvement in their own relational intelligence and to help people within their church and workplace grow in it as well. One encouraging thing that happened during the latter part of 2011 and once again in 2012 was all the support and positive affirmation I heard from people about Relational Intelligence. In one instance, it was an honor that the Willow Creek Association recently highlighted my book, Relational Intelligence in their 2011 and 2012 resource catalogue. Thanks for being supportive yourself, and if there are others you know who would benefit from the ideas from my book, please pass on a recommendation.
If you don’t already, I invite you to follow me on Twitter: @stevesaccone
Steve
Read MoreThe Protege Program
In 2005, I founded the Protege Program at Mosaic in Los Angeles–a 2 year global leadership development experience for church planters, social entrepreneurs, and future ministry leaders. Due to its great success, I’m releasing my second book, PROTEGE, with IVP (coming soon) to open a dialogue about what leadership development can look like in churches and the life of young leaders.
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