Most of us think we know what workplace coaching is, but the truth is we don’t. Traditional leadership tactics have led us astray, and I rowed in the same boat throughout my career until I explored training outside of my financial institution. That’s when I realized we were doing it wrong, that there was a better way to ignite results and long-term growth within people. In last week’s blog, I told you exactly what workplace coaching is and isn’t and how to do it right. But this week, I’m going to show you what that looks like. I will take you through a process for how to coach employees using five (unmissable) steps. Stay to the end for an exclusive checklist.
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A Recap: What Coaching Is and Isn’t
- Coaching IS NOT: telling people what to do and how to do it.
- Coaching IS: helping people cultivate courage to change their behaviours so they can reach their desired outcomes.
That’s why I call it Edge Moves coaching or being an Edge Mover’s coach; you give your team the opportunity to grow beyond their comfort zones into their courage zones.
Those changed behaviours? They’re Edge Moves—incremental actions that take people closer to their courage zones.
Ready to see what this looks like in action?
5 Steps to Design an Edge Moves Coaching Session
I call this process a series of unmissable steps because if you’re not doing one of these five things (or all) in a “coaching session,” you aren’t actually coaching.
To be an Edge Mover’s coach and have a successful coaching session, you need to:
- Make space for intentional, strategic thinking.
- Analyze comfort zones.
- Facilitate three types of change.
- Develop self-awareness in talent and purpose.
- Design Edge Moves.
Now let’s do a double-click on each so you know how to design an effective coaching session.
Step 1: Make Space for Intentional, Strategic Thinking
Every day, we’re pulled into a multitude of directions, both professionally and personally. Back-to-back meetings, initiative pitches, picking kids up from school, making dinner, etc. The list goes on and on, and I call it a tornado vortex because you’re constantly swirled around with varying priorities and responsibilities.
The good thing about a coaching session is that it allows you and your employees to quiet your tornado vortexes. It’s sacred time to finally quiet down and think about career priorities strategically.
When I use this step, I often start off by saying something like, “What would you like to talk about today? What’s top of mind?”
It’s helpful to choose one central situation that’s impacting your employee. From there, you don’t hold their hand through the fire of figuring it out, you simply support them by asking four important questions:
- What are you thinking?
- What are you feeling?
- How do you feel about what you’re thinking?
- What do you think about how you’re feeling?
These questions help them go beyond the surface of a work situation, allowing for deeper understanding and creative ways forward.
Step 2: Analyze Comfort Zones
To grow and develop, you need to establish your foundation, your baseline, so you know where to measure advancement from.
At work, this looks like asking your employee what they’re enjoying and what they’re good at. These are talents, strengths, and skills that fall inside their comfort zone.
From there, you can help them use what they’re already good at to explore new opportunities, allowing them to leverage the familiar while expanding into the unfamiliar to drive different results and broaden their impact.
Analyzing comfort zones is perfect for people on your team who are enjoying what they’re doing but want to do more or try something new. This type of conversation helps them be strategic about exploring their advancement avenues within your company.
Step 3: Facilitate 3 Types of Change
Remember, coaching is all about giving people the ability to change their current behaviours to drive desired outcomes.
In a coaching conversation, you can focus on facilitating three types of change from an employee:
- Mindset.
- Emotional state.
- Behaviours and actions.
I recommend following them in that order, as they stack upon one another to make for more sturdy, sustainable change. Afterall, to change, it always starts with establishing and pivoting your mindset and exploring how you’re feeling. In turn, implementing new behaviours becomes a whole lot easier because you’ve already gotten your mind and heart in the game.
Step 4: Develop Self-Awareness in Talent and Purpose
AKA—coach to your people’s Brilliant Differences. As an Edge Mover’s coach, you help unveil the true potential of your people, supporting them in identifying their strengths and talents they may not have noticed on their own.
Once you’ve identified their strengths and Brilliant Difference, you can touch base to see how they continue to use it, as well as new ways they can leverage it.
Allow them to voice their awareness by asking questions like:
- How have you seen your Brilliant Difference show up this week?
- What impact did you have?
- Where didn’t you get to use your Brilliant Difference but would have liked to?
- Have you noticed any new opportunities where you can execute your Brilliant Difference?
This series of questions allows your people to continuously evolve, and one day, what was once their Brilliant Difference will transform into something new (most likely something that wasn’t in their comfort zone before).
Step 5: Design Edge Moves
Coaching sessions should always have takeaways. Not for you as the coach, but for the coachee. That’s where traditional workplace coaching gets it wrong; the manager is often left with more on their plate than the employee.
It’s time to turn the table and give your employees the full meal so they can take control of their career.
Remember: Edge Moves are incremental actions that bridge people from their comfort zones to courage zones. They’re small yet impactful habits that prime people to be comfortable with bigger changes.
The Edge Moves you offer your employee will be unique to your conversation and the situation you discuss, but it doesn’t have to be tumultuous. It could be as simple as self-reflecting.
Here are six types of Edge Moves you could offer to get started:
Innovation:
- Lead a new initiative.
- Experiment with a new approach.
Communication:
- Inject storytelling into a meeting or conversation.
- Speak the language of their audience.
Leadership:
- Allow them to coach someone else.
- Project and task delegation.
Relationship:
- Add people to their network.
- Have an influential conversation with a stakeholder.
Visibility:
- Speak up in meetings.
- Present an idea/initiative to leadership.
Mindset:
- Shift from individual, technical expert to broader, impactful leader.
Bring It All Together With a Checklist
You don’t need to memorize all the steps, but you do need to grab your Edge Moves Coaching Session Checklist before leaving. Download it and save it for reference to get real results and strategic change from every meeting and coaching session.
