Manila, 22 July 2020 — Can you empower a teammate in minutes?

The coaching style lets you influence a change quickly through a 1:1 conversation. Nowhere is this more evident than when you acquire the skills to empower a teammate.

Using a Coaching Style

We are unpacking this month how leaders can use a coaching style in their workplace. Read how we reviewed Three Coaching Traps and continued our exploration with a look at Short Coaching Styles in the form of TAP Coaching (see the diagram below). We already introduced the T Style in #Grow3Leaders, where we will soon continue with learning and practicing the A and the P styles. Last week, we discussed why it’s critical for you to activate a Bias to Act in your behavior at work.

Now, let’s get back to that promise of empowering your teammate — Collabmate we say in #Grow3Leaders — in minutes. TAP Coaching offers three styles to do just that, in 5, 10, and 20 minutes. Would you believe that you can transform someone’s life in 20 minutes?

What would be the reason for you to use a coaching style to empower a teammate? Well, let’s start by exploring three reasons: to let her/him reenergize, reframe, or redesign.

#1 Reenergize: Overcome an Obstacle

This is where you can use a coaching style conversation to help your teammate overcome an obstacle and reenergize when s/he is feeling stuck, low on energy, or frustrated by a challenge. It’s a situation that we all face at one time or another. Getting back on track quickly will help your teammate and by extension the whole team (Collab), including you.

#2 Reframe: Change the Perspective

A second reason is to help a teammate change perspective to look at a situation in a new way. This could be zooming in or out, applying a different worldview to the challenge, putting oneself in the shoes of the client, or taking a different time perspective. We looked at the leadership skill of taking multiple perspectives in the month of April. Often, a simple change in perspective will help the teammate and the Collab to move forward better.

#3 Redesign: Discover a new Solution

One of the most powerful outcomes of a coaching conversation is to discover alternative solutions to a problem. Coaching, and the use of short-coaching styles, can help to unlock this benefit for your teammate, leading to better performance and innovation by the team as a whole. Breakthrough moments can happen during or after short coaching moments that take just a matter of minutes. It can be a cathartic, liberating experience.

Empowering Each Other

What we’re talking about is teammates being able to empower each other. Whether you are the Collab leader or a member is immaterial. When everyone acquires the skill, everyone will benefit when someone empowers a Collabmate and vice versa. Can you imagine how you will feel when you overcome an obstacle, change perspective, or discover a new solution after one of your Collabmates leads you through a short coaching-style conversation?

So far, we looked at three reasons to empower your Collabmate. Of course, you could come up with additional reasons, and you’re welcome to share them.

The Coaching Mindset

We talked about skills you need to empower your Collabmate: these are the abilities to conduct an effective coaching-syle conversation. They are quite simple to understand, yet not easy to implement when you’re a newbie. That’s because they go against most of your mind’s training from your education and work experience. The only way to build muscle in coaching skills is to learn, practice, and get feedback.

The simplest way to get started is to see it as a distinct Coaching Mindset that you will use. It’s like switching your brain to a different wavelength. Different rules apply. Here are three rules to adopt when switching to the Coaching Mindset.

Non-Distracted ~ First, you will be non-distracted, listen, and give your full attention and be fully present to your Collabmate during the conversation.

Non-Directive ~ Second, you will be non-directive by not giving advice, just listening after you ask your question. Tame your ‘advice monster’ by zipping your mouth.

Non-Judgmental ~ Third, you will be non-judgmental by suspending your opinions and focus on appreciating your Collabmate and the ideas s/he comes up with.

While there is more to learn, these three are enough to get you started. Or not?

Community of Leaders

If you want to meet peers and learn the ins and outs of using a coaching style, consider joining us in #Grow3Leaders. Our secret sauce is to add the power of collaboration to learn, act, and succeed together. We learn and practice effective leadership behaviors together and ‘out loud’ to create positive change, including in these difficult times of dealing with Covid-19 and the new normals that are emerging.

#Grow3Leaders is an international and cross-generational community of leaders. We like to compare ourselves to practitioners going to the Dojo to practice with others. You are ready to join and take on the Grow3Leaders challenge when you invite three colleagues to come with you and become influencers of positive change in your workplace together. Joining us is free of charge—not free of commitment. If you have questions, reach out to me on LinkedIn to get a quick answer or to set up a call.