The most common misconceptions about professional coaching!
Professional coaching IS about helping others figure things out themselves, using powerful questioning, active listening, and being fully present. It IS NOT about giving advice or directing.
Today, we are going back to the roots..clearing up some very basic misconceptions about professional coaching…what it IS and IS NOT.
The confusions about professional coaching have valid reasons:
Professional Coaching originates from sports coaching, which is a combination of training, guiding and motivating approaches.
It is not a protected profession, such as those of a therapist, doctor or lawyer. There is no binding, lawful governing body in any country, based on my understanding.
Coaching still today is a general catch-all for many different Leadership approaches.
Let’s sort this through!
✔ What Professional Coaching IS:
Helping someone figure things out themselves
Powerful questioning and Active Listening
Being fully present with someone
Being an equal partner to someone
Being a sounding board
Sharing neutral observations
Being direct and caring at the same time
❌ What Coaching is NOT:
Giving advice, training, directing, mentoring
Sharing your own experience and opinion
Helping someone with YOUR resources
Providing feedback on what’s right or wrong
Giving direction on what needs to happen
Assessing and fixing performance
Helping people to get to your correct solution
Coaching is a powerful style that inspires people to build amazing resources, so they can overcome their toughest challenges and achieve their craziest dreams. It is THE most useful long-term style for a Leader to build self-motivated, autonomous teams.
Coaching is disruptive. It’s powerful. It’s also still super rare to be seen in organizations. Why? Coaching is a challenging SKILL that needs to be learned, mastered and sustained. The best
Leaders get intentional training at some point in their careers to add professional-level coaching to their tool belt and practice an empowering, coach-like approach in their daily interactions.
Two days ago on Friday, I ran a live session on LinkedIn, where I explored in a fun way ‘8 Traits of
Bad Management‘. When you flip these into the positive, there is a surprising connection to coaching skills. Check it out HERE and leave me a comment on LinkedIn!
All the best and have a grand week ahead with lots of small and big coaching moments!