Coaching Strategy
First of all, what is a coaching strategy? Interestingly, it's something that is absent sometimes in even very large organisations, where often ad hoc coaching activity prevails and the value of coaching is not systematically optimised.
As with any strategy, it must be distinguished from coaching tactics and planning, which relate more to the day to day practices and organisation of coaching within an organisation and ideally laid out in your .
A coaching strategy optimises value for the organisation
Because coaching has evolved as it has, there's a danger that it can be treated either as a private executive indulgence or as just another commodity with misleading and inappropriate ROI measures.
By contrast, a strategic view of coaching ensures that the benefits it delivers are valued and integrated along with equally important priorities such as leadership development, of which coaching is an integral part.
What to include in your coaching strategy
There are several elements that add demonstrable value to coaching practice and should therefore be included in your coaching strategy.
1. Align coaching with organisational strategic objectives
Just as leadership needs to be oriented to the delivery of your organisational and cultural outcomes, so with coaching. Both internal and external coaches need to be aware of organisational priorities to ensure that coaching objectives are aligned to enhance and strengthen these. This can also be achieved by involving a line manager or HR business partner in the initial contracting and objective setting of a coaching process in order to ensure that coaching supports the desired cultural and leadership objectives and priorities of the organisation.
2. Agree appropriate and meaningful measures
Evaluation should be an intrinsic aspect of the coaching process; otherwise, how will you know you have achieved what you set out to do? Coaching outcomes that are aligned with organisational objectives are strengthened by including specific behavioural measures that can be agreed between the coach, coachee and management. These evaluation criteria may be quantitative, qualitiative or usually a combination of the two. Linking them to appraisal or personal development plan activity can also be effective.
3. Ensure continuous improvement
Supporting the continuous professional development of both internal and external coaches is a key aspect of coaching strategy. Coaching supervision ensures that the coach maintains an appropriate balance between the individual and the organisational client and that the alignment of benefits is maintained. Reflective practice adds generative value to the coaching process, resulting in more powerful results and organisational impact.
4. Capture and share the learnings
As a by-product of coaching and reflective practice, whether in 1:1 coaching, team coaching, action learning sets or debriefings, themes emerge and realisations are made that are relevant not just to the immediate group but also to the organisation. Providing both formal and informal means for these learnings to be captured and shared allows the benefits of coaching to be more deeply and generatively implemented throughout an organisation, strengthening the positive impact of coaching at a strategic level.