With little warning or training, we are expected to abandon the old ways, and start acting like team leaders, facilitators, or coaches. Employees have plenty of other options where they will be treated as full members of a team.We are suddenly expected to create trust, collaboration, and empowered relationships. This is what the new work environment is calling for, but many of us are baffled about how to actually implement it. Coaching is more than just a fundamental shift, not just in skills, but in the whole mind-set behind interacting with staff and peers. When someone truly becomes a coach, they learn to see the possibilities within individuals that those individuals cannot see themselves. It is about helping people fulfill their potential at work and as human beings. What sets the great coaches apart is their genuine concern for wanting to bring out the best in each player and the team as a whole.

A coach does not try to control or force performance the way a manager might. A coach tries to influence performance, to make it possible. Ultimately it’s always the employee who performs. Sports and business coaches both strive to motivate, inspire, and get the best performance from their players. Both demand commitment, action, and results for the team, while building trusting relationships. Both need focus and vision…both play to win. In sports, the coach is considered competent to coach simply by virtue of being hired. In business, a manager is not expected to be a coach and is usually not trained as one. A manager has to work with the talent he or she is given, not people they choose. Winning in business usually translates into success on the bottom line, not necessarily into personal accomplishment or growth. Research indicates that workers want to be coached. The pace of modern business has everyone under pressure to perform at all times. Companies are always searching for new and better ways to compete. The soft, friendly, easy-going manager, who everyone likes, fails as a manager. They can offer support, but can’t communicate the “critical message” when it is needed. The blunt, hard-driving manager also fails and can deliver the message but does it with a hammer.

A successful Hudson Valley business coach needs to be both sensitive and direct. The coach helps the employee see the performance shortfall and approach it more effectively. If today’s manager pretends to be a coach but continues to act like a boss, it creates distance and mistrust in the relationship.

A coach has to be willing to listen to feedback from others; to hear what they think about the coach’s ability to coach. The easy-going manager who enjoys relationships with people is often surprised to learn that others see him as wishy-washy and prone to wilting under the pressure.

The well organized, highly knowledgeable, take-charge manager is often seen as a no-nonsense manager who takes care of business. But where they have trouble is accepting the feedback that they lack sufficient interpersonal skills to coach with flexibility and friendliness.

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