Hello, everyone. Welcome to Advanced Coaching Skills for Leaders. This is the next topic in the 2024 Deer Oaks Supervisor Excellence Webinar Series. I'm Greg Brannan from Deer Oaks. Great to be with you today. This is the 12th year that we have offered this series, the supervisor excellence webinar series.

We're so glad you joined us today. We've got a great turnout. We have several hundred people with us today, so really appreciate everyone taking time from your busy schedule. And today of course, we're going to talk about a topic that's important to most of us that are in a leadership position, and probably all of us as employees, is advanced coaching skills for leaders.

And so this is again, I mentioned the third topic in our quarterly series this year. We began back in January with, the Keys to Creating a Thriving Team Culture. We followed up in April, with Successful Approaches to Difficult Employee Conversations. Today of course, is Advanced Coaching Skills for Leaders. And we're going to finish the series this year, in 2024, in October with, How to Lead a Team that Provides Great Customer Service.

If you were not available to log on and take part in either of the first two sessions, the Keys to Creating a Thriving Team Culture or Successful Approaches to Difficult Employee Conversations, or if you haven't had a chance to register for the October session, How to Lead a Team that Provides Great Customer Service, all you have to do is hit reply to your GoToWebinar invitation for today.

And ask our staff to please either send you the recording link to the January or April sessions, or the registration link for the October session that's coming up. All right, folks, I also want to remind you that during these educational presentations provided by Deer Oaks, participants are in listen-only mode.

What I mean by that of course, is you won't be able to audibly ask questions during the formal part of the presentation, which should really only last today about 30 minutes, give or take. But your questions are important to me. So when we get to the end of the formal part of the presentation, I will open it up for questions.

At that time, please feel free to type any questions you have into the question box in the GoToWebinar software, that you'll find in the upper right hand corner of your screen. So I'm looking forward to that Q&A session here coming up. All right, folks, let's go ahead and get started.

Folks, let me begin with some research around the benefits of coaching. Now, as most of you know, coaching is a communications approach that is used by a lot of people professionally. I mean, I guess most of us would recognize the coaching communication with sports, from playing sports or being involved with sports with your kids.

Their sports teams all have what's identified as a coach. Now, in a professional setting, coaching takes on a similar definition, because coaching for sports obviously is-- you'll have the leader of the team, which you could call the manager of the team.

The leader of the team, that's called different things in different sports or the head coach, the coach is responsible for supporting the team, motivating the team, training the team, encouraging the team. And of course, the same thing happens in a professional setting. We just call the terms a little bit differently.

In a professional setting, a supervisor or a manager or a director, someone in a leadership role in a professional setting, they will use a coaching approach similar to what a coach in a sporting environment would use. To also again, to encourage a team, to train them and teach them, to help them improve their performance, to motivate them, to give them recognition.

So the similar connotations, both in a sports environment and also in a professional environment, but all that to say, coaching works. Coaching is really a research proven communication approach, that works in a lot of different venues because it enables leaders to connect with people, provide a motivational environment, encourage them, teach them, recognize them, support them and hold them accountable to perform.

Now, it's interesting, the Human Capital Institute and the International Coaching Federation, they've done research on the effectiveness of coaching in a professional setting. And it's really interesting because the numbers are really fantastic.

According to those two institutions, the Human Capital Institute and the International Coaching Federation, when an organization uses a coaching approach or when a supervisor or a manager uses a coaching approach, new employees onboard faster, 67% faster onboarding.

And think about that. If you're new in an organization and you're working with a supervisor or manager that uses really good communication skills, is collaborative, gives you a voice, shows an interest in your input, is very encouraging, very positive, you're naturally going to bond with your organization more quickly and onboard, and get ready to get up to speed as fast as possible.

Same thing happens with employee engagement. When individuals work for a supervisor or a manager that uses a coaching approach, there's 79% higher employee engagement in these studies. Ain't that interesting? Because we all want engaged employees.

Engaged employees come to work every day and give 100%, we want that. We want our teams to come to work motivated, to do their best. To be committed to the organization and its goals, and give a full effort.

Well, again, if you're working for someone who uses a coaching approach, who's always encouraging, who's always supportive, that has your back, that holds you accountable, that is always there to provide encouragement for you along the way, you're naturally going to be motivated, to get more engaged and do your best work.

The same thing with improved team functioning, that the research shows that working for a supervisor or a manager that use a coaching approach, improves team functioning. It gets teams working more cohesively together.

Again, because it creates a-- coaching again, creates a really motivational, positive environment, supportive environment, where people feel cared about, they feel encouraged, they feel respected. And when that happens, teams coalesce better. They're more cohesive. They work together better. They enjoy being together. They become a work family.

Also, another benefit of coaching is faster leadership development. Part of the approach of coaching-- we're going to get into the details of that here. We're going to get into the how to here in just a moment. But part of the benefits of coaching in terms of leadership development, is when a supervisor or a manager in a professional sense, uses a coaching approach, they typically don't dictate.

They're not always telling people what to do. They're not bossing them around very much. They're creating an environment where people are encouraged to have input into how work is going to be done. They're encouraged to have a voice, and have an opinion about how problems should be solved.

So because of that, because a coaching approach again creates an environment where people get more involved, take more ownership, get more engaged, they enhance their own leadership skills. They become ready to take on leadership responsibilities faster. Because their leader is giving them an opportunity to be a part of the process, to be hands-on.

And of course, when you have that experience, you're going to grow in your leadership capabilities faster. And then the bottom line of course for every supervisor, manager, director, whatever our title is-- the bottom line for everyone in a leadership role is to have a productive team.

And when the research from the Human Capital Institute and the International Coaching Federation identified that when a supervisor or a manager uses a coaching approach, at the end of the day, because of how supportive and engaging, and inspiring a coaching approach is, people just at the end of the day, are motivated to do their best work and they're a lot more productive.

All right, folks. And so as we drill down into this, I want to start with the concept of collaboration. But before I get into that, I would love to give you all an opportunity-- if you can use the question box in the GoToWebinar software on your screen, I would love to give some of you the opportunity to weigh in and share what your thoughts are.

So if you could take a moment, and share your opinion about why a coaching approach-- when it's utilized by a leader in a professional setting, why does it work? Why is it so successful? I'd love to hear from you. Again, if you could use the question box in the GoToWebinar software, and share some of your ideas.

I won't be sharing any names, but I do want to give you all an opportunity to share your opinions with others. All right, one of our colleagues said, because coaching includes mentoring. I like that. Mentoring obviously is very helpful to employees. Here's another one, using a coaching approach helps to build trust, absolutely.

Another one of our colleagues said, using a coaching approach helps workers to think more critically, absolutely. Taking a coaching approach helps you to develop your talent, for sure. Coaching provides a personal connection between you and the employee, I totally agree. I've got some really great feedback here from a lot of folks. I'm going to get to as many as I can.

We do have over 400 people on the call today, so I probably won't be able to get to everyone's comments, but I'll get to as many as I can, I promise. Coaching recognizes and utilizes the skills and abilities of staff, I totally agree with that. Another colleague said that coaching gives staff the opportunity to apply their own creativity and autonomy, yes, it does.

And this is a really good one too, that when you-- from one of our colleagues. When you get input and apply the suggestions of those closest to the issue, employees that are closest to the issue, they are more likely to buy in and follow through. That's a great point, absolutely. I think that's great. Coaching empowers the staff. Here's another one. Coaching is a partnership, I love that. It absolutely is.

Another one of our colleagues said, coaching makes me feel like I'm a real contributor, not just a cog in the system, I agree. Another colleague said coaching shows employee support, it does. And let me get to a couple more, and then we'll move on. Another one of our colleagues said, coaching creates camaraderie, it absolutely does.

And then last but not least, coaching engages staff and lets them participate in their own growth. Folks, thank you so much. And again, because we've got so many people on the call today, I wasn't able to get to everyone's comments, but thank you so much. Those are wonderful comments.

And I'll give you a few more opportunities throughout. And we'll also have a question and answer session at the end. And at the end, we'll get to as many questions as time allows. All right, let me start with-- in the how to section, of the how to process of coaching. Let's talk about embracing an approach that includes collaboration.

What I mean by collaboration, is partnering with the employees. And so if you're a supervisor and you're managing a team, collaboration would look like-- let's say I'm going to assign work to an employee, collaboration would look like, I would partner with the employee and we would discuss together what the work plan would be.

We would work together to come up with the best way forward, as opposed to dictating. And so I want to have us look at coaching. And sometimes things become more clear when we compare them with other ways of doing things. Kind of the opposite of a coaching approach, would be dictating or directing a highly directive approach.

When a manager or supervisor overly dictates or overly directs their employees, setting the goals themselves, not giving the employees much input, telling employees what to do and how to do it. Instead of giving employees input into the process, employees can feel like they're being micromanaged.

They can feel like they're being bossed around, and that can be demotivating to employees. I know we all know that. Whereas collaboration is, a manager, supervisor partnering with the employees. So when they assign work, they don't just tell them what to do and how to do it. They will work with the employee to come up with the work plan.

Give the employee input into that work plan. They're the subject matter expert. We hired them to do the job. They'll work with the employees to come up with the goals, instead of just dictating to the employees what the goals are. They'll partner with the employees and say, what do you think our goals ought to be for this? And so they're regularly giving employees input.

Think about this, when a manager or supervisor consistently gives employees input into how things are done, how problems are solved, how work is completed, employees are naturally going to feel more valued and respected. And when that happens, employees are going to typically be much more engaged to do their best work.

And so let's remember that, folks. Let's remember that collaboration, which is the central part-- it's the central communication skill within a coaching approach, is to collaborate, is to partner rather than just dictating. If you're dictating, telling people what to do and how to do it all the time, you're not really using much of a coaching approach.

And I had that problem early in my career, is that I over dictated at times. I was giving too many suggestions. I was directing people's specific efforts. I would tell people what to do and how to do it sometimes, when I would assign work. And I realized that people weren't getting very engaged, they weren't taking ownership.

And as I got better training over the years, I realized that a lot of that was on me. That I needed to do a better job. I needed to be less directive, and make less suggestions, give less recommendations. And instead, create an environment where I was getting input from employees, making employees feel like their voice mattered, and making them an equal partner in how we were doing things.

And as I learned how to do that, I realized motivation increased a lot on my work teams. I've had a lot lower turnover over the years, since I've become more of a collaborative coach than a directive manager, like I was 25 years ago.

And as a result, we have better performance. And so that's what I really want us to focus on today, is to try to figure out, how can I become-- because all of you are doing coaching at one time or another. I know that, I'm confident that we have over 400 people on the call today, that probably almost all of you-- if not all of you, are doing some pretty good coaching sometimes.

Absolutely, and one of my goals for today, is to help us all maybe embrace how to be a little bit more of a partner and communicate a little bit more of a collaborative way day to day, so that we're enhancing the amount of coaching that we're doing. Because again, when people work for someone who uses a collaborative coaching approach, the research is really clear like we started at the outset today. People are generally more motivated, and more engaged to do their best work.

All right, let me drill down a little bit more into characteristics of coaching. And so we talked about, that coaching creates a collaborative environment. Now, think about this, SHRM, The Society for Human Resources Management-- and I know you're all familiar with them, or a lot of you are anyway. It's the human resources professional association.

They did research several years ago, that identified that after a paycheck, the number one motivator for employees in the United States is to be treated with respect. Folks, one of the reasons coaching is such a motivating experience-- a coaching approach is such a motivating experience for employees, is it's very respectful.

When you're coaching, you're not dictating. You're not telling the employees what to do. You can make suggestions as part of your collaboration, certainly. You can have good two-way conversations where you and the employer are both having input, into the development of a work plan or coming up with solutions to problems.

You can work together. Absolutely, and you can both have opinions. But as the leader, if you're constantly dictating-- and again, that was the problem I had 25, 30 years ago. Probably 75% of the time, I was the one dictating the work plan. I was the one making suggestions about how we were going to solve problems. I was the one that was giving direction.

An I had to learn how to involve employees more in the process. And again, coaching creates that collaborative environment, where the employee feels like they're a part of it. And it engages people by giving them input. Folks, one of the things I truly believe in, is that people support what they help to create.

That people buy in and take ownership, and tend to follow through more often-- some of you said that in the initial comments that you gave me today, people tend to take ownership and be more motivated to follow through, if they're a part of it.

If they have an opportunity to be part of the solution, to help us come up with the solution or to help us create the work plan or the project plan, typically, they're going to be much more motivated and engaged to take ownership, and do their best work. And so let's remember, folks, if we want to keep our employees engaged-- I've had employees that have been disengaged, and I've had fortunately, a lot of employees that have been engaged.

As you all know, those of you in supervisory roles right now or management roles right now, you know that having an engaged employee is incredible, it's wonderful. An employee that comes to work motivated to give 110%, is all in, has great energy, is a great teammate and takes initiative, I mean, that's what we want.

We want people that want to be there, and want to give 100%. And so coaching creates that environment. Think about that. If we're always telling people what to do and how to do it, or if we're always dictating, this is what your goals are, we're always giving our opinion and if we're always giving advice, if we're doing 80% of the talking as the leader, people won't feel like they have a voice.

People will feel like they're being bossed around. I'll never forget, one of the most profound conversations I had was with a-- I was talking to a young city planner, that worked for a municipality. He was a well-educated guy, probably close to 30. And I was asking him to tell me about his relationship with his boss. And he went on, he got very animated.

And he went on to say, I worked for this guy for two years. And he started to complain and he said, and this guy has never asked me for my input about anything. And he looked at me, he says, dude, he says, I've got a brain. I've got a master's degree. He says, and this man has never-- he never seems interested in my opinion. He just always tells me what to do.

And he went on to say, and I feel like I'm just always being bossed around. And then the kicker was, he said, and I don't know how much longer I'm going to stay here. He says, I really don't like working for this guy. That really reinforced for me, that folks-- and I know I'm preaching to the choir about this, but employees don't want to be told what to do all the time.

Sure, we can give some direction as a supervisor, absolutely. But if that's the only way we're communicating-- if we're always giving direction, always telling people what to do, always calling the shots and not including the employees in the process, the employee is not going to feel a part of things. They're not going to feel respected and valued.

And at the end of the day, they're not going to be as motivated to do their best work. So it's really important that we create an environment where we're doing coaching a lot. The other thing about coaching, is coaching is not confrontational. I know most of you know this. If you're doing a good job of coaching, you're having a good two-way collaborative conversation with people.

Like walking up to someone-- even if they've had a problem, let's say there's a performance issue, you're not calling them and telling them what to do, what they're doing wrong and how to fix it. That's a directive fix. Telling them what they're doing wrong and how to fix it. But in a collaborative coaching conversation, you'd be calling the employee in and pointing out the deficit performance, and asking the employee what they think they could do to improve the performance.

Giving the employee a voice in coming up with the solution or coming up with a performance improvement plan. So coaching is not-- we're not being real confrontational, which can be uncomfortable for employees, can be anxiety providing for the supervisor, because it's hard to confront sometimes. And then people can be very defensive and push back.

Where coaching is, we're generally having a conversation. I'm going to give you a two-way conversation that's much more respectful and comfortable for both parties. And I'll give you some examples here in a moment. So how do we become more of a coach, folks? One is, try to use a coaching approach as a-- it's kind of a management strategy.

If you were to ask me today what I've evolved into, what's my management approach or what's my management strategy? I would say I use a coaching approach. And over the years, I've gone from using a coaching approach episodically, as I was learning how to be more collaborative as a leader, to nowadays, it's my primary way of interacting with staff. And I do it informally or formally.

I can be walking down the hall with someone, and something will come up. And instead of just saying-- what I used to do, just trying to get to the point quickly, is I used to say things like-- and I just remembered, we're doing this wrong and we need to do it this way next time to get back in compliance. Do you have any questions? I would just dictate the solution quickly.

And I didn't recognize that by doing that, I wasn't respectfully interacting with the employee. I wasn't allowing the employee to be a part of the process. Be a part of the solution. Nowadays, I'll be walking down the hall with an employee. And if something comes to mind, I'll say, hey, we got this situation going on. What do you think we should do with this?

I've just become much more of an interactive collaborator, and that's what coaching is all about, folks. So when we consistently ask questions, I think it's one of the central strategies-- and I know most of you already know this. But one of the central ways to become more of a coach, is to more consistently ask people what they think.

And I'm going to give you some examples of coaching conversations, in various kinds of scenarios that we'd all be familiar with here just in a minute. But I just want to remind us that if you have more two-way conversations with your employees, whether you're assigning work, solving a problem, correcting deficit performance, no matter-- having a career conversation with someone, a career development conversation with someone.

The more you can make a conversation two-way, and treat it as a partnership between you and the employee-- and I'll give more examples here in a moment, the more effective your coaching efforts will be and the more comfortable it'll be for your employees.

All right, let me give you a little bit of a three-step approach for coaching. This isn't a script, but it's a nice outline. I'm kind of visual in the way that I see the world, and so I have to-- in my mind , is I have to see some steps. But again, this isn't a script, but typically in a coaching approach-- and let me use the example-- and I'm going to show several of these.

Here are some common coaching scenarios that we're going to go through today, assigning work, addressing performance, solving problems, addressing interpersonal issues and so on. Let me start with assigning work, which is probably one of the most straightforward ways to have this conversation.

So step one would be, in a coaching approach, I would engage with the employee. And basically, my job would be, as the supervisor, when I'm going to assign work, would be to introduce the project or the task.

And maybe give them the context, and tell them why it's important. Or maybe even give them the time frame. But it would be real important not to start getting down into the weeds, and telling them how to get it done.

Think about this, supervisors, at least most of the time, should be sharing with employees the what and the why when we're assigning work. But we ought to let the employee have input into the how. We hired them to do the job. And if we're always telling them how to do things, we're kind of overstepping.

And now it's OK to give advice, and to make suggestions and critique performance. That's a part of what we need to do as a supervisor, but we ought to be conversational about it instead of just talking at the employee.

And so for example, again, if I met with an employee and said, hey Bill or Ann, I've got this exciting project that just came up. It came down from senior management, and I think you'd be perfect for it because you have great experience in this area. And I wanted to chat with you about it. Do you have a minute? Let's say, Ann says, yeah, sure. I'm all ears, what's this about?

So then I'll lay out the parameters. So it's a project. We've got about 30 days to get it done. We can use some best practice approaches. We're going to have some resources to help you with it. But I'm really excited, because I think that you'll do a really great job with it. And now that you've heard the scope-- so that's step one. And it's important, folks don't start getting down into step two.

If you get down into step two and start dictating the how to, we're kind of overstepping. That's the employees territory. And so then I would say to the employee, what do you think we should do? Now that you've heard the scope of the work and the expectations, what are your thoughts about how we ought to get this done?

And give the employee the opportunity to give their input, give their opinion, make their recommendation. Now, if you don't completely like everything the employee is saying, you can add to it. Step three is the back and forth. And I know you all recognize this as a really good two-way conversation. First is starting the conversation, introduces what we're going to talk about and why.

Ask the second person for their input. The second person gives some input. In step three, the first person says, OK, I like this and this. But that other piece you mentioned, I'm not so sure about. So for example, instead of saying-- if the person said-- when you said, how do you think we to get this done? The person says a, b, c.

You might say, well, I like a and b, but I'm not sure about c, how about a, b and d? Now, in step three, you're going back and forth, and you're trying to find a compromise solution. Or you're working together. You're collaborating to come up with a final work plan. But I mean, that's really a coaching approach in a nutshell.

And I know I'm being real kind of-- I'm trying to simplify the approach, but the main piece here is-- I know you can all tell, the main piece here is making sure you give that employee some input. And so again, if you're telling the employee, here's the project I need for you to complete and here's how I need you to do it.

You have overstepped, and now you're doing their job for them. And again, that can make an employee feel like they're being bossed around or micromanaged, and that's not going to be a very motivating experience. So you want to make sure that in every coaching conversation, that you ask the employee for their input, ask for their opinion, ask them for their ideas.

When you show interest in employees' input, their opinion, their ideas, it'll make them feel valued and make them feel respected. That's a motivating experience for an employee. They're typically going to buy in then or be much more likely to buy in, and take ownership of this project and do their best work. So we're going to do a few more of those.

Another common scenario would be solving a problem, and that would be very similar. So basically, I would call the employee in and say, hey, we got this situation going on and I'm not exactly sure what to do here.

I mean, here's the background, and here's the issue. And have you ever dealt with something like this before? What are your thoughts? What do you think we ought to do to handle this? And turn it over to the employee, and give them a voice. Give them an opportunity to be a part of the solution.

This again, is why a coaching approach is so motivating to employees. It makes them feel like they're a part of things. And many of you at the beginning, when you gave your input, talked all around this and really gave lots and lots of good points about why coaching is so motivating to people. It makes them feel valued.

It makes them feel like they're not just a cog in the wheel, but they're a part of the process, like one of our colleagues shared. It's a very motivating experience for people when they feel like their voice matters. My boss at Deer Oaks, our executive director, does a really good job of that.

And she'll even send me emails and say, hey, Greg, we got this going on right now. What are your thoughts? And wait to hear back from me. That's coaching virtually. I mean, but basically saying, hey, here's a statement of the problem. And instead of telling me what we should do to fix it, she's asking me and waiting to hear my ideas.

That's motivating to me. Makes me feel like my boss-- makes me feel great, like my boss cares about my opinion, my she values my input. That makes me feel great. It makes me feel like I'm valued and respected. And so that's what we need to be thinking about, folks, is make sure you're always giving the employee as much as possible, an opportunity to give you input, give you their advice. Tell you what they've experienced in the past.

Make them a part of it. And that's what we're really trying to get to with some specific examples today. Now, step three is the back and forth. Think about every two-way conversation. Person one says something, person two has some input. And then the two of them go back and forth, and try to find a middle ground or work through the situation together.

And try to come up with this compromise or a solution that both people can support. That's a two-way conversation. Unfortunately, oftentimes when supervisors and managers are too directive-- and again, had this problem 25 or 30 years ago, I had to change these habits. I was doing 80% of the talking.

So when I would start to coach people, I would tell them what to do and how to do it if I was assigning work. If I was walking up to someone and saying, hey, we need to fix this problem. Here's what's going on and here's what I need you to do to fix it.

I would be dictating the solution, and really not-- at least not very often, bringing employees into it and showing interest for their ideas. Giving them an opportunity and a voice to give their input. And again, when we need to do that, that gives employees-- that's motivating to people, to know that you respect their voice.

All right, the last example I'm going to use today is addressing performance, because this one-- addressing performance sometimes can get a little uncomfortable for people. Now unfortunately, when a supervisor who's too directive addresses performance, they will call an employee in and say, hey-- I'll give you an example here.

They will call an employee and say, hey, that monthly report that you turned in, it was not thorough enough and it did not have enough supporting materials with it. And I'm disappointed because you know this goes to our senior management team, and they want to see a very thorough and they want to see a lot of supporting charts and graphs along with it.

And I know we've talked about this before, so I need you to go back and work on this again. I'm going to give you another day. I need you to go back and work on this. And I you to beef this up. And I need you to do this, this and this to get it back up to the level that will be acceptable to our senior management team. Any questions?

Now folks, that's dictating the solution. That's me telling that employee, here's what you did wrong and here's what I need you to do to fix it. Again, that can feel very uncomfortable for an employee. We're dealing with adults. Adults don't want to be told that they're wrong, and then be told how to fix something. They want to have a voice.

Every human being wants to have a voice. So adults need a voice, to feel valued, to feel respected. And so what we want to do, folks, with the three-step coaching approach-- I'm going to do that same scenario. If you were to call the employee in and say, hey, I just wanted to touch base with you about your monthly report.

I liked a lot of it, but I noticed that it did not have the usual supporting materials and charts and graphs that you usually include in your monthly reports, and was wondering why. Giving the employee the benefit of the doubt.

So now step two, the employee says, well, you know what, sir, I was really busy this month and I just didn't have time to get to it. But I wanted to get it in on time, so it just kind of threw it together and hoped that's OK. Had I had more time, I would have made it more thorough. And so then I would say to the employee, OK, I understand.

I have months like that too, when I'm overwhelmed. But this is a report-- because it goes to senior management, that we can't shortcut. As you know, I mean, our executives really look forward to these summaries and this data. And they use it in their reports to the board. And so I really need you to-- I or I'm going to say it this way.

What we really need to do, is to just take a step back and make this a little bit more thorough. So how about this? I know you're busy, if I give you a couple more days, would you be able to-- and maybe help you with, take something off your plate right now, because I know you're busy right now.

If I give you a little bit more time and some support with some of the other tasks, what could you do to bring this report back up to the level that we've come to know that our senior management is looking for? And then give the employee the opportunity to come up with the solution, to come up with the fix, come up with the performance improvement plan. And that's what we're talking about here, folks.

And so let's make sure that when we're interacting with employees, as much as possible, let's give them opportunities to have input. That's the key part here. Coaching again is collaboration, like we talked about earlier.

A coaching approach is a partnership. It's you and your employee working together to come up with the best solution, to come up with the work plan, to come up with how to improve the performance. But it's really, really important that the employee has a voice in that. Because if they have a voice, they're going to take ownership.

They're going to feel more valued because you gave them that opportunity. And typically, they're going to be more motivated to do their best work. Now, one additional technique I want to share and then I'm going to open it up for questions, is. I want to talk about something that's called building.

And so building is a technique that many of you will recognize when I describe it. You may not think of it as building right off, but building is a communication strategy, when one person in a conversation gives an idea and the second person in the conversation builds on that idea. Building is a really important part of coaching. Because for example, as you all know-- let me go back to the three-step approach for a moment.

As you all know, if you said to an employee-- if you asked the employee, what do you think we should do to solve this problem? And let's say the employee says, I think we should do a and b. And you don't like that suggestion.

You don't think that's going to work. What you don't want to do, is shut the employee down by just saying, no, that won't work. You don't want to just completely dismiss the employee's idea. Think about that, folks. And I know you all have been in those situations, where you've asked someone to give their input, but you don't agree with their input.

And now you're feeling kind of uncomfortable, because what do you do with that? I ask them for their input, but I think they're wrong. And so that's where building comes in. So let me go back to building again.

So if you ask an employee, what do you think we should do to solve this problem? And the employee says, a, b, try to find something in that to say, OK, a, I think we can work with a little bit. B, I don't think would work in this situation, and here's why. But a, I think we can work with. What if we did a and c? That's building on someone's idea, that's taking a part of their idea and building on it.

Again, if you just categorically dismiss an employee's suggestion when you ask them for input, it kind of shuts down the coaching process. It shuts down the collaborative process because you gave them input, but then you didn't take any of their suggestions.

And so it's really important that we find at least something that you can build on in the employee's idea. Or go back to the drawing board with them and say, let's brainstorm together. That's another way to build on ideas and say, let's brainstorm.

You could say, I'm not sure a and b would work, but can we brainstorm? Can you think of anything else? Let's brainstorm together. Because the idea is, you never want to just shut the employee down, that defeats the purpose of giving them a voice. Giving them input, to just shut it down or to just dismiss it, but do whatever you can define something that you can build on.

Or take it a step further and brainstorm with the employee, so that you're both working together to come up with additional ideas that you could both live with. And so all right, folks, I know we covered a lot in a very short period of time today.

We have plenty of time for questions. We do have well over 400 people on the call today. So there's a good chance we won't get to everyone's questions, but I will get to as many as I can today. And so again, if you could use the question box in the GoToWebinar software on your screen to bring your questions in, we'll get to as many as we can.

Here's a really, really good one. We got lots of good ones in here, folks. Here's a good one to start us with, is how do you coach an employee when the employee isn't achieving their work goals. I think I'm following that question correctly. I hope I am. So I think a coaching approach works ideally when someone's falling short of performance. They're not meeting their work goals.

I would bring them in and just point out to them, you and I agreed that you were going to try to achieve this. And here we are a couple months down the road, and so far-- would you agree that so far you've not met the goal? And let's say the employee says, no, I agree.

And you can ask why. You can say, do you have thoughts about why you've not been able to meet the goal so far? Because we had come up with these goals together. Could you give me an example of-- or some of your specific thoughts about why you think you're not able to meet the goal right now.

Let's say the employee says, well, I've had this going on. I've had that going on and so on. And you say, OK, I understand. Everyone's busy, but can we agree that moving forward, this needs to be a priority goal because this is sort of a central part of your job responsibility?

Can we agree to that? And let's say the employee says, OK, we can agree to that. And then would turn it back to the employee and say, OK, let's take the next 30 days. OK, what could you do in the next 30 days to start moving towards meeting this goal?

And I'll partner with you. I'll work with you, and just tell me what you need from me. But what would you do in the next 30 days to help us start to move towards successfully achieving this goal? And again, instead of you dictating to the employee what they should do, you're giving the employee an opportunity-- you're pointing out the need or the issue.

You're pointing it out, but you're asking the employee to come up with-- to have input into how the work's going to be done, how the goal is going to be achieved, how the work's going to be completed, how the performance is going to be improved and so on. Another one of our colleagues here asked a good follow on question, how do I know if I'm dictating? Should I ask my staff?

You can. If you're telling too much-- there's a good book out there by Michael Stanier, and the last name is spelled S-T-A-N-I-E-R, Michael Stanier. And the book is was called The Coaching Habit. I think the subcategory-- it's a good book. I've got a copy of it on my tablet. The subcategory is, Stop Telling and Start Asking and Change the Way you Lead Forever.

And if you think about that, we go from being directive or [inaudible]--

We go from using a dictating approach or a directive approach, by stopping the telling process and asking a question. Whenever you ask the employee an open question, what do you think we should do here? How do you think we could get this done? What kind of experience have you ever had with this kind of a situation in the past?

What could you commit to moving forward to get this back on track? Whenever you shift from telling people what you think they should do, to asking them for their input, that's when you go from dictating or directing, to collaborating and coaching. Hope that helps.

I think you're getting lots of great questions today. And one of our colleagues said, coaching is patient and open. Absolutely, thank you for that. It is, it's a very patient process where you're very open to allowing space for the employee to come up with their own answers. That's a big part of it.

Here's another good one. How can you help coach someone who is unhappy in their job, but unwilling to see that impact on their work quality and load? I would use a similar approach. I would bring the employee in and just say, I've noticed that you don't seem to be as enthusiastic as I used to see you.

And to ask, am I reading that right? I used to see you a year ago, just really enthusiastic. And there's been a period of time where I just haven't seen that same bounce in your step, that same enthusiasm in your approach. Is there something going on that I can support you with?

And let's say the employee is saying, no. I guess I think I'm just in a little bit of a rut. And I've been here for 15 years, and it's like same old, same old. And so what I would try to do with the employee, from a coaching standpoint there is I'd say, I can relate to that. I think we all hit plateaus at different times in our jobs and in our careers.

I think that's pretty normal for people. But let's brainstorm, what could you do day to day or what could I help you to do day to day, that would make your job more interesting to you? Maybe give you some new ways of looking at things or maybe even open a door of opportunity, or maybe support you in trying something new. Let's brainstorm.