Team Coaching for teams in organisations

Team CoachingWe are passionate about maximising the potential of teams and team coaching provides an effective way to quickly move a team to higher performance. There are numerous definitions of team coaching and three we like are:

Team Coaching:  “The art of facilitating the performance, learning and development of a team”.  Downey

Team Coaching:  “The purpose of team coaching is to enable the team to succeed at a particular objective.  The focus of team coaching is to enable the team, and also the individuals within it, to ‘develop’.”  Hardingham

Aim of team coaching:  “There is a strong argument for defining the aim of team coaching in terms of bringing the team to the point where it is largely self-sufficient in coaching itself.”  Clutterbuck

In the book “Team Players and Teamwork: The New Competitive Business Strategy”, Glenn Parker notes some common issues teams are likely to experience and which team coaching can address:

    • There is talk but not much communication
    • Disagreements are aired in private conversations after team meetings
    • Team meetings are formal or tense
    • Decisions tend to be made by the team leader with little  involvement of team members
    • Team members cannot easily describe the team’s mission
    • Team members are not open with each other because trust is low
    • There is talk but not much accomplishment
    • There is confusion or disagreement about roles within the team
    •  People in other parts of the organisation do not cooperate with the team
    •  The team doesn’t recognise the strengths and differences of each team member
    •  The team may have been in existence for some time but never reflects on how it goes about things

What is Team Coaching in organisations?

You may be wondering what exactly team coaching is and whether it’s really just a rebranding of ‘team building’ or ‘team development’.  In our experience there can be a number of similarities and activities that could equally feature in ‘team building’, ‘team development’ or ‘team coaching’.  However the key distinguishing characteristic  of team coaching is that the coach or facilitator is working with an intact team, one which is looking to raise its performance, often seeking to move from an ‘average’ or ‘good’ team to a true ‘high performing’ team.  By ‘high performing’ we mean a team that others look up to because team members work well together, build on each other’s strengths and complement weaknesses and, crucially, consistently deliver and meet their goals.  Each team coaching programme is bespoke and tailored to the clients needs. Team coaching is applicable at all levels and is especially valuable for senior management teams.

A skilled team coach will work with a team in a diverse range of ways – observing, questioning, listening, providing challenge, using an appropriate tool or framework to facilitate learning and imparting knowledge via skill-building sessions.

Specific areas of focus for team coaching are likely to include:

    • Agreeing or revisiting the team’s mission, purpose, vision and goals
    • Meeting or exceeding performance standards
    • Behaviour that maintains team cohesiveness whilst recognising and respecting differences in team members’ ways of working
    • Creating clearly defined roles and motivating tasks
    • Developing collective and individual self-awareness, self-belief , shared values and agreed norms
    • Supporting a no-blame culture
    • Agreeing processes for problem solving, decision making, conflict management and boundary management
    • Responding effectively to changes in team membership, structure, performance criteria and processes

Contact Colin Graves now to discuss team coaching on 07881 636538 or via the web.

See also Myers Briggs Workshops for teams