In response to this challenge, last year the CIPD commissioned the Ashridge Centre for Coaching to research a number of aspects of coaching, including the goals, roles and relationships, processes, development activities and evaluation approaches that shape and support the coaching offer.
Some 20 organisations took part, as case studies or as participants in a collaborative enquiry group. The research also drew on data from the 729 respondents to the CIPD survey. The research revealed that there was great tension between the personal and the organisational dimensions of coaching.
At the centre of this is the widely accepted premise that the effectiveness of the individual coaching relationship is what matters in delivering successful outcomes. Therefore the most significant challenge for organisations is determining:
- What support, in the form of systems, structures and processes, can be provided to best support that critical relationship?
- How can we ensure that this work delivers results for the wider organisation as well as for the individual?
A key finding is that organisations with successful coaching find a form for their system that matches their coaching context. We found several approaches to delivering coaching; any of which can be successful as long as the approach is compatible with the context for the coaching.
We encountered three broad approaches to structuring coaching services which are manifest in the various aspects of the coaching system:
Centralised/highly structured
Standardised and consistent service across the organisation
Organic and emergent
Responsive to different needs and preferences in the organisation
Tailored middle ground
Consistency in some aspects of the service while responding to specific organisational needs.
We were surprised to discover that organisations did not necessarily progress from less to more structured approaches. Instead, as coaching matures, it finds a form appropriate for the organisation at that time. The research highlighted seven key factors that appear strongly to influence how coaching can best be structured. These factors, far from being distinct, link to form a web, where each factor influences and is influenced by the others.
1. Business priorities
This factor is concerned with particular drivers for the organisation. It includes long-term strategic objectives as well as shorter-term imperatives driven by acute market or other external challenges.
For example, the context for coaching in the Metropolitan Police is an imperative to build a more relational approach to policing in the capital. The BBC’s coaching offer is delivered in the context of significant shifts in the organisation’s strategy as broadcasting broadens into multimedia. At UPM-Kymmene, the drive to be the number one supplier of newsprint paper means that greater innovation and responsiveness is called for at all levels in the production and supply process.
These imperatives have a significant impact on the coaching offer. While we have found that explicit links to business strategy are not always made, the most effective coaching always considers the priorities of the organisation and is responsive to changes in those priorities.
Key questions:
- What are the current priorities for the organisation?
- What are the implications of our business priorities for a coaching offer? What impact might they have on who is offered coaching and how objectives are set?
- How might coaching support our response to those priorities?
2. Organisation culture
The coaching offer needs to be compatible enough with the current culture that it will be not be rejected, but different enough to make a difference. This is a subtle challenge that often requires experimentation in safe contexts to find the right balance. The best work will often be done at the boundaries of what is acceptable to the current culture.
For example, in the Met, one of the purposes of coaching is to support a culture change from a command and control environment to a more relational approach to policing. Therefore, coaching has required substantial support at a senior level to gain acceptance in a culture that sees coaching as “soft”.
The implications are potentially profound. Here, coaching helps the practitioner to have a model by which to make sense of the organisational culture, eg, Johnson’s and Scholes’ “cultural web” (1992). However, in practice many participants relied on an implicit sense of what was acceptable or unacceptable in their organisation’s culture, together with a readiness to experiment at the boundaries.
For example, coaching has many attractions for organisations that are used to a high degree of hierarchy and control, but that aim to be more innovative in their mindset. Such organisations appear to opt for one of two strategies:
- narrowly defined coaching offers potentially on a small scale;
- an emergent approach, making coaching available on an ad hoc basis where there is interest.
Thinking about culture requires consideration of the organisational structure and how responsibility for certain activities is held within that structure. For example, an organisation seeking to move from a federal structure towards operating more as a group might bring more L&D resources into the centre and undertake some co-ordination or enabling of coaching activity at group level.
Key questions:
- How would you describe the culture in your organisation? (Consider using a model to check you have taken into account all aspects of the culture)
- What works well, and less well?
- What is the difference that you wish coaching to make to this culture?
- What are the implications of these questions for where and how you offer coaching?
- What type of structures, systems and processes will work well and still model the culture changes you wish to support?
3. Coaching purpose
We found that more organisations could be clear about an overarching purpose for coaching than could state clear, Smart-type objectives for coaching at an organisational level.
Coaching is both a shaping factor and is itself influenced by business priorities. As a shaping factor, the purpose of coaching, once defined, will have a significant impact on the coaching offer.
The principle purpose of coaching at Nokia, for example, is the development of leadership capability and the growth of a coaching culture. This purpose means that on some level coaching needs to touch as many people in the organisation as possible. It also means that senior leaders need to experience or be involved in coaching.
Key questions:
- What is the overarching purpose of coaching? What is its role as opposed to other interventions?
- What are the implications of that purpose for the elements of the coaching system?
- What is the definition of coaching for this organisation at this time?
4. Learning and development climate
This encompasses elements such as the degree of cynicism or acceptance with which people tend to respond to L&D processes, the position and reputation of the L&D function in the organisation and the perceived success of previous interventions. For example, organisations with a relatively low L&D profile tend to implement coaching on a small scale, allowing success stories to spread by word of mouth before developing the offer more widely.
Key questions:
- How do people tend to respond to L&D interventions?
- How is the HR or L&D function perceived in the organisation?
5. Perception of coaching
The perception of coaching in the organisation is important in shaping the offer. It is often based on prior experience, or on assumptions about what coaching is (“soft”, “remedial”, etc). Essex County Council, for example, operates an in-house coaching and mentoring service. So far the L&D team has found that more people opt for mentoring than coaching because of a commonly held assumption that coaching is a remedial activity. The council is working to change this culture and perception so that more staff access the service.
Key questions:
- What experience do people in the organisation have of coaching?
- Are these experiences positive or negative?
- What assumptions do they hold about the purpose of coaching?
- What assumptions do they hold about the form coaching might take?
- Are there any influencers who have a positive experience of coaching? How might I use that influence to create a positive perception of coaching more widely?
6. Available resources
A key consideration is the availability of resources such as people, funding and, in some cases, time. As one participant said: “It is a balancing act with the resources available to you.”
For many organisations, the lack of appropriately skilled internal coaches has been a key factor in the decision to offer external coaches. Conversely, this has been a driver for others in developing an internal coaching capability. For example, when Oxford City Council wanted to offer coaching throughout the organisation but had limited resources, it developed internal specialist coaches. It now has 20 coaches, who have coached more than 100 individuals.
Key questions:
- What is the purpose for coaching?
- What are the constraints on resources?
- What mix of coaching resources is available and affordable?
- What, if any, time limits exist in respect of the coaching offer? For example, are there objectives that coaching needs to support within a specific time frame?
7. Degree of sponsorship
Senior sponsorship is critical to the long-term success of coaching activity. The degree of sponsorship has a direct impact on the way coaching is offered. Where there is visible, enthusiastic support from senior management, the coaching offer can be high profile, formal in its operation and explicitly linked to the wider strategies and processes in the organisation.
For example, the director of HR at the Met says he and his colleagues on the board are united in their determination to spell out the long-term, tangible benefits of coaching. That said, the Met is taking an incremental approach to embedding coaching because of resource and cultural factors.
Conversely, where the senior team is less aware and supportive of coaching, or reluctant to use it more widely, the offer tends to be more experimental and low-key; often successfully launched via a bottom-up process.
Rebecca Prideaux from Cadbury Schweppes explains: “We found that when launching coaching into various parts of the business, if we had a passionate leader whose actions matched their words about coaching, if we were clear about what we were trying to change and there was an overall change agenda, we got greater traction and results, faster.”
Key questions:
- What is the senior team’s experience and understanding of coaching?
- What role are they willing to play in supporting coaching?
- What do I need to do to build their sponsorship?
- How do I make the most of support for coaching in the senior team?
- Who are the key leaders and influencers in the organisation?
No model is without limitations and this one is no exception. First, we suggest you use the seven factors as a starting point, and be open and responsive to the presence of other factors in your own context.
Second, you will not get away with carrying out an analysis just once. The factors shift and change; senior sponsorship may grow or wane, as will business priorities. So it is important to find ways of seeing and responding to changes in context. Finally, in complex organisations the context for coaching may even vary in different divisions or business units.
Ann Knights is business director at the Ashridge Centre for Coaching.
Learning points
- Pay attention to the context for coaching; systems are successful only when they match the organisational context.
- Coaching is structured in three ways: centralised and highly structured; organic and emergent; and tailored middle ground.
- Organisations do not necessarily progress from less to more structured approaches. As coaching matures, it finds a form appropriate for that organisation at the time.
Further information
- The research used mainly case study and enquiry-based approaches. This reflected the highly relational and contextual nature of coaching itself. The participants were the Alzheimer’s Society, the BBC, Bombardier Transportation, Cadbury Schweppes, Cega Group, the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, Essex County Council, the Metropolitan Police, M&G, NHS Fife, NHS Tayside, Nokia, Orange, Oxfordshire County Council, Redbridge Borough Council, Salisbury NHS Foundation Trust, The Children’s Society, UPM-Kymmene (UK), Yell Group and Zurich Financial Services.
- CIPD In-company Solutions run a range of coaching and mentoring courses. For details visit www.cipd.co.uk/train/in-company/subjects/coaching or call 020 8612 6202.
- Ann Knights will be discussing the research findings at the 12th WFPMA World HR Congress being held alongside the CIPD’s HRD learning and development event on 14-17 April at London’s ExCeL. For more information visit www.cipd.co.uk/hrd or call 020 8612 6248.
References
- V Anderson, The Value of Learning: From Return on Investment to Return on Expectation, CIPD, 2007.
- Anon, “John Lewis Partnership”, IDS HR Study 831, October 2006.
- A Blackman, “Factors that contribute to the effectiveness of executive coaching: the coachee’s perspective”, The Business Review, vol 5(1), 2006.
- Brumwell and P Reynolds, “How coaching cuts costs and saves time at BT Retail”, Strategic HR Review, July/August 2006.
- M Chidiac, “Getting the best out of executive coaching: a guide to setting up a coaching process”, Development and Learning in Organizations, vol 20(3).
- D Clutterbuck and D Megginson, “Your organisation: where is it on the road to becoming a coaching culture?”, Training Journal, June 2005.
- D Clutterbuck and D Megginson, Making Coaching Work: Creating a Coaching Culture, CIPD, 2005.
- E De Haan and Y Burger, Coaching with Colleagues, Palgrave Macmillan, 2005.
- E De Haan and D Curd, Executive Coaching in Practice: What Determines Helpfulness for Coachees?, Ashridge, 2007.
- A Elliot, “How coaching drives high performance at Portman”, Strategic HR Review, May/June 2006.
- M Frisch, “Extending the reach of coaching: the internal coach”, Human Resource Planning, vol 28(1), p23, 2005.
- M Gladwell, The Tipping Point, Little, Brown, 2000.
- Learning and Development 2007, CIPD survey, available at www.cipd.co.uk/surveys
Volume 3, Issue 2