81 Challenges Smart Managers Face subra

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it has begun.
9. Appoint a program champion who will take charge of
its follow-through.
10. Refuse to quit at the first sign of failure or malfunction.
11. Encourage continuous upward feedback of reality.
12. Measure your progress from the beginning.
13. Reward active participation.
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No project, program, or initiative is a sure winner from
the beginning. Vigilance, patience, on-going belief, and con-
tinuous re-evaluation are required to ensure a successful out-
come. Occasionally you must also let go of a project when it
becomes clear that it was not consistent with your mission,
objectives, or goals.
Motivation is what gets you started.
Habit is what keeps you going.
JIM RYUN
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CHAP TER 8
COACHING CHALLENGES
There is a difference between training and coaching.
Training is teaching people what to do, when to do it, and
how to do it. (That s the next chapter.) Coaching is catching
people doing it right or wrong and guiding them either to do
it better or to do it right. Coaching is a gradual modification
of behavior by rewarding the behavior you want continued
and bringing incorrect or inappropriate behavior or actions
to the awareness of the individual so they can see how it
needs to change. Remember, all discovery is self-discovery.
You cannot manage your organization from behind your
desk. It is critical for coaching success that you circulate
among your employees so you can observe behavior in
action.
Coaching must be tailored to the background, experience,
personality style, goals, skill level, and attitudes of the indi-
vidual. To do otherwise is to invite frustration and failure.
Effective coaching should be done in private so as to pre-
serve the self-image and status of the individual receiving the
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coaching among his or her peers. No one likes the disap-
proval of their fellow employees.
Effective coaching should build on existing strengths
while attempting to change inappropriate actions. When
coaching an individual, always affirm something positive or
right that they are doing, before discussing the inappropriate
behavior.
Annual reviews are not an effective way to coach employees
in the long term. You shouldn t wait a year or even six months
to fix undesirable behavior. That is why coaching is so effec-
tive it is positive, spontaneous, motivating, and productive.
There are two ways to have highly productive employees.
Hire perfect employees (unlikely!) or coach employees into a
higher level of performance. Coaching, as I have said, is a dif-
ferent activity than training and one that takes a great deal of
time, observation, employee involvement, discussion, and
patience. Coaching is just one form of feedback.
I mentioned earlier the old saying, Don t send your ducks
to eagle school. Not everyone was meant to fly as high as
the eagles. I believe that everyone has unlimited potential,
but I also believe that many people are unwilling to do their
part to ensure that their potential is realized. Some people
are satisfied flying closer to the ground. Some people need to
soar. Neither behavior nor attitude is right or wrong. People
have a right to their own objectives and lifestyle goals.
The objective of consistent, positive, and pertinent coach-
ing is to help employees to want to do better, period.
Coaching guides the employee, regardless of position, to the
higher ground.
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Company presidents often fail to give adequate coach-
ing time to their vice presidents. Their assumption is that
because vice presidents are paid a six-figure income and
have twenty-five years of experience, they should be able
to just jump in and do the job correctly all the time. Not
so. They may not need coaching on Management 101,
people skills, or the basics of the business, but they will
need time with the president to be able to get up to speed
on corporate history, rituals, perceptions, expectations, and
historical issues that have impacted where the organization
is today.
Managers often tell me they are too busy with paperwork,
administrative issues, or meetings to coach their employees.
That is why so many companies must resort to crisis manage-
ment when employees at whatever level, from the president
to the janitor, keep repeating the same mistakes, ignoring the
consequences of previous mistakes, or being oblivious to the
fact that mistakes are being made. These mistakes, errors, or
whatever you want to call them are costing your organization
right off the bottom line. Coaching is one way to improve
results by reducing mistakes.
There are also numerous benefits for hiring an outside
coach. An outside coach:
" Will bring objectivity to the employees actions and
behaviors
" Doesn t have agendas with the employee or the organi-
zation
" Tends to be neutral in situations where the person s
manager might get too emotionally involved
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