Getting involvement during coaching

There are a few important ingredients that improve people's learning curve; fun, good instructions, room for practice, competent coach, ... Today I want to focus on an important ingredient that lies within the person who's learning : INVOLVEMENT. People who are involved/engaged, are open for new things, get energized by the learning and want to apply what they learned.

Common mistake :
When people are coached many coaches come up with the ideas and tell their trainee what to do. We call this the outside-in approach. Mostly these coaches pass knowledge, tips & tricks on to the trainee and they expect the trainee to copy paste this knowledge.

The inside-out approach :
A while ago I wrote on this blog an article about the ASTD session of Alan Fine (author of You already know how to be great) In his book, Alan describes how he uses the GROW model (goal - reality - options, way forward) to coach people inside out. Instead of telling people what to do, he asks them questions and triggers them to find the answer themselves (without making judgements! ). This is also what Ken Blanchard meant in his book "The one minute manager meets the monkey". Coaching is about helping people to find the answer themselves. It is NOT about telling them what to do.
From my own experiences I know this is the strongest approach on one condition ; the person is really willing to learn & grow.

You can use this technique both as external coach or as manager to coach your employees. It doesn't take hours to use this approach. It can even be done in 15min time at the coffee machine. Stick to the 4 stages of the approach, and you'll bear the fruits of it.

Questions to use with inside-out coaching & GROW approach :


GOAL :

• what do you want to learn during the coaching ? 
• what are the consequences if you don't learn this ? 
• where do you want to be in ... time ? 

REALITY :

• what has been happening ? 
• what is withholding you from making the next move ? 
• what is the problem you're facing ? 

Remark : for both topics (goal & reality) as a coach it  is important to push your trainee to make things clear himself. You can do this by asking after every answer "why / how / when, ..." questions. This will sharpen the issue and create focus for the coaching. It will make the trainee think himself. 

OPTIONS :

• at this stage you open a brainstorming with the trainee. All options are possible to go from reality to goal. If the trainee can't come up with enough options, ask questions, and push him to new options. Don't tell him what you think the options are, because if you would, you start coaching outside in. 

WAY FORWARD :

• Now you choose what options you'll use / implement and define the action plan to go from reality to goal. 

To conclude :
If you use an inside out approach for coaching you'll get more involvement, more results and motivated people, because they'll realize they have the answers within themselves which increases their faith & fire.