Coaching and Succession Planning

Succession planning keeps good people moving up the ladder. Coaching is useful for staff improvement, development and skills transfer. Coaching a successor or mentoring a trainee means delegating while maintaining responsibility. What skills and attributes does a coach need? The coach needs to consider the learning style of the individual, and their own coaching style. Discover the difference between coaching for improvement and coaching for development.

Coaching is useful for staff improvement, development and skills transfer. The coach needs to consider the learning style of the individual, and their own coaching style which may be directive / non-directive, helping/ controlling, hands on/hands off.

A coach normally has certain attributes and skills. Such as

Patience, Skill, Knowledge, Self-belief ,Confidence ,Firm, assertive, ,Analytical skills, ability to develop rapport, explain concepts, be an active listener , clarify, summarise, observe, feedback, encourage , question.

A coach will select appropriate tasks, agree the task, objective and goals with the learner, move along the spectrum of delegation, monitor and support, and allow freedom to make mistakes, compare results with goals, and give feedback.

During review they will also explore what could have been done differently.

When coaching for improvement in an employee’s performance the coach will go through the following stages;-

Build a relationship, examine current performance, define improvement required, and consequences of failure to improve, develop an improvement plan, gain commitment, support and monitor, and follow up.

Coaching for development will involve

Build a relationship, agree on purpose of coaching, identify skills and knowledge requited , identify knowledge gap, set goals , gain commitment, support and monitor, follow up.

Some managers are natural coaches and should be encouraged to develop their staff. This keeps good staff moving up the ladder, allowing for internal promotion, and encouraging staff retention and good morale.