We hosted free webinars under the title Why does nobody google “Team Coaching”?, one late March, the other early April. We were really pleased with the level of interest, shown through registrations and the number of registrants who showed up and participated in the conversation.
In our work as organisational development practitioners/consultants, we offer a range of services to help Leaders improve Performance through People. This includes
- Change Facilitation,
- Team Coaching and
- Leadership Development.
What we’re finding is that Team Coaching is not yet well understood and widely adopted, with few people searching for the term “team coaching”. While potential clients approach us for assistance with their teams, to resolve conflicts, address unhelpful team dynamics, or to foster greater cohesion, what is often on their minds is a once-off workshop that will fix their challenge and allow them to return to ‘business as usual’. As flippant as that might sound, it is often true. So, we’d like to raise awareness and share with you what team coaching is, what value it brings, and what it might look like in practice.
Team coaching is a process of facilitated team conversations with the aim of improving performance through collective reflection, learning, and alignment.
The client being coached is the team and not the individuals so the focus of the coaches, their attention, is on the collective. Our specific focus, as CalanaMurray, is on the quality of the relationship system of the team because we believe that the quality of the relationship system is interdependent with the quality of results delivered. Individuals function, in organisations, as part of a team and it is by enabling at team level that environments to flourish can be fostered.
The value added through team coaching lies in teams functioning more effectively as units. This is achieved by supporting the co-creation and co-ownership of healthy team environments and equipping teams to deal constructively with conflict. Where teams are able to regulate their team dynamics for optimal health, they set themselves up to perform better.
In practice team coaching consists of a series of conversations, facilitated by team coaches, where the agenda or topic is defined by the team. Team coaches support the team with tools and processes that help them learn about themselves, make conscious decisions about what they need to work on, act, and hold themselves and each other accountable.
Team coaching does not replace individual coaching, which deals specifically with the development needs of the individual. It also does not replace individual development, in its different forms. With individuals existing and operating as part of a team, team coaching works at the level where the individuals interact and contribute, with the aim of enhancing collective functioning.
