Background
of Study
Every organization’s ultimate goal
is to achieve its strategic objectives. Making profits is one of the strategic
objectives for many organizations. Employee performance is an important
building block of an organization that lays the foundation for high performance
(Stone, 2007). To enhance employees
high performance, employers should come up with measures that can help their
employees work and think individually while meeting their responsibilities in
an innovative way, while at the same time understanding and foreseeing their
industry’s market and business situation (Armstrong, 2014). Consequently the
question of how an employee can work in both an efficient and effective manner
to maximize a firm growth and productivity arises. Effective coaching &
counseling sessions can be of immense assistance to help increase productivity
and engagement of employees in an organization (Stone, 2007). Further (Stone,
2007) points out that the relationship existing between performance and
leadership is both indirect and direct; this is why it is important for
employers to develop their members of staff by use of development programs.
Introduction
The
most necessary step in any effort to increase employee performance is
counseling or coaching. Counseling or coaching is the day-to-day communication
between a supervisor and an employee (Sisko, 2014).
Coaching
“Coaching is a one-to-one method of
helping people develop their skills and competences” (Armstrong, 2010, p.366).
Organizations provide coaching to their employees from internal and external
expertise who concentrates on specific skills and behavior (Armstrong, 2008).
Coaching can help in enhancing an employee performance (Downey, 2014) as it
provides the employee with a chance to increase their skills and motivation which
eventually leads to an overall positive impact on the employee job performance
(Mooney, 2015). By improving the performance of the individuals, it will in
turn drive the organizational performances through increased labor
productivity, service quality and enhanced customer satisfaction (Armstrong and
Taylor, 2014).
Coaching
always provides positive feedback about employee contributions. At the same
time, usual coaching brings performance problems to an employee's concentration
when they are of no consequence or big enough, and assists the employee to make
them correct (Whitmore, 2002). The purpose of coaching is not to make the
employee feel badly, or to show how much the HR expert or supervisor knows. The
goal of coaching is to work with the employee to resolve performance dilemma
and get better the work of the employee, the team, and the department (Downey,
2003).
Coaching Models
There
are several models used for effective coaching. Given below are the few of them
●
GROW
Coaching Model
●
OSCAR
Coaching Model
●
CLEAR
Coaching Model
●
FUEL
Coaching Model
● ‘Raagaa” Coaching Model
I
would like to elaborate on the GROW model for Coaching here.
The GROW model (or process) is a
simple method for goal setting and problem solving. It was developed in the
United Kingdom and was used in corporate coaching.
Figure 1.0: Grow Model
(Source: ProVeritas Group, 2017)
Through this model Managers and Coaches can plan and structure a
conversation or idea to deliver the desired end result (Downey, 2014).
The below four steps are in this model.
01. Goal
02. Reality
03. Options
04. Way Forward
01. Goal
The first stage is to agree and understand the goal that the
mentee wants to cover in the session (Whitmore, 2002).
A Goal should be SMART, PURE and CLEAR
Specific, Measurable, Agreed, Realistic and Time
phased
Positively stated, Understood, Relevant and Ethical
Challenging, Legal, Environmentally sound, Appropriate
and Recorded
02. Reality
After setting the Goal, the next phase determines the reality of
the situation (Whitworth, 2007) this exploration is to raise the awareness and
self-awareness of the employee (Whitmore, 2002). Awareness is defined as
perceiving things as they really are and self-awareness is recognizing those
internal factors that distort one’s own perception of reality (Downey, 2003).
03. Options
Thirdly GROW model involves in inventing the options that bridge
the gap between the Current Reality and the Goal. Necessarily the coach must
guide the coachee to identify these options in their own light (Downey, 2014).
Once your mentee is aware of the reality around the situation they
need to think about actions, solutions and ideas that will help resolve or move
the situation forward. Having options is important as choice enables us to feel
in control and empowered. It is even more powerful if those choices are our own
and the choice we make is also our own. When asked to think about options for
taking an issue forward we can be faced with negativity. This negativity comes
from our own limiting beliefs. As a mentor we need to get people to see beyond
these beliefs.
05.Way Forward
Once the options for mowing forward have been agreed, it is
necessary that the mentee has fully bought into action if they are to feel
confident in achieving same (Popovic & Jinks, 2014).
The final phase of the GROW model examines the effectiveness of
their choices and assures if the objective has been achieved.
The below video explains
the GROW model
●
Build valuable skills
and knowledge they can use to advance in their careers
●
Feel supported and
encouraged by their manager and the company
●
Experience the pride and
satisfaction that come with surmounting new challenges
Counseling
Counseling is a more individual attempt. It is harder because
there are no clear answers. It requires the supervisor to really pay
consideration to the work and career related concerns of the subordinate
(Popovic & Jinks, 2014). A person stressed with his project or doubtful her
abilities want more than exhortation or training class. They require to be
heard and understand first before they will open themselves to support and new
approaches (Downey, 2003). Even employees with family or financial problems
need to be heard first before they can be approved along to right company
resources (e.g., employee assistance programs).
It is a trusted supervisor with whom workers will talk about
career decisions within and without the company. A qualified, confident
supervisor knows that people will sometimes leave a group for good and personal
reasons, hurting immediate productivity (Whitmore, 2002). Yet that same
supervisor also knows that time invested in people pays off in the long run in
inspiration, output, devotion, dependability and retention (Downey, 2014).
Counseling is not about donations or being a get smaller. It's about helping
people achieve their possible and mutually reveling in it. Eventually, it's
about group performance (Whitworth, 2007).
Counseling can be done on different areas, like as follows:
- Psychosocial support: Psychosocial support is the procedure of meeting
a person's emotional, social, mental and religious desires. All of these
are necessary fundamentals of positive human development.
- Career development support: It is a complex
managerial course which involves people, addresses their ambitions,
assigns those roles & responsibilities, matching with their potential,
evaluate their presentation, and create Job positions to accommodate
growth ambitions of workers.
- Job related issues support: Job related issues
support is the process of providing guidance to the employees if they are
facing any kind of issues on their jobs.
Differences between coaching and counseling
Although many people
think that coaching and counseling are relatively same, conceptually these are
two different wide areas. Coaching refers to the process of continuous
development on the employees (Sheward & Brach, 2012). So the employees
succeed in their area of performance. Whereas Counseling is concerned with the
employees who perform low (Sisko, 2014).An effective manager who counsel can
become role model, coach, broker and advocate for the employee (Whitworth,
2007).
Table 1.0: Differences between Coaching and
Counseling
Coaching
|
Counseling
|
Future-focused
|
Past-focused
|
Solution-focused
|
Problem-focused
|
Works towards
outcomes
|
Works towards
emotions
|
Does not give
advice
|
Gives advice and
recommendations
|
Asks the question “How can we change?”
|
Asks the question “Why should we change?”
|
The coachee has the answers- assisted to find their own solutions
|
The counselor has the answers – gives diagnosis and
treatment
|
Backtracking – using client language and tone to recap
important words or phrases
|
Paraphrasing – restatement of a statement or text using
other words
|
(Source: Ericson Coaaching International,
2015)
Real example from the organization I work for.
I work for a private
Commercial Bank in Sri Lanka, who strategically planned for a Change targeting
for the year 2020, named Transformation
2020 with a vision of becoming Systematically Important Bank in Sri Lanka.
In order to achieve the Vision, the Change program had to be done for all 2550
employees of the Bank. Many coaching and training work shops were introduced in
the early 2017, and later the bank adopted to a mechanism as below:
Change Coach work shops
were arranges in the below manner
1. All the TLT (The
leadership team) members and senior management staff were categorized as Change
Leaders – 75Nos
2. The potential people
from branch managers, department heads and assistant managers were identified
as Change Coaches. – 225Nos
Three change coaches
will be reporting to a change leader.
3.All the other staff –
2250Nos will be reporting to the change coaches.
Ten change agents will
be allocated for a change coach.
The ten change agents
were requested by the change coach to come to a particular location and within
3 months 3 sessions will be conducted by the change coaches to the change
agents, and the problems arised from the workshops were discussed on the Change Connect Day where all the change
leaders and change Agents met together at a place in July 2017. This way, all
the 2550 employees were covered on the coaching and counseling session about
the Transformation 2020.
Key findings and recommendations
Coaching provides an
invaluable space for personal development. For example, managers are frequently
presented with employees struggling with low confidence (Stone, 2007). The
traditional approach would be to send them to an assertiveness course and
hope this addresses the issue. In the short-term, the employee learns new
strategies for communicating which may improve confidence (Armstrong, 2010).
Unfortunately, in isolation these courses rarely produce a sustained increase
in confidence. Although external behavior may change; it needs to be supported
by changes in their internal thought processes. This is often where coaching is
most effective(Armstrong, 2008).
Managers should not
underestimate the impact of coaching on their people as it frequently creates a
fundamental shift in their approach to their work. For example, increased
self-confidence enables employees to bring more of themselves into the
workplace. This results in employees being more resilient and assertive (
Stone, 2007).
Coaching focuses on
helping another person learn in ways that let him or her keep growing
afterward. It is based on asking rather than telling, on provoking thought
rather than giving directions and on holding a person accountable for his or
her goals (Armstrong and Taylor, 2014).
Employee counseling has
emerged as the latest HR tool to attract and retain the best employees and
increase the quality of the workforce (Armstrong 2012). In today's fast-paced
corporate world, there is virtually no organization free of stress or stress-free
employees. The employees can be stressed, depressed, suffering from too much
anxiety arising out of workplace related issues like managing deadlines,
meeting targets, lack of time to fulfill personal and family commitments, or
bereaved and disturbed due to some personal problems.
Counseling can be
defined as the provision of brief psychological therapy for employees of an
organization (Downey, 2003). This is paid for by the employer. An ‘external’
service, such as an Employee Assistance Program (EAP), typically comprises
face-to-face counseling, a telephone helpline, legal advice and
critical-incident debriefing. In an ‘in-house’ service, counselors may be
directly employed by the organization.
Counseling offers the
employer a service that is valued by employees, has the potential for savings
by reducing sickness absence, takes pressure off managers through the
availability of a constructive means of dealing with ‘difficult’ staff or
situations, and contributes to its reputation as a caring employer. Workplace
counseling is often viewed by employers as an insurance policy against the
threat of compensation claims made by employees exposed to work-related stress
(Mooney, 2015).
The biggest bottleneck
in employee counseling at the workplace is the lack of trust on the employee's
part to believe in the organization or his/her superior to share and understand
one’s problems. Also, the confidentiality that the counselor won't disclose his
personal problems or issues to others in the organization. Time, effort and
resources required on the part of the organization are a constraint.
Conclusion
One of the most vital issues facing organization is preserving employee
assurance to business goals and objectives. Most of all companies are facing a
time of great managerial change led by oversees outsourcing, downsizing, global
reform, and retreating career progression paths. Because of these changes,
workers are less probable to rise up the position and more likely to amend jobs
or area of occupation often. With performance being an elementary foundation
stone to financial achievement, employers will need to put into operation
constant learning programs and enable workers to obtain new skills to thrive.
There are many situations in the office when counseling can be implemented.
At any time, employees may experience problems related to
personal, professional or might be their career development, which may
seriously affect success at the company and in achievements of its financial
and strategic goals. If these difficulties go unsettled for a period of time,
they are possible to crash the employee's talent to perform effectively on the
job.
Coaching when used in an effective manner can positively affect an
organization. It can produce improved relationships and teamwork between staff
at different levels. Employees have increased job satisfaction, which improves
productivity and quality, and there is an overall improved use of people,
skills and resources, as well as greater flexibility and adaptability to
change. Coaching when used in organizations can help align an individual
employee performance with the organization or team objectives, can help improve
the communication between the managers and the firm’s teams, can help employees
do better than their assumed limits, can maximize the individual strengths and
help employees take responsibility and ownership for their mistakes and
actions.
Counseling is a strategic resource that workers can use and
managers can rely on when work performance, career transition, personal
behavior in the workplace and/or cultural fit becomes a question. It provides a
means for supervisor to encourage their workers to seek career, personal or
current job related support early to avoid small troubles from receiving out of
hand and creating greater barriers to accomplishment. It's also a way to help
key workers to get rid of personal and professional issues and reach higher
career aspirations, so that they maintain to add important value to the
business.
The management of banks should therefore ensure a well-planned and
strategic coaching and counseling program is in place and the coaching is done
and implemented effectively. Not only that but also the banks management should
make sure that coaching/ counseling program is exposed to all employees.
Coaches are advised to suggest improvements, enlighten hen and
also inform them on how they are doing. Coaches should provide results of
events as close to the event as possible to enable the ideas they give to stay
fresh in the employees’ minds and so as to make any needed changes in a timely
manner. The banks coaches should come up with a routine which is frequent and a
detailed discussion with the employees on their performance. This routine
should be informal in nature and the parties should discuss their view on the
employee development and performance.
Coaches at the bank should be encouraged to have an introductory
session with potential coachees first. If the person does not feel right with a
given coach he or she should be allowed to see a different mentor or coach. In
order for people to develop and grow towards optimal personal performance, they
require the right environment. The individual needs to feel understood,
accepted and valued for the person they really are. If the person does not feel
valued for being themselves, but instead only feeling valued for being the
person that they perceive someone else wants them to be, they will start to
develop out of congruence with their intrinsic, inherent path, which will
result in distress and dysfunction. The coach should therefore be very careful
to not spend too much of the session talking and leading the discussion. They
should be consciously aware of slowing their thoughts and listening to the
coachee to help reflect back to the individual their situation and possible
solutions.
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