Coaching Tip: Need for Job Skills is Rarely the Reason a Coach is Hired

Originally Submitted on 6/22/99.

Introduction

Most coaching clients already know how to do their job, usually very well. That's not where they need career help. Most frequently needed are people skills, self-presentation skills, and, sometimes, an awareness of the pitfalls of political skirmishing. Add to this a healthy dose of time-management, organization, and balance, and you have a highly successful client.

The Coaching Tip

A major fear of many beginning coaches relates to their ability to coach someone who is in a field with which they are not familiar.

'How can I tell someone how to do a job I've never
done?' is a frequent question.

The answer is, 'You can't, but you don't usually have to.'

When a client comes to a coach, s/he usually knows how to do the job, and may be very successful at the work itself. Problems are most likely to occur in interpersonal or time management areas. The client may need help in interacting with colleagues, supervisors, or supervisees. Another area is in knowing how to self-present, to be
assertive without being abrasive, to showcase one's abilities without being a show-off. Lastly, and perhaps most frequently, clients may need to learn how to manage and balance the many time-demands of the job, or of the job and the home.

An understanding of interpersonal dynamics, of the dangers of triangulation in the workplace, and of buying into other people's or one's own control issues are frequently what is needed to smooth out the glitches that have held back an otherwise promising career.

Likewise, the reassurance and urging of an enthusiastic and supportive coach can reassure a client that s/he does have useful contributions to make at meetings, can make a dynamite presentation, or can achieve the *right* look and sound.

Time organization, prioritizing and balance round out the majority of client needs.

Only if the coach is working in a specialized area where s/he is hired to develop specific work skills is the ability to do what the client does important to a career coach. In other cases, the client is most frequently helped by coaching to people skills, self-presentation abilities and time-management.

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