According to recent research carried out by the Institute of Leadership & Management (ILM), 84% of employees say that every organisation should implement coaching in their management and development programs. In fact, our research shows that developing coaching and mentoring skills at each level of an organisation is the key to unlocking potential and increasing productivity.

What Is The Difference Between Coaching And Mentoring?

Coaching is typically non-direct teaching, offering guidance and advising while mentoring is one-on-one, where individuals share their specific knowledge and expertise with others. Both, however, are the means of using experienced leaders to teach teams how to achieve their objectives.

How Coaching and Mentoring Increases Business Performance

With most companies’ primary goal being to increase turnover and make profits, many businesses lose sight of the fact that these objectives are achieved by teams made up of humans. By recognising this and applying coaching and mentoring methods to management styles, companies can optimise on their workforce’s natural skills and well-being and, as a result, increase overall productivity.

Here’s how coaching and mentoring can boost your employee performance.

Increases Engagement and Collaboration

Whether performing one-on-one mentoring with workers, or corporate coaching with entire teams, our research shows that a skilled coach can reduce conflict, improve team communication and understanding, and help employees with interpersonal skills.

Coaching and mentoring build stronger teams with a more inclusive culture, aligning the organisation’s ethos with that of its employees. This creates a cohesive working environment, where employees work well together, where processes are streamlined, and collaboration between members is seamless.

Identifies and Develops Skills Within Teams

An effective coach can identify the skills needed for success within a role and helps to plot a path toward developing those skills. In this way, the power of coaching and mentoring is in its ability to reinvigorate careers, keeping workers from stagnating in their positions and moving its people forward, collectively. This ultimately moves the company forward too.

Defines Goals and Objectives

Any manager will attest to the fact that there are few things as detrimental to a company as aimless employees and teams. Leaders who take a mentoring approach to managing their teams can help staff define their goals and identify the actions that will achieve those goals. Coaching empowers managers and employees to plan, execute and review actions – this translates to consistent productivity, and a sense of job satisfaction for workers.

Crisis Management

One of the most valuable roles that any coach fills is that of crisis management. As much as we hope to never encounter difficult times in business, an effective coach helps his team to navigate through crises with resilience and calm. Being able to recover fast means getting back to business fast – a leader who applies practical, hands-on mentoring of staff wastes no time in getting the team back on track.

Taps into Natural Strengths

In addition to identifying skills required for a role, a qualified coach has learned the art of identifying the soft skills – natural strengths – that people already possess. Such a leader applies methods of coaching and mentoring to nurture and harness those strengths to the benefit of the employee, and the company. Workers who master their strengths become powerhouses of production in an organisation when placed in the right role.

Creates a Safe Environment for Human Experiences

Discerning leaders never forget that their teams are, first and foremost, human beings. Subject to emotions and personal experiences, every employee brings with them a host of hopes and fears that control how they perform on a day-to-day basis. The art of helping staff navigate these rollercoaster emotions is what sets a true leader apart from the traditional “boss”.

A manager who applies coaching techniques creates a safe, confidential space where employees are able to disclose the areas of their humanity that may be affecting their productivity. Here, the coach can practise sensitivity to the employee’s feelings – a practice now commonly known as emotional intelligence – and mentorship and support on the way forward.

Want To Create A Leadership Team Equipped With The Skills To Coach?

Find out how choosing to study a leadership and management qualification with DLC can help you and your business to thrive.

This article was first published by The Institute of Leadership and Management. Click HERE to view the article on their site.