Just prior to Christmas, we added a brand new course to our website. It may well have slipped under your radar as, if you've been as busy as the Trainer Bubble team, there's not been a chance to gather breath! Therefore, we thought we'd take the opportunity to let you know all about it...
In this course we take a good look at anxiety. As we progress, the course clarifies what anxiety is, what it is caused by and why it is so important for us to know about it in the workplace.
Underpinning our course is a crucial message – making anxiety normal.
The course takes a non-clinical approach – there is no medical or scientific element to this course; it takes a common sense, practical and straightforward stand.
This course is suitable for anyone at work. It has been designed to assist us all with achieving an understanding of what anxiety is and how it might be handled whether -as a sufferer, or as the manager or colleague of a sufferer.
When you reach the end of this course your participants will:
· Know what anxiety is and what it isn’t
· Be able to discuss the impact of anxiety on colleagues, on productivity and working life
· Know the role of the manager, employer and colleague of an anxious person – and the role of the sufferer
· Be able to draw sensible comparisons between anxiety and physical illnesses
Produce a plan to define the action they will take to address the stigma attached to anxiety with a view to improving business performance.
The course was designed by one of our new designers, Sue Buck, and is an interesting addition to our portfolio. We look forward to more of Sue's work in the future as, if this course is anything to go by, we can expect great things. You can view this training course and many others at our website www.trainerbubble.com
Showing posts with label work. Show all posts
Showing posts with label work. Show all posts
Tuesday, 5 January 2010
Friday, 13 November 2009
A short story for all business owners
A man owned a small farm in Hampshire. The Hampshire Department for Work and Pensions claimed he was not paying proper wages to his help and sent an agent out to interview him. "I need a list of your employees and how much you pay them," demanded the agent.
"Well," replied the farmer, "there's my farm hand who's been with me for 3 years. I pay him £400 a week plus free room and board. The cook has been here for 18 months, and I pay her £250 per week plus free room and board.
Then there's the half-wit who works about 18 hours every day and does about 90% of all the work around here. He makes about £100 per week, pays his own room and board, and I buy him a bottle of whisky every Saturday night. He also sleeps with my wife occasionally. "That's the guy I want to talk to...the half-wit," said the agent. "That would be me," replied the farmer
"Well," replied the farmer, "there's my farm hand who's been with me for 3 years. I pay him £400 a week plus free room and board. The cook has been here for 18 months, and I pay her £250 per week plus free room and board.
Then there's the half-wit who works about 18 hours every day and does about 90% of all the work around here. He makes about £100 per week, pays his own room and board, and I buy him a bottle of whisky every Saturday night. He also sleeps with my wife occasionally. "That's the guy I want to talk to...the half-wit," said the agent. "That would be me," replied the farmer
Tuesday, 22 January 2008
The Manager as Coach
In my role as consultant, I am often asked whether all good managers are effective coaches and if so, does this lead to the opposite being true.
To answer these questions with any great authority, it is important to define what is required of a manager when performing the role of coach. In order to do this, it is best to examine all management activity of which there are three key areas: Managing, Leading and Coaching.
These three activities are complimentary and are required to help a good manager achieve their business objectives, by enabling a team to perform at their best. You could refer to these skills as the legs of a stool on which a good manager sits.
When leading; the manager creates and shares a vision of the future with their team and ensures that their activities are consistent with bringing about that change.
When managing; they deliver results to the organisation by controlling the work of the team and agreeing and monitoring such things as budgets, timescales and quality levels.
When coaching; they support team members in their learning, to enable them to develop the skills, knowledge and attitude necessary to successfully deliver their job responsibilities and goals.
It is important to note that these three elements overlap because some of the processes and skills that are used in one area are also used in another. There may be times when the manager needs to use coaching skills to help their team understand and take ownership of quality levels or times when management of budgets requires strong leadership and vision.
Problems arise when the manager is not clear about which approach is appropriate in a particular situation. For example, if a coaching approach is used when deadlines are tight or a crisis has arisen, precious time may be lost. If a management approach is used when a team member has made a mistake, the learning opportunity will be missed and the mistake may be repeated.
All this boils down to the simple fact that coaching is incredibly important to a manager’s role and to be truly effective, they should acquire this valuable skill. However, if they neglect the requirements of management and leadership, they will ultimately fail.
So, to answer the original questions; Are all good managers effective coaches? I suspect so. Does that make all effective coaches good managers? Not unless you can sit on a one legged stool!
To answer these questions with any great authority, it is important to define what is required of a manager when performing the role of coach. In order to do this, it is best to examine all management activity of which there are three key areas: Managing, Leading and Coaching.
These three activities are complimentary and are required to help a good manager achieve their business objectives, by enabling a team to perform at their best. You could refer to these skills as the legs of a stool on which a good manager sits.
When leading; the manager creates and shares a vision of the future with their team and ensures that their activities are consistent with bringing about that change.
When managing; they deliver results to the organisation by controlling the work of the team and agreeing and monitoring such things as budgets, timescales and quality levels.
When coaching; they support team members in their learning, to enable them to develop the skills, knowledge and attitude necessary to successfully deliver their job responsibilities and goals.
It is important to note that these three elements overlap because some of the processes and skills that are used in one area are also used in another. There may be times when the manager needs to use coaching skills to help their team understand and take ownership of quality levels or times when management of budgets requires strong leadership and vision.
Problems arise when the manager is not clear about which approach is appropriate in a particular situation. For example, if a coaching approach is used when deadlines are tight or a crisis has arisen, precious time may be lost. If a management approach is used when a team member has made a mistake, the learning opportunity will be missed and the mistake may be repeated.
All this boils down to the simple fact that coaching is incredibly important to a manager’s role and to be truly effective, they should acquire this valuable skill. However, if they neglect the requirements of management and leadership, they will ultimately fail.
So, to answer the original questions; Are all good managers effective coaches? I suspect so. Does that make all effective coaches good managers? Not unless you can sit on a one legged stool!
This Article is adapted from our training course 'Coaching at Work', which is available from our website at Trainer Bubble.
We also provide business consultancy in areas such as leadership, coaching and effective business development. You can discover more about the wealth of services offered by Trainer Bubble at our website Trainer Bubble ServicesMonday, 26 November 2007
Effective Coaching - A Question of Questioning?
Questioning is the critical component of all coaching, it is the principle that coaching is based upon and all good coaches realise that the key to unlocking an individuals potential is through a good use of questions.
In its simplest form coaching could exist on the following three questions:
What worked well?
What didn’t work so well?
What will you do differently next time?
In any given developmental scenario, these questions can be used as a fail-safe approach to questioning. The output responses are what will drive an individual on to better performance.
This process is extremely simple and will work in most impromptu coaching scenarios. We have a tendency to overcomplicate processes in business and this for me really demonstrates that often the simplest methods are those that work best. Of course there are times when your coaching will need to be more specific and focused on the individuals needs.
When coaching to develop people it is usually best to avoid starting a question with ‘why?’ The reason for this is that by using ‘why’ we are establishing something as fact. For instance; when I ask a question like, ‘Why do you think you are not good at selling?’ we are subconsciously telling that person that the idea of them not being able to sell is already established. This of course, will undermine their confidence in this area and will ensure that our work to help them meet an objective to start selling is going to be made all the harder.
An example of what you could say instead of ‘Why do you think you are not good at selling?’ might be, ‘What is it about selling that you find difficult?’ This could then easily be followed up by a positive question of, ‘When have you been successful at selling?’ This is positive re-enforcement and will help the coachee establish the positive elements of their experience.
You may feel that this approach is not as direct. However, you should consider what it is you are trying to achieve. If you want to let someone know that they are no good at something, sure, go for the direct approach, but if you want to develop them, use effective questions.
By using questions and encouraging the individual to come up with their own answers, we are instilling a strong sense of ownership. If we as coach provide the answers, then the coachee has no reason to take action as they might not see the value. If a coachee does not complete an action they set themselves then the responsibility for failure is theirs.
Of course, the flipside of this is that success for the coachee is so much sweeter when they realise that the positive result is down to them.
This is an excerpt from the 'Coaching at Work' training materials from Trainer Bubble. You can view the complete course materials at our website - Trainer Bubble.
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