I often find people are promoted due to their technical abilities. This seems to make sense – the person who performs best in their role is rewarded with more responsibility. The problem is, their expertise is in the discipline they just left – not in leading people. Most new managers simply lack the necessary skills and tools to successfully manage and lead the people they have been promoted to oversee.

The qualities of a leader have been long vaunted as crucial and important in our businesses. Management is seen as a little old fashioned but it appears that we have forgotten about the basic fundamentals of management skills which help our people succeed. Managerial expertise is a necessary complement to the leadership skills we’re so hung up on. Without the former, the latter won’t succeed.

I have definitely benefited from being coached by colleagues, as well as from coaching others in training workshops. In many ways, I get to practise being coached by participants every time I deliver workshops on coaching as a tool for managers. But the benefits of coaching can only be realised when the coachee owns the goal.

This is a question I often ask the managers and supervisors I work alongside.  I’m really trying to discover whether they use a coaching style when managing their direct reports. 

The concept of coaching as a technique has been around for almost 50 years, but I am constantly surprised that many managers with direct reports aren’t using this important tool to their advantage.  

We all feel outside our comfort zone and ability level at times.  Particularly when we are attempting to push the boundaries of what we know and how we’ve operated in the past. Read my tips on kicking the imposter out the door.