Only days before my consulting contract ended with a particular sales company, a member of the management team called me and said, “Help!” I know that part of my job is to coach my sales people but no one has really taught me how, exactly. Can you teach me this week before you leave?

The true answer is ‘NO”. “But I’m going to start coaching a particular salesperson today and I don’t know exactly what to do or say” she said. In an emergency, this down–and-dirty coaching list, gives a clue as to how to begin conversing in a coaching manner with your team members, and less in a typical “boss” management or consulting style.

Many companies say they have a coaching culture, but in fact, do not have any trained or certified coaches in their company. Coaching requires a knowledge and understanding of process as well as the variety of styles, skills and techniques that are appropriate to the context in which the coaching takes place.

That being said, there are a few things you can make sure to understand and do, if you are caught needing to be a coach on the fly when you are not an experienced coach.

1. Hire a Skilled Coach yourself.This is the fastest way to understand the role and duties of a coach, as well as the process, the style, and the benefit of coaching.
2. No judging. Do not try to be a consultant. Take your manager’s hat off. Do not judge anything. (At least try not to.) Listen, guide, and ask more questions.
3. Ask Exploratory Questions. Ask at least twice as many questions as you make statements. Be genuinely curious. (A coach is not expected to have the answers. The premise in professional coaching is that every client is whole, creative, and resourceful, and has the wisdom to find the answers they need.)
4. Repeat–Confirm-Validate. This creates a feedback loop to avoid miscommunication. Repeating what you heard them say, asking if this is correct, and validating their comment by making a response. (“I see, I get it, I understand, Oh, hmmmm”; those are validations). Never make them wrong. You don’t have to make them right either. Their perception is their reality. Honor that.
5. Respect the coachee. Avoid words like “but” and “should”. Don’t interrupt.
6. Hold the mirror. Let the coachee learn by hearing what they are saying, and whether it makes sense to them, at which time, you can clarify and ask what actions they think they should take next. Put accountability in place if appropriate.
7. Remember it is a process that enables learning and development to occur and thus performance to improve. Give them the room to do it. It is not your job to “fix the problem”. It’s theirs. Stay in the background and lead from behind.
8. All business performance coaching is life coaching also. Be realistic. If your coachee is having marital, financial, physical, or spiritual problems, it will affect their job performance. Be ready for non-business topics to come up.
9. Have the guts to honestly and directly confront the coachee. Tough but loving. Offer any possibilities that you may think of, as just that: possibilities.

Questions to help you if you are a fledgling coach:

Clip these assorted questions and scripts and put them on your desk or in the person’s file, or someplace close by. They are to help you keep the coachee talking and the discovery process happening. Do not try to use all of them! Just use a few of them and see what happens. Remember this is a process, and you are part of the process as well!

• What’s the best thing that you’ve done since we met last?
• What’s the best thing that has happened in the last week?
• Which areas would you say are the strongest areas in your job?
• Which areas would you say are the weakest areas of your job?
• What’s the truth about that?
• Are there any tools or resources that would make your job easier if they were available?
• Identify your number one need right now.
• What have you been trying to say that you don’t think is getting listened to?
• What does success look like for you in your current position?
• Where do you picture yourself 5 to 10 years from now?
• Tell me more about that.
• Rate your health on a scale of 1-10.
• If you could get that problem solved and everything was perfect, what would be your next step?
• How do you feel your daily schedule is working for you?
• What’s happening in the rest of your life that’s making your job easier?
• Is there anything that if you could fix it, would make your job better for you?
• What can I help you with over the next 12 months, as your coach?

My firm belief is that all companies should be trained to develop a true coaching culture, not by words only, but in reality. When I consult for a company, that is one of the first things we put into place: every person in the company gets “coached” once a week; some only for 20 minutes by their immediate team leader using a pre-prepared script, and some for as long as an hour by a more skilled coach. In general, higher ranking employees need more coaching, because they are dealing with more issues. C-level executives need more coaching than anyone else in the company, because all problems and successes start at the top.