Huddle Up! Hey, coach! No, your employees don't need a swift kick in the butt to reach their goals; they just need some personal attention.

Most managers just don't know how to coach. They don'teven see development of their people as their responsibility. Butwhen you do develop your employees, they'll be willing to walkthrough brick walls for you. That's how powerful a motivatorcoaching is." So says Jeff Lugerner, a vice president at theGrowth and Leadership Center, an executive development firm inMountain View, California.

How will employees get to their next level of performance?Proactive owners and managers know the only reliable way is toprovide individual employees with a boost by offering thecoaching--disciplined, one-on-one counseling--they need to learnthe path to take and the how-to of overcoming the obstaclesthey'll find along the way.

What's more, today's low unemployment rate means youhave to do something to help your employees because you probablycan't hire new ones--"at least, you can't do iteasily," says Janelle Brittain, executive director of DynamicPerformance Institute, a consulting firm in Chicago thatspecializes in coaching and team-building. So if you want betterworkers, nowadays you've got to help make them yourself.

Robert McGarvey writes on business, psychology and managementtopics for several national publications. To reach him online withyour questions or comments, e-mail rjmcgarvey@aol.com.

Go, Team

Are you a good coach? Don't be too quick to nod in theaffirmative. Entrepreneurs, say the experts, often come intocoaching with several strikes against them. "You can't dothis if you have a need to be right; you must be open-minded,"says Cheryl Richardson, former president of the International CoachFederation and author of Take Time for Your Life: A PersonalCoach's Seven Step Program for Creating the Life You Want(Broadway Books). Of course entrepreneurs arestrong-willed--that's part of the package--and that means youmay have to work extra hard to coach right.

Strike two is that the surest way to derail even well-meaningcoaching is by not committing the time needed, says Richardson.Time-pressed entrepreneurs, she says, are notorious for lettingcoaching meetings slip off their calendars. But even goodintentions won't produce results if you don't commit thetime.

"For coaching to bring benefits, you've got to bepatient," says Chuck Popovich, a business professor at RobertMorris College in Moon Township, Pennsylvania. "You won'tsee results in 45 seconds."

Strike three is the fact that many entrepreneurs feel they haveto act like a cop to successfully coach. Rich Russakoff, presidentof Bottom Line Consultants in Richmond, Virginia, and a coach forowners of small and mid-sized businesses, explains: "Toooften, coaching happens only as a way to criticize an employee. Butthat's not being a coach; it's being a cop. A cop focuseson the past and finds fault. A coach focuses on the future andlooks at past behavior only to find better ways to perform in thefuture. But many entrepreneurs think they're coaching whenthey're simply being cops."

Have you struck out? Even if you have, don't despair,because the coaching experts are quick to offer up the tips youneed to coach more efficiently and effectively.

Getting Started

Where do you begin? "Formalize the relationship," saysLugerner. Coaching doesn't happen on the fly; it's amethodical approach to employee development. "Tell theemployee `I want to meet with you regularly to help develop you andyour career path.'"

How often you meet depends on the employee. For some employees,a weekly session is a must; for others, once a month is adequate.The time required varies, too. With some workers, a 15-minutesession is plenty, while others will require half an hour, maybelonger.

Which employees should receive coaching? "All your peopleneed it," says Lugerner. "Coaching is how we all getbetter." In a very small business, that means it's yourjob to make regular time for every worker. In bigger companies,other managers can take on some of the coaching (with you coachingthe managers). If it sounds like a lot of time, remember: Yourbenefit in this is an ever-improving work force--which translatesinto mounting productivity and profitability. So the payoffs arereal.

The next step in effective coaching is to set an agenda."You need to establish a checklist of to-dos and benchmarksfor progress," says Lugerner. That doesn't mean you do allthe work, but, by working with the employee in the initial coachingsession, the two of you establish goals as well as criteria formeasuring progress toward those goals and a timetable for reachingthem.

When you set goals and benchmarks, "suggest, don'ttell," Lugerner advises. "Telling [your employees what todo is] coaching in a hurry. It doesn't get results."

If you limit your role to making suggestions, you'll putmore of the work in your employee's hands--hands that mayactually be more suited for the particular task than yours. Say youwant the employee who handles shipping to reduce errors by 25percent. You may not have many concrete ideas about how toaccomplish that goal, but the employee who does the work will havedozens of ideas. So use the first coaching session to consider allthe options available, and, still working with the employee, pickout the best ideas of the lot and find a place for them on thatworker's to-do list.

Let The Coaching Begin

Once you've set an agenda, complete with a to-do list, goalsand a timetable, it's time to get down to actually coaching theemployee. Although individual sessions will vary, there are a fewhard and fast rules to keep in mind:

• "Make sure you do more listening than talking," saysBrittain. "A rule of thumb is that the coach should listen 60percent of the time."

Popovich agrees. "One thing I see in so many managers is alack of listening skills," he says, "but those are skillsyou need to develop to coach effectively."

• Let the employee do most of the problem-solving. When theemployee says, "Well, I have a problembecause . . ." don't jump in withsolutions. Instead, ask "What are some possible ways you knowto solve the problem?" Coaching is helping an employee do hisor her job better, not doing the job yourself.

"Managers are too quick to offer solutions, but thatdoesn't develop their employees," says Richardson."Challenge your people to solve their own problems--with yourhelp--and they probably will."

• "Protect the employee's self-esteem," urgesPopovich. "Be honest in what you're saying, but also watchwhat you're saying. Don't come across as toocritical." Employees, he adds, are just like you--under a lotof stress--which means everyone involved is hypersensitive. Butyour employee can't do a better job without believing that heor she can do it, and letting a few offhanded critical wordsslip can undermine that.

• Tailor your coaching sessions to the individual. "Coachingis one-on-one, and it takes into account the personality and skillsof the individual employee," says Popovich. Make sure you havea clear idea of what the employee's strengths and weaknessesare before you begin trying to coach that person.

What should you do as the coaching starts to take hold and theemployee begins to actually produce better results?"Recognize, recognize, recognize," says Brittain."Recognition is a powerful motivational tool that isn'tused nearly enough."

But don't just say "Good job." That's only astart. To make the recognition more powerful you have to bespecific. "The more exact you are about why you'reoffering praise and recognition, the more likely you are to seethat positive behavior strengthened," says Brittain.

Coaching may sound like harder work than you imagined, but theresults are likely to be well worth the effort. "If you knowthe skills it takes and come into it with patience, you can doit," says Russakoff.

Brittain adds that there's a sweet benefit in coaching forany boss who puts in the effort. "It's a marvelous feelingto watch somebody grow and know that you contributed," hesays. "It's very rewarding to be a good coach."

Contact Sources

Bottom Line Consultants, (804) 741-5771, http://www.russakoff.com

Dynamic Performance Institute, (888) 262-8686, http://www.dynamicperformance.com

Growth and Leadership Center, (650) 966-1144, http://www.glcweb.com