Leaders: Effective Discipline & Coaching Conversations
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The skill of effective coaching or discipline conversations as a leader.
Coaching, providing feedback, and sometimes corrective action conversations come with the territory for leaders.
One important role for leaders is to provide feedback and coaching to their team in order to improve and help them be as successful as possible. This also can mean discipline and corrective action to address poor performance or behavior.
Conversations like this are empowering, can be delicate, and can also have wildly different impact and results based on how they are approached.
From seasoned leaders to people who are brand new to it, the ingredient that I believe to be critical to success and also lacking from many conversations in this realm is the approach of viewing this type of feedback as a partnership.
The traditional way of approaching discipline.
The typical way that see much discipline and coaching addressed often goes something like this:
“This performance/behavior I am seeing from you isn’t acceptable, it needs to look like this instead. Take care of it, figure it out and fix it or else we’re going to have a bigger problem.”
This is certainly one way to deliver feedback. The downside of approaching things like this is that it creates a big separation between the person who’s delivering the feedback and the person who’s receiving it. Metaphorically, it sends the other person to an island by themselves where they need to go figure things out, improve, and get better.
Being a partner instead.
I believe that more effective coaching conversations create partnership, collaboration, and connection, versus separation and isolation. Which looks and sounds something more like this:
“This behavior/performance is what I’m seeing from you, and it needs to look like this instead. How can I support you in this? What do you need from me to help get you where you need to be? Let’s make a plan to get you there.”
It’s a similar message as the one above with the same end goal, but offered as a bid to partner with that person to collaborate on improving rather than scolding them and sending them to figure it out on their own.
Providing coaching and feedback from a place of genuine care, support, concern, and an investment in the other person’s success is massively more effective than shame and punishment.
The difference in how that person perceives and receives the information will greatly impact their response and motivation. This approach increases their willingness to turn things around because it proves to them that you care by bringing a sense of partnership and collaboration to the situation.
They still need to be held accountable.
Especially when it comes to discipline and corrective action conversations, do not confuse that taking this approach means that they are off the hook.
You can be direct, kind, and supportive while still being crystal clear about what you need to see from them, and what the consequences will be if things don’t change.
The thing to remember is that you can hold people accountable for their behavior, and have them take full ownership and responsibility to turn things around without being mean to them. You don’t have to act like a cruel, power hungry prison warden to get the results you want.
Employees are more likely to respond well and actually improve when they feel like you care about them as humans and are invested in their success.
Final thoughts
The difference between isolating someone for their behavior versus coming from the perspective of teamwork and collaboration has a huge impact on your ability to effectively coach people into greatness.
This may be a very different approach than what you have been on the receiving end of, or might be used to as a leader. Effectively providing coaching and feedback is so important to your success in managing teams and employees.
Be kind, direct, and willing to work with them to achieve better.
Related Articles:
Tips for Difficult Conversations & Apologies
A Quick, Simple Hack to Start Challenging Conversations
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This article was created by Galen Emanuele for the #culturedrop. Free leadership and team culture content in less than 5 minutes a week. Check out the rest of this month's content and subscribe to the Culture Drop at https://bit.ly/culturedrop