Coaching

Introduction

For more than twenty years, I have coached business teams of all types – executive teams, improvement teams, project teams, transition teams, problem-solving teams, and many others. My passion is helping teams realize success. I am convinced that teams, when coached correctly, are the best way to make positive changes in organizations. I like seeing that happen.

Getting teams to do the right things – and get the right outcomes - is not always easy, though. As I learned from more than 200 teams, it takes the right elements and efforts to make teams successful. And, it doesn’t take much to make teams fail.

I wondered whether anyone would be interested in lessons from my experiences. I thought of Sam Levenson’s quote: “Learn from the mistakes of others. You can’t possibly live long enough to make all of them yourself.”

So, I distilled the experiences into 50 lessons for anyone trying to get results with business teams executives, managers, team leaders, members, facilitators, trainers - anyone trying to get a team through the myriad of obstacles that organizations throw in their way. Even coaches of little league teams or parents trying to get more cooperation from the “home team” may benefit from these lessons.

The lessons are organized into five sections: Look In, Look Out!, Look Around, Don’t Look Down, and Look Up.

Look In considers nine personal abilities that you should examine or develop to coach effectively. Coaching business teams is rewarding, yet demanding work and requires the right attitude, skills, and approach.

Look Out! recounts eleven experiences that I wouldn’t wish on another coach. Coaches must protect their teams from surprise attacks that put the team – or themselves - at risk. Strategies for avoiding humbling experiences are noted.

Look Around provides twelve reminders for you to examine your team, its members, and its organizational context. Every team has its strengths, weaknesses, and personality and no team or situation is perfect. Good coaches examine what they’re given and commit to grow the team and improve its environment.

Don’t Look Down summarizes nine scary situations where I simply put one foot in front of the other and followed my courage and intuition to get through. Sometimes it’s what you have to do as a coach.

Look Up concludes the book with nine lessons to help you aspire to greatness with your business teams. Coaches push, prod, and pull their teams – and themselves – to new ideas, challenges, and abilities.

Every team taught me something and I hope the lessons will prove helpful to you. At the very least, you may get a few chuckles over my experiences. Most importantly, I hope you avoid some of the mistakes I made – you can’t possibly live long enough to repeat them all.