Internal coaching can save big money for external coaches. But how does a company recognize its need for an internal coach? Whom to choose for this position? How to ensure that internal coaches won’t loose their qualification? And what about managers – will they be willing to listen to their colleagues and collaborate with them?
This is just a small part of questions that were addressed in a discussion group of Internal Coaching at the 19th HR Live conference. Andrea Jarolímová, Head of Education and Development at Raiffeisenbank, together with her colleague Milan Klindera provided detailed expert insight into the actual functioning of internal coaching and all its advantages and pitfalls. The discussion was moderated by Milan Bobek, an accredited coach and ČAKO supervisor, who is the CEO of FBE Prague, HR Live partner institution.
Coaching is non-directive management of people, which increases their competence. Internal coaching is frequently used in selling. Great efficiency has also proved in call centers. In some cases, companies have coaches for their managers, but they are more likely to use external coaches. Those are in addition to coaching managers often hired to train internal coaches and to supervise.
In Raiffeisenbank coaches are often chosen from people with certain types of expertise. They then get the right training to train, coach, and mentor as well. It is important that these activities are clearly separated and the role of the person does not interchange unnoticed.
Any company that chooses an internal coach must decide whether to hire a new employee at the labor market, or whether to train their own people. A qualified coach is very expensive to hire. Training employees is time consuming and involves high costs. Basic training takes about a year and ranges from 50 to 90 000 CZK. After about half a year, the company should recognize if the selected person will be able to work as a coach effectively.
Selecting the appropriate employee for the role a complex issue: Depending on their future “clients”, employees’ position within organizational structure needs to be considered. Even if the person selected will not coach managers, they will have to deal with them and it is important that they will be perceived as a partner. Choice often falls on HR staff for their neutrality. Candidate for the coach would ideally have to go through an assessment center and confirm their true motivation for the new role.
The participants were also interested in the initial problems after implementing internal coaching in an organization. As with other strategic issues in HR, there is a need for management support. That can best be achieved by providing coaching experience to the manager. In particular directive kind of people tend to be very pleasantly surprised by the overall effect of coaching.
Internal codex also helps during implementation of internal coaching. It helps to assure other employees that no information provided to the coach will be disclosed or forwarded to their supervisor. In addition, HR must start supporting processes such as ordering of coaching, promotion within the company, etc.
Once you establish internal coaching, you must take care to maintain its quality. Appropriate supervision by external coaches helps a lot, but coaches can provide intervision to each other. Especially at the beginning, it is appropriate to measure the results of coaching in areas where it is possible - especially in sales. Last but not least, quality coaches need to work on maintaining their skills - whether they operate within a company, or as external.
The event was marked by a professional but informal style. Participants appreciated the opportunity for personal acquaintance with colleagues engaged in similar work in other companies. They were assured that their work heads in the right direction and can be further improved by sharing their experiences.
The next HR Live will take place in mid-2012. In the next few days we are going to publish more articles with detailed outputs from the various discussion groups. Photos from the events, all articles, and outputs can also be found at www.hrzive.cz .