Telling takes five minutes. Coaching takes fifteen. And saves you the next five conversations.
A practical introduction to workplace coaching - the questioning, the listening and the follow-through that lift performance without compromising autonomy. Every participant practises live with one of our trained actors.
Leaders who coach lift their teams out of dependency
Leaders who coach well lift their teams out of dependency. Their people make better decisions on their own, take ownership of outcomes and bring the harder problems forward earlier.
This workshop builds the coaching skill from the ground up - the open questions, the active listening, the GROW model as scaffold - and then puts every participant in a live coaching conversation with one of our trained actors. Practice is where the skill lands.
Introduction to Workplace Coaching can be adapted to integrate the coaching models and frameworks your organisation already uses. We build the practice around your language, your performance framework and your team's actual development conversations - not a generic case study from somewhere else.
Powerful questions, not answers
Participants practise the questioning patterns that surface options the coachee had not yet considered - and learn when a question is a coaching move and when it is interrogation.
Outcomes over process
A coaching conversation is judged by what the coachee leaves able to do, not by how cleanly the model was followed. GROW as scaffold, then the muscle to let go of the model.
Knowing when to coach
Coaching, mentoring, directive feedback and performance management are different conversations. The skill is recognising which conversation a moment calls for and switching between them deliberately.
Live practice with actors
Every participant has a live coaching conversation with one of our trained actors. Real feedback, real adjustment, real capability built in the room.
What participants walk out able to do
Coaching is a craft, not a model. By the end of the workshop, participants have practised the conversation, received feedback on what worked, and named the specific habits they will take into their next development conversation.
- Identify which type of conversation a moment calls for - coaching, feedback, mentoring or performance management
- Apply a workplace coaching model (GROW or your organisation's preferred framework) in live practice
- Use powerful questioning patterns to enhance communication and engagement
- Let go of the process and stay focused on the coachee's outcome
- Practise different styles of coaching conversations with our trained actors
- Develop techniques for when coaching is not working - and the move to make instead
“Our leaders had done coaching theory three times before. This was the first session where they practised the conversation and got it wrong in a way they could feel. That is where the skill started landing.”
— Director of People, professional services firm
Frequently asked questions
We typically scaffold with GROW because it is well-known and practical. If your organisation already uses a different model (CLEAR, OSCAR, internally developed frameworks) we adapt the workshop to use yours. The model is the scaffold; the practice is the point.
Yes. We commonly run executive cohorts where the coaching conversation is harder - higher stakes, more politics, longer-standing patterns. The format adjusts; the live-practice spine stays the same.
Often built in alongside Leadership Development or Courageous Conversations as part of a wider capability sequence. Coaching is the move when telling stops working - it sits next to the directive conversations leaders also need to be able to hold.
No. The workshop is built as an introduction. Leaders who already coach get refinement, vocabulary and live feedback; leaders who are new to it build the foundation skills from scratch.
This is not a credentialling program - it is a practical capability workshop. For leaders who want formal coaching certification we can recommend ICF-accredited partners. Most organisations we work with want behaviour change in their managers, not a credential on the wall.
Training Delivered Differently
Want your leaders coaching rather than telling?
Tell Jacob what your leadership program already covers and where coaching sits inside it. Twenty minutes to scope the right fit.