Coachability Supplemental

Supplemental coaching is when you assign activities for improvement without being physically present. The easiest way to do this is through "listening chats" where you ask for feedback on your strengths and areas for improvement. The goal is to become more thoughtful in seeking feedback from peers. The key is to simply say thank you without getting into discussions or rebuttals. This teaches true listening and reflection, leading to greater coachability. After four weeks of twice-weekly interactions, ask what they learned and are committed to improving. This will make them highly coachable. Now, remember, supplemental coaching are those activities that you facilitate, you assign, where you don't physically have to be present. And I will tell you, out of all the subjects where we could apply supplemental coaching, it is coachability. Here is probably the easiest thing you could do, and that is to assign what we call listening chats. Now, we assign these to leaders. We also assign these to individual contributors, employees. A listening chat is when you go up to someone and say, Bob, share with me two things that you think I do well as a teammate, and maybe what's one area where you would encourage me to improve? So it's very structured feedback. Notice my language. Area where I have an opportunity to improve. Not my dreadful attributes or constructive feedback. That language ignites emotion. We want to position people on a cadence to become thoughtful in their pursuit of feedback from peers. So a listening chat is where you ask for feedback, and you can structure it any way you want in terms of coachability, being a better teammate, more positive influence on the team. And you have them go out maybe once a week, twice a week, and ask teammates. Where have I exhibited positive traits as a teammate? Where do I have opportunities to raise my game? What's a suggestion you might have for me? And here's the key. Here's the rule of engagement that people find difficult. You simply say thank you. You don't get into discussion. You don't get into rebuttals. And what it does is it teaches true listening, and it also teaches reflection, which leads to greater coachability. You can have them do this, and over the course of four weeks, twice a week, they'll have eight interactions. At the end of each week, ask them that almighty question. When you complete your two activities with your peers, your listening chats, ask them to reflect and share what are two things you learned about yourself as a result of those conversations that you are positively committed to improving. That will ignite a highly coachable person.