When it comes to the benefits of team coaching, it could be said that there’s a never-ending list. As we shared in a previous blog, some of the top 5 benefits of coaching that organisations, leaders, and team members capitalise on include increased psychological safety, enhanced trust, and team spirit.
But as the need for coaching greatly varies and depends on how a team is currently doing, the benefits a team may be seeking from coaching do too. With this in mind, we’re sharing some additional benefits of team coaching in this blog.
What Is Team Coaching?
Before we dive into the additional benefits of team coaching, let’s quickly recap what it is.
As defined by the International Coaching Federation, team coaching is:
“A partnership with clients in a thought-provoking and creative process that inspires them to maximise their personal and professional potential. Team coaching is coaching a team. The team as a unit is coached, just as a top sports team as a whole is coached and accompanied on the journey to success. The aim is to get the individuals to work well, whether they are together in the same space or apart, on individual tasks and projects.”
It’s important to note here that team coaching is different from group coaching, which is coaching individuals in a group setting. When it comes to group coaching, others in the group develop from observing an interaction between one of the groups and the coach. In contrast, team coaching involves the whole team.
Other authors, such as Hackman & Wageman, wrote in 2005 that “Team coaching is direct interaction with a team intended to help members make coordinated and task appropriate use of their collective resources in accomplishing the team’s work.”
Meanwhile, David Clutterbuck defines team coaching as “helping the team improve and the processes by which performance is achieved, through performance and dialogue.” And Hawkins and Smith describe it as “enabling a team to function as more than the sum of its parts by clarifying its mission and its external and internal relationships”.
The Benefits of Team Coaching
If you’ve read our other blogs surrounding team coaching, you’ll already know that some benefits include:
Increased trust in the workplace
Better employee retention
Higher productivity levels
Greater employee satisfaction
Sustained relationships
Employee engagement
Team coaching can also help leaders identify any problems within the team and offer guidance in resolving them.
In addition to these benefits, many teams will experience the following:
Realism in development. As the team coach observes first-hand the process of the team’s dynamics, culture, and delivery, they can be the mirror for the team to see how it operates internally and with stakeholders in and outside the business. Transformation within the team can additionally be felt as team coaching draws a response that usually impacts the organisation’s culture.
Enhanced well-being. The well-being of individuals is a valuable benefit of team coaching as the team members increasingly rely on each member’s availability, commitment, and engagement. The team coach acts as an additional pair of curious eyes to draw the team’s attention to its well-being.
Accountability on the job in a non-judgemental, supportive way. As the team coach remains curious, challenging, and unattached to specific outcomes, an additional benefits of team coaching includes greater accountability on the job. Knowing that a conversation about team behaviour and results would be had in a safe space encourages the team to make commitments and take actions that deliver results.
Increased team spirit. Drawn from the unity of purpose, team coaching generates the confidence to take risks in knowing that there is backing from the rest of the team. In working through its mandate, purpose, remit, and resources, the team coach helps the team build a good foundation for the unity of purpose and action.
Team learning and knowledge management emanate from the reflection process of team coaching. A habit of learning lessons in the team generates a transfer of knowledge, especially where such learning is documented and available to the team. When teams enable individuals to fully play to their strengths whilst managing their weaknesses alongside other team members’ strengths, the team becomes a place where experimentation is safer.
How? Well, team coaching is uniquely placed to support teams as they strive to achieve high effectiveness. This is because the team coach stays the entire course with the team to bring about transformation. When results are delivered, learning occurs, and knowledge sharing also becomes safer.
Finally, for the many businesses that hope to understand the benefits of team coaching, the Engage Team report is available to benchmark a team’s state before and after a coaching intervention. This report is an empirically validated measurement to demonstrate the levels of return on investment to verify the benefits of team coaching.
When Is It Best To Employ Team Coaching?
With so many benefits to be seen and had, it’s normal to question when the right time to employ coaching is. Although many will suggest taking advantage when your team is facing a specifical problem or has hit a bump in the road that they’re struggling to overcome, team coaching is equally just as beneficial when teams are working well together. If you’ve noticed some shifts within your team, here are a few questions to ask yourself to determine whether team coaching is right for your team at the minute:
Have you noticed a lack of trust between your team members?
Has communication within the team broken down?
Is the team struggling to meet the goals and objectives set by the organisation?
Do all team members voice their thoughts and opinions in meetings?
Are their team members that don’t voice their thoughts and opinions as often or at all?
Has productivity within the team reduced?
Are your employees happy and engaged?
Have any of your employees expressed that they’re not happy in their role/at work?
Have you noticed any team members avoiding meetings or calling in sick?
Is your team currently working well together to achieve goals and objectives?
If you’ve answered yes to any of the above questions, these are signs that your team might need coaching.
Remember, though, that all teams are unique. So to really understand whether team coaching would be beneficial, it’s best to seek support and guidance from a leadership coaching provider. Upon doing so, most providers, like us, will offer a complimentary consultation and coaching chemistry sessions to really dig deep into what’s currently going on within your team.
From here, we can then determine whether team coaching is needed. In some cases, the whole team may not need coaching. Instead, one or two members of the team might benefit from one-to-one coaching, which can have a knock-on effect on the whole group.
Contact Us Today
Whether your team is not yet excelling, is considered dysfunctional, or is simply on its journey from good to great, we’ve got you covered.
The Leadership Coaches excel at team coaching, with many of our team qualified in various team coaching techniques and backed up with real-world experience and credible results; call on us for your next success.
To find out more, visit our website here, or call us today for a no-obligation consultation on 03450 950 480.
Written by experienced team leadership coach Joseph in 2021 and updated in 2023.
Sources
https://chiefexecutive.net/8-characteristics-great-teams-sports-business/
https://www.mckinsey.com/business-functions/organization/our-insights/the-organization-
blog/improve-your-leadership-teams-effectiveness-through-key-behaviors
http://www.thinkwiseinc.com/impact-of-team-performance-survey-report.html\
https://www.adp.com/spark/articles/2018/07/building-effective-teams-part-one-team-
underperformance-is-common-and-costly.aspx
Clutterback, D. (2007) Coaching the Team at Work. Nicholas Brealey London.
Hackman, J R and Wageman, R (2005) A theory of Team Coaching, Academy of Management Review, 30 (2) pp 269-287
Hawkins P (2014) Leadership Team Coaching: developing collective transformational leadership, 2 nd Ed. Kogan Page.
Hawkins, P & Smith, N (2006), Coaching Mentoring and organisational consultancy: supervision and development. Open University Press,/McGraw-Hill, Maidenhead.
https://engagecoach.com/
