An Impact podcast with Sarah Osteen, created for the Impact leadership playbook.
The future of leadership is about learning, and this means creating the conditions for others to learn and grow. When it comes to leading learning, there is one leadership style that stands out above all others: coaching. But what exactly is coaching? And how can a leader integrate this into their practice?
"When we think about the leadership toolkit, coaching is one more tool to connect, but it's also one more tool to communicate and deepen relationships with team members and the team as a whole."
Latest listen
In this mini podcast (23 mins), created exclusively for the Impact leadership playbook, Dan chats to Sarah Osteen about coaching. Based in Seattle, Sarah is a Senior Consultant for Impact US. With 25 years’ experience in learning and development, she’s known for her witty sense of humour, tenacious attitude towards learning new skills, and uncommon approach to authenticity, which raises the quality of all her interactions.
What is coaching?
"At it's most basic, coaching is about a leader asking questions instead of providing answers. So, really serving in a role to support a direct report, or a peer, or sometimes even another leader, instead of judging or directing them. It's about facilitating development and growth rather than just doling out tasks or giving an explanation.
I think anybody can be a coach. There are certain roles within organisations that lend themselves to coaching, particularly when you have direct reports. But even if you're an individual contributor, there's opportunities to coach peers. And it's a great skill to start developing if you are interested in moving up within an organisation, starting to practise having those coaching conversations where you are both challenging and supporting others."
What role does coaching play in the leadership toolkit?
"As a coach, it is my job to understand how to connect with this person. The same goes for leaders within organisations, thinking about how to specifically connect with their direct reports in ways that are going to deepen and further the relationship as well as achieve business goals. So that looks like thinking about how to specifically communicate with that person. How to connect? How to use examples? Has this person been defensive in the past? How have they received feedback in the past? What has made them really excited? When we think about the leadership toolkit, coaching is one more tool to connect, but it's also one more tool to communicate and deepen relationships with team members and the team as a whole."
What does the future of coaching look like?
"The future of coaching looks like it is very integrated into an organisation. For example, if we're talking about executive or leadership coaching, it's very connected to the organisational goals as well as to the individual's growth. […] Thinking holistically around, what does growth look like for this individual? And how does that align with the organisational goals and values?"
Listen to the podcast on Spotify
This mini podcast was created for our leadership playbook, an interactive resource capturing 45 years of learning about leadership.