MTI Newsletter

Current projects of
MACHWÜRTH TEAM INTERNATIONAL
Organisational and Personnel Development

Coaching:
Ecologically worthwhile or
temporary trend? Ronald M. Heuer
Consultant
An interesting survey of the LAB Lachner Aden Beyer MACHWÜRTH TEAM
International
& Company shows the growing demand

Within the Anglophone region, 55% of the managers consulted

especially within the USA, the
personal coach was and still is a
status symbol, whereas in Ger-
many laying claims to profes-
sional support was seen as a
symptom for weakness for a
long period of time.
Today this view has changed
and most of the managers have
an eye for the importance of
coaching.
Over 90% of the managers re-
gard coaching as ecologically
worthwhile and helpful.
But merely 9% of the companies
are offering this as regulars of
their personnel development
a coach in the past. App. 31%
are planning to be coached
within the upcoming year. These
are the main results of the “16th
LAB Managerpanel”, which was
made by the international con-
sulting company LAB Lachner
Aden Beyer & Company in co-
operation with the business
magazine „Wirtschaftswoche”.
It is barely ten years since coa-
chings mostly were used for se-
rious reasons, e.g. if transfer or
special company leave of per-
sonnel doesn’t even enter the
equation because of the exper-
tise or of contractual obligation.
(often significant for chairmen).
Coaching was the last resource
before capitulation.
Coaching is not counselling!
The positive experiences with
coaching within the English re-
gion lead to a changed view on
coaching in Germany too. A few
years ago this doesn’t even en-
ter the equation, especially by
the male managers, because
they compared it to “counsel-
ling”. They were afraid to be in-
doctrinated.
The support in realising some
ambitious aims and neglecting
modesty was and still is very
famous in the USA. "Think big -
you can do it if you really want"
this is the popular conviction in
the USA.

With a professional Coach by

ones side one is able to be
more productive.

Even if the basis of information

about topic, procedure and be-
nefit of coaching could be few
measures.
MACHWÜRTH TEAM INTERNATIONAL • Dohrmanns Horst 19 • D-27374 Visselhövede
Telefon +49 (0) 42 62 / 93 12 - 0 • Fax +49 (0) 42 62 / 38 12
e-mail: info@mwteam.de • Internet: www.mwteam.de • www.mticonsultancy.com
MTI Newsletter
Current projects of
MACHWÜRTH TEAM INTERNATIONAL
Organisational and Personnel Development
and far between short in our
country, coaching is established
as an important and helpful in-
strument for personnel devel-
opment and became an original
part of change management and
organisational processes.
Coaching isn’t a temporary
trend, but will become more and
more important for leadership
development. The trend leads
off of standardised trainings to
individual qualification meas-
ures. Up to now coaching was
reserved to the executive level,
but now it become relevant for
all specialists and members of
MACHWÜRTH TEAM INTERNATIONAL • Dohrmanns Horst 19 • D-27374 Visselhövede
Telefon +49 (0) 42 62 / 93 12 - 0 • Fax +49 (0) 42 62 / 38 12
e-mail: info@mwteam.de • Internet: www.mwteam.de • www.mticonsultancy.com
the executive staff based on the
growing complexity within the
business and the private life it
will become more and more to a
matter of course to call a spe-
cialist in, who is able to give a
helpful and neutral reflectance
on the self-assessment.
The benefit is mainly seen
within the personal support of
the transforming skills of man-
agers. Even in times of perma-
nent changes it becomes more
and more important that man-
agers are playing an active role
within these changes. The ca-
pacity to understand that semi-
nars and trainings are able to
change someone’s mind but
that they have to be supported
for achieving the aims is cer-
tainly conducive to the accep-
tance of coaching. Such a skill
coaching is more and more ac-
cepted and is not only used by
the high potentials.
Coaching is a question of
strengthening the strength, iden-
tifying the chances and breaking
new grounds.
It has to be clarified whether the
content of the coaching has to
be kept in confidence or if the
results will be communicated
with the superiors or with the
personnel department to support
special individual further devel-
opments.
Coaching is typically seen as
process consulting and the
managers are braced for their
role by giving feedback reflect-
ing and by the common search
for courses of action. This con-
sulting could take place during
the preparation or post process-
ing of a regional meeting, which
is joined by the coach as an ob-
server, too. In Addition to this
observation of appraisal inter-
views (sales interview, devel-
opment interview or conflict dis-
cussions) can be seen as
coaching, too. This observations
hasve to be reflected afterwards
to introduce more effective
methods and to develop the be-
haviour skills.
Concerning advanced trainings
coaching became a must-see for
managers – even specialists
should use this to develop them-
selves from having the expertise
to using the competence. Regard-
ing to this coaching is offered ad-
ditionally in development pro-
grammes as a further option. A
mixture of training and coaching
always leads to success.
In such management develop-
ment programmes coaching sup-
ports the transfer of the content to
the person, who develops his be-
haviour skills and embraced the
learned things afterwards. The pe-
ron gets some feedback and for
each difficult situation a “re-
hearsal room” and a dress re-
hearsal.
A further interesting aspect: The
manager as a coach for their em-
ployees. Empirically doing the
splits between the managing and
the coaching position is very diffi-
cult. The reasons for this are
manifold.
MTI Newsletter
Current projects of
MACHWÜRTH TEAM INTERNATIONAL
Organisational and Personnel Development
managers…
ƒ …are not an appropriate
coach
ƒ …are not qualified to be a
coach
ƒ …do definitely have not
enough time for coaching
ƒ …do not take enough time
for coaching
Nevertheless it turned out to be
helpful to introduce managers to
the methodically procedure and
the elements of coaching to op-
timise their leadership skills and
their personnel management.
MACHWÜRTH TEAM INTERNATIONAL • Dohrmanns Horst 19 • D-27374 Visselhövede
Telefon +49 (0) 42 62 / 93 12 - 0 • Fax +49 (0) 42 62 / 38 12
e-mail: info@mwteam.de • Internet: www.mwteam.de • www.mticonsultancy.com
That is for sure: within the growing
frequency of coachings they will
become better.
Coaching as a temporary
trend? Apparently not! Coach-
ing is rather seen as the trend
within professional personnel
development.
Even though a precise verifica-
tion of the Return on Invest-
ment of coaching measures is
very difficult to prove, one can
see basic positive changes
within the behaviour, the envi-
ronment anbd within the sphere
of influence of a manager. This
leads to better results referring
the company development.
After a process consulting or per-
sonal coaching the coachees con-
firm the functional and personal
benefit for their own further devel- MTI
opment.