Emotional intelligence required for effective coaching

When you start out as a coach to uplift teams’ Agile and design capability you make some assumptions about how people will receive you, how they’ll respond to your advice and feedback on their performance and growth.

For example, you’ll probably assume that teams will respect your expertise and want to hear what you have to say about topics that you are more experienced in and knowledgeable of than them.

They may not.

You might assume that it’s obvious to the teams you coach that you’re there to take them on a journey from a low level of maturity to a higher level of maturity and that this levelling-up is not just desirable but expected by the organisation who engaged you.

They might not be ready to embark on that journey.

You might assume that people will be open to learning new skills and changing the way they work if you can demonstrate that new ways of working are more productive, efficient, humane, and result in better outcomes for their organisation and its customers or users.

They may think their current skill set is adequate.

People might believe they are already doing a good job, that their employer is happy with them and the work they do. Wouldn’t someone have told them if that wasn’t the case? They might believe they’re already delivering great outcomes for their organisation and its customers or users.

When a coach comes in the team may perceive them as a threat; a threat to the status quo, a threat to the team dynamic, a threat to their privacy, and for some a threat to their power and in some cases a threat to expose those who have been slacking off on the job.

It is incredibly challenging and confronting to hear that the way they’ve been working and the results they’ve been delivering have room for improvement, which implies there’s a shortfall or deficiency.

People don’t want to accept that the skills and knowledge that has stood them in good stead for years might now be less valued, that what was A-grade last year is B-grade this year. This doesn’t mean that’s the true state of affairs but rather the perception of people who have had a coach thrust upon them.

It’s reasonable to feel threatened when outsiders coming in and interfere, observing, assessing, and upsetting the equilibrium. These teams don’t know you and they aren’t impressed by how many qualifications you have on your business card.

They might conceal their fear and anxiety by trying to make you irrelevant “The methodology you preach won’t work here” or “You don’t know us well enough to give valid advice” or “How hard can it be? If we have to change we’ll figure it out on our own, thanks”.

(This is most relevant to my experience working with teams in Australia and different cultures will have different norms around deference to expertise, self-worth, confidence, and what doing a good job looks like to them)

Emotional intelligence and identifying people’s fears and what underlies their concerns are critically important for coaches when engaging with new teams, especially when you are seen to have an agenda such as teaching them Scrum or design thinking.

For coaches who are not employed in-house, you won’t have the time to sit quietly, hold out your hand, and wait for them to come to you. You must get results and fast to keep your client happy. Perhaps you’re tempted to use the team’s management to coerce the team into cooperating with you. That’s a terrible option that will only exacerbate resistance, drive it underground out of sight, and lead to increased friction and burnout for everyone.

Instead, go to the team, sit with them, show an interest, find out what you need to do to demonstrate you are not a threat, recognise their fears and discuss them compassionately and curiously. Understand what the team values, what is important to them. Help them transition to seeing themselves and what they do through a new lens.

But do not compromise on the subject matter. Do not make what you’re teaching them more palatable by diluting it and opting for a “lite” version of skills and knowledge. If you’re there to uplift a team’s Scrum maturity then you must achieve that. If you’re there to teach and coach in design thinking then make sure when you finish you’re leaving a team of design thinkers.