Peer Coaching Impacts Leadership Development
Bobbie, part of a peer coaching circle that is meeting monthly, says “finding the time currently to be more proactive is a struggle”. After asking a few questions to better understand Bobbie’s challenge and context, the peer coaching group members (and the circle facilitator) begin providing advice while Bobbie listens:
- I suggest you build 90 min into your calendar everyday for “proactive” time and be firm in not booking meetings during this time
- Involve your team members in this topic and ask them what you can delegate more operational stuff to them in the future that will contribute to their learning
- Review your top 3 priorities weekly and find time to make progress on these
- Building on to the advice just given, you might have to say no to conflicting requests / expectations
- Review all the meetings you attend and ask “do I really need to attend these?”
The above is a typical peer coaching circle scenario. When facilitating our leadership development programs, we consistently hear that the peer coaching component is very impactful for participants. While there are a number of reasons why, the key one is that participants are given practical and solution orientated ideas for implementation that they would readily not receive in their intact teams. The value that leaders derive from the discussions is of such a nature that they often continue meeting in their circles after the leadership development program has come to an end.
Peer coaching circles can be an integral part of an overarching leadership development initiative, and they can be facilitated independently of a bigger program. Relatively easy to implement, some of the questions you might consider in making them happen in your organization:
- What is your vision for the process? What is the overall purpose?
- Who will I target, and how will I invite them to join?
- How many sessions over how many months will be scheduled?
- Should I start with a pilot? And if so, how can I use successes from the pilot to roll it out further?
- What methodology will I use in the peer coaching meetings?
Bobbie might decide not to implement all the advice received and implementing a few of the ideas that do resonate enable her to continue to grow as a leader.
We’ve launched a new cohort-based public peer coaching process that is primarily aimed at Director and Manager level. More details on what is covered and how the process works can be found here.
Nic Tsangarakis, Principal
nict@kwelaleadership.com