Effective leaders have several approaches in their toolkit. Sometimes they give direction, sometimes they need to delegate, and sometimes they choose to collaborate.

Coaching is another powerful tool in an effective leader’s toolkit.

Long considered a “nice to have” soft skill, recent research shows that coaching is actually one of the most powerful tools to increase engagement, strengthen relationships, generate ownership, and support team members.

At its core, coaching is about building more productive and enduring relationships, helping colleagues understand what they want and what stands in their way, and supporting people to be maximally effective. It’s a core leadership skill.

And yet, leaders are rarely taught how to coach. Many organizations teach leaders how to navigate conflict, give tough feedback, delegate, and communicate effectively. Layering in coaching skills takes all of this to the next level.

Coaching skills are like rocket fuel in a leader’s capabilities.

At The Boda Group, we’re both leaders and certified coaches. We understand many of the challenges and opportunities our clients face, because we’ve been there. We’ve been trained, and we’ve logged thousands of hours coaching leaders. We can help leaders develop coaching skills to improve their interaction with other leaders, teams, and the organization. Our clients find that coaching is as useful for their high-potential and newer leaders as it is for their most senior leaders.

The six-month A Coaching Approach for Leaders program is built on a foundation of rigorous research and taught by a group of certified and very experienced coaches. But sometimes, it’s just not practical to get a group of leaders together in the same location four times in six months.

In this case, the four individual workshops that comprise A Coaching Approach for Leaders can be delivered either together or individually to meet your organization’s needs.

Coaching sounds easy, and yet we find that most leaders struggle mightily with really listening, being empathetic, and asking helpful questions. Perhaps most difficult of all is resisting the urge to give advice or just solve the problem themselves.

The individual coaching workshops are fun, address real issues, stretch leaders out of their comfort zone, and build important leadership skills.