Coaching, Coach Training & Culture
Organizational culture refers to the personality of an
organization. An organizational culture guides and limits how employees
communicate and work. Although organizational values and ethics may be
reflected in mission statements, codes of conduct, web sites, office
décor and employee titles; organizations culture seem more profoundly
determined by the attitudes expressed by managers.
An organizational culture reflects the history, customers and management
structure of an organization. Although the internet and journals can help
communicate an organization's services and products, these questions often
offer more insight into an organization's culture:
- Who can be trained? Who is trained?
- Are employees expected to be mobile?
- Does training bring respect or alienation?
- What must employees do to be promoted?
- Are customers considered to be intelligent?
- Do line employees generally trust their managers?
- Do employees and their managers communicate easily?
- Are the organizational values aligned with local cultural values?
- What are the consequences to employees who show creativity or initiative?
Whether an organization is a military unit, an international bank or a
computer store, people who violate or ignore cultural rules may alienate
themselves from their customers and employees. To be effective, efforts to improve
employee and organizational efficiency can integrate cultural differences.
Do you want to create and maintain a consistent corporate culture across
many locations? We can help you develop standard procedures, objectives and
staff attitudes to apply to people in different areas. This is a major yet
essential task that many managers avoid. We can help you.
Accelerated Learning & Expert Modeling
We can help you create and maintain corporate culture by training and
retaining staff. If you
commit to employee development - your employees are more likely to commit
to you. Our in-house coaching and coach training can help you
maximize cost-effectiveness, content quality and employee
retention.
Our systemic coaching and coach training offers
accelerated learning solutions
for skill gaps in both entry-level staff and older managers, while
expert modeling can
minimize the time for individuals who show potential to acquire expertise.
In-House Coaching & Coach Training
Coaching is still a new profession. Success, relationship and team coaching
are hardly known in most of the world. The word coaching is difficult
to translate into many European languages, while avoiding the words for sport,
counseling, consulting and therapy.
Although systemic coaching and coach training may not satisfy every need, in-house
training offers many benefits. If cost-effective in-house skill training can be
integrated into daily work, training programs can immediately improve
bottom line profits - sales training, stress management and communication for
example. Systemic coaching
can fill other organizational and management needs.
Employee orientation and follow-up training can reinforce corporate
culture, policies and objectives while contributing to operational efficiency.
However, few smaller or mid-size organizations can create their own dedicated
coaching and training programs.
Finding Good Coaches & Trainers
Good trainers are scarce. A trainer with solid business experience can
earn far more as a manager than as a trainer; and inexperienced trainers may
not be very effective. Many qualified managers could be good trainers, but they
are too busy. Most organizations avoid "losing" their best managers
to become trainers. Instead, they often hire young university graduates as
instructors, hoping that inexperienced instructors will somehow evolve into
mature, competent trainers without damaging any employees.
Good luck! If you find competent trainers, you also need a curriculum
and training materials tailored to your needs. Although some experienced
trainers may also be excellent program developers, most trainers use
training materials supplied by third-party providers - usually from book stores.
Training materials that do not reflect your corporate culture and needs
may negate the benefits of local trainers. Most commercial training aids
in local languages are translations of outdated English
manuals. The aids have limited relevance, quality and cultural applicability,
and may be detrimental. Fifty year-old American training manuals translated
into Arabic may have unpleasant yet predictable results.
The best in-house training programs are managed by experienced trainers who create
customized training packages and who mentor local assistants to
become trainers. (See: Expert Modeling).
Local Outsourcing
Most training companies offer basic
staff development, language instruction and clerical training. Local
training companies can be a resource for teaching these core skills. They are
useful for smaller companies that cannot maintain training departments.
It may be difficult to find competent
trainers who can teach more complex skills with culturally specific
training aids. Outside large cities this may be impossible. (Coaching and training
companies have trouble keeping competent coaches and trainers - they are
often recruited by their client companies.)
Overseas Training
While local training programs can be effective, overseas work-study
programs can help develop high-potential staff. In addition to
the benefits of education and cultural understanding, foreign training may
brings status, which can boost a manager's motivation and effectiveness.
While overseas training can be transformative, transformed employees
may leave your company ...
Integrate Strategies
Creating effective training strategies requires a deep understanding of
training goals and management resources. Some questions that can help us coach you are:
- What are your attrition rates?
- What is your organization's size?
- What are your organization's objectives?
- What are essential missing competencies?
- What curricula and training aids do you require?
- What will likely happen if a workgroup is not trained?
- What are the performance objectives for each workgroup?
We can help you combine your options to
optimize the number of staff trained, cost-effectiveness, quality of content
and employee retention. We can help you create this powerful combination for
developing your managers, employees and potential leaders.
