Bad news

The good news

Team-centric coaching approach

Conclusion

Selected bibliography

Team-centric coaching approach

Team-Centric Coaching (TCC) approach is based on the facts that employees routinely accept and follow their freely agreed contracts. Moreover, the concept of “employment contract” between an organization and an individual is generally understood to be only a rough guideline of deliverables. The new concept is that of an “interpersonal” contract between team leaders and players. They are rooted in mutual personal identity and shared leadership in a team context as a partner. The team is seen as a triad of leader, players, and coach. Following the sports analogy for the present, after the hiring, coaches intervene to negotiate interpersonal team contracts with players. The operation of a team filled with such negotiated contracts is charismatic. Teams with a greater proportion of partners have a huge advantage. The proportion of contract players is the coach’s job and they take pride in the development of partners within their team. Interpersonal team contracts are based on agreement of shared respect for competence, trust in character, and benevolence in personality. They serve as reciprocal agreements that depend on and tend to generate respect, trust, and generous humor. When players agree on mutual goals, they remind each other of this when necessary. They help each other grow in knowledge and skill. In other words, they act as partners. A coach can call “time out” and suggest different tactics when the team is faltering. Coaches and players work collaboratively on continuous improvement, and when they overcome a challenge, players and coaches rejoice. Players, coaches, and leaders agree on members’ contributions to the team and leaders and players do the same for their coach. In work organizations other than sports, laws and regulations inhibit team leaders from approaching a player without an invitation to talk about career matters. Many of these laws define crossing the line when a player “feels uncomfortable.” New team architecture will drive changes to these constraints. Here are some coaching ideas for those in charge: (1) Begin by offering an executive coach relationship, (2) respect team members and build competence and trust, (3) practice benevolence and patience, (4) communicate in cultural language, (5) celebrate small gains, (6) instill team as “psychological profit center”, (۷) seek continuous growth and flexibility, and (8) enable continuous engagement in projects.