Delivery of Value

There is often consternation on how to measure coaching, most organisations want to see a return on investment (ROI) for everything they undertake. Whether it be directed training for staff or the introduction of new equipment and I.T. systems. Coaching is not exempt from this metric, however, there are other ways to measure the benefits that coaching brings to an organisation.

Over previous decades there has been a focus on creating high performing individuals and teams, focussing on output and performance levels, making people more efficient and therefore more productive. This is where coaching is measured more traditionally as ROI, how have executives and leaders become more productive, are goals being achieved and KPI’s met or even surpassed.

In previous years coaching has been offered as part of a development pathway for leaders, designed to increase self-awareness and enhance performance in order to support wider goals within a company. This kind of approach can be measured not just against a financial return. Studies have shown that a happy workforce is a more productive workforce, by using this as a metric to determine the impact of coaching, i.e., evaluating staff engagement levels and contentment, we are able to clarify the effect of coaching in a different way.

When measuring coaching in this way there are key things to be remembered, the clearer an organisation is on what they want coaching to achieve, the easier they will be able to identify its influence. If coaching is not aligned to business values and there is no clear desired outcome, then ability to determine impact will be compromised.

As discussed by Jones & Gorell (2018) “what gets measured gets managed”, this refers to how our minds work, where we focus our attention tends to be where our actions are focussed also. Thus, if we focus purely on the ROI then coaching will only be viewed in the financial sense. It is imperative that coaching should also be evaluated and not just measured.

This evaluation must be a constant theme throughout the coaching process, it must consider the views and opinions of all those involved, and the feedback provided at each stage (pre coaching, during, post coaching) should be used to assess the experience of those involved and the impact it has had at both an organisational and individual level. There are numerous ways to do this, however, Jones & Gorell suggest surveys are one way that this feedback can be garnered. The question set must be carefully considered so as not to limit responses of one type over another. Neutrality and independence are key, only then can a true measure of coaching’s impact be ascertained. Utilising a model such as the continuous improvement cycle ensures the feedback being provided is acted upon and positive changes are made when needed.

Whichever method of measurement is chosen, the organisation must be clear on what they expect coaching to achieve, as previously mentioned, if this is unclear and we do not know why coaching is even happening, how can we expect to assess its value to the organisation and the individual.

More recently, there appears to be evidence suggesting that employees now view having meaning to their work as equally important to renumeration and job security. This is another area where coaching can be useful and its value assessed, through coaching we are able to increase levels of self-awareness and provide the opportunity for coachees to consider their own ethical compass and core values when deciding on their goals.