My Leader Is My Coach

Abstract

Modern leadership theories emphasize that one of the leader's roles is to develop and support employees to fulfill their career development goals. Coaching is one effective practice for helping people develop their potential. However, substantial differences exist between the traditional and the leader-follower coaching dyads. While traditionally the whole interpersonal experience with a coach happens within the coaching practice, the leader and the follower share many experiences at both the dyadic and the team levels. Furthermore, while the goals of traditional coaching are set around the personal development of the coachee, leaders also need to direct followers toward common goals and take managerial tasks like monitoring performance and distributing rewards. This chapter explores the dynamics of building a coaching relationship within the leader-follower dyad. The authors advocate the need to sustain a coaching-inductive relationship throughout all the interactions of the leader and the follower beyond the coaching interactions. They present two case studies to showcase these principles.