Job coaching: What is it?

Bertrand Huck, Talentis coach, describes his experience and the challenges in supporting directors and managers to take office.

What are the challenges for companies to secure the employment of their talents?

“What we are seeing, and several studies show it, is that around 50% of new positions taken up in new contexts, of course for managers and managers, end up failing after two years, which is colossal, and therefore, it is a waste of time, money and energy for all parties. Especially since we often put a lot of resources into recruiting to find the rare pearl. Once you find it, you throw it into the deep end and you imagine that the person will do the trick. In reality, it's a bit more complicated than that.”

What are the main challenges for managers?

“The manager, of course, is expected to quickly bring added value in terms of vision, strategy or even the transformation of the organization. So his challenge is to quickly understand where the challenges, the challenges are going to be and how he will be able to find the transformation levers that will really allow him to make a difference quite quickly. However, nowadays, he has less and less time to do that.”

And for managers, what are the main challenges?

“A manager who arrives in a new context is expected fairly quickly on results. However, for him, the challenge will already be to integrate this new context, because the strategic framework will be given to him. The difficulty will be to integrate it as quickly as possible and therefore, to dare to challenge its hierarchical line, its own management, in order to obtain the maximum understanding, elements and visibility on the strategic challenges of the company. We can also identify organizational and cultural elements, methods of organization, operation, communication, decision-making processes, etc... A lot of things that it has to integrate in order to be able to be operational as quickly as possible.”

What is the benefit of individual coaching during job coaching?

“When you take on new roles, I want to say that there are three axes:

· The first is to integrate this new context, ensure that you quickly demonstrate the expected skills and be able to make the right decisions.

· At the same time, do not rush too much, - because haste can also lead us into error and into some form of feeling of failure that can be quite rapid.

· Third, it's also often something that happens on a more personal level. The new leader obtains new responsibilities, this also leads to transformations in terms of identity, that is to say: “Who am I in this new role? ”. It's a new identity, and it sometimes challenges people more than they can imagine.

These are a lot of elements that create pressure and stress in a period that is ultimately quite short: taking office is six to nine months, sometimes even less. We leave quite little time, so it is important to have a space where the manager, the manager taking office, has the opportunity to take a step back and gain perspective.

What can help is to have a sparring partner who will both be there to support him, but who will also confront him, give him feedback and help him to remain vigilant and not to drown himself in this flood of information to be integrated.”

Is it different for young managers?

“Perhaps there is something specific about young managers who take up their duties, sometimes for the first time in this type of position: this is what I call the “waiting room syndrome”. That is, they need to have information, but sometimes they don't dare to ask for it, whether from colleagues or, of course, from their own manager. Moreover, managers of managers are also very busy. They have found this famous rare pearl, they put it in place, they think that if it does not ask for anything, it is because the person is managing, and finally, we are wasting time.

This is also our role in coaching, helping managers dared to reach out to others, and in particular their line of command, to obtain the information they need as quickly as possible and not stay in the waiting room. This is sometimes difficult to do because the relationship of trust has not yet been established, however, if the manager of the manager does not take the step, it is up to the neo manager to do it. And so, in the context of coaching, very often too, we succeed in triggering this trigger for this approach to take place.”

Do you have an anecdote about taking office?

“What has already happened to me is sometimes meeting managers or managers of people who are taking on new challenges, who are extremely enthusiastic at the start and maybe even who are in a kind of naive way. And then, faced with the first difficulties, it's a bit of a cold shower, and these people, at that moment, are often plunged into a form of doubt and ask themselves a lot of questions.

I remember a coachee I accompanied and who was on the verge of giving up, of saying no, who thought that the suit was too big and that he would not make it, there was really this feeling of not being able to do it. And in fact, we worked a lot to try to restore his confidence, to find the first points of contact, which were the first intermediate successes. And finally, it was a great success, both personally and professionally. Most likely, without this support, this person would have abandoned the business and would probably have missed out on a very good opportunity.”

“Change can also be a big challenge, it's not easy, even when you wanted to reach this new position on your own. The fact of going through these difficulties and finally coming out of them with a sense of success and personal accomplishment is still quite satisfying, for the coach and the coachee.”

If you too want to support your new manager or manager when they take office, consult our offers and do not hesitate to contact us for more information.

Contact us!