A Mature Business Adds Navigational Coaching and Grows 20% In Revenue, Attracting Repeat Engagements

Introduction

OneCoaching
Fleur Dwyer and Barb Seaton
PO Box 8040
Wolumla NSW 2550
Australia

www.onecoaching.com.au

Since 2000, OneCoaching has been providing coaching services to executives, leaders and managers. The mission of OneCoaching is to transform the way leaders throughout the world relate and communicate. Fleur Dwyer and Barb Seaton, the Principals of OneCoaching, provide coaching skills to government, industry and education leaders in Australia, New Zealand, US, UK, Canada and Asia. Their primary services are Executive & Manager Coaching, Leadership Development, Coach Mentoring & Supervision. This interview was with both Fleur and Barb.

Situation

Our business was in good shape and we were pleased about the work we were doing and with our business financials. Our practice is mainly leadership development and a little coach mentoring. We do executive coaching with leaders and managers in both private and public organizations.

We already offered a “portfolio” of training programmes, and customized them to fit our clients’ needs. We were working on writing our own trainings, but due to busy schedules, that was mainly on an as-needed basis. We were introduced to Navigational Coaching by New Zealand colleagues who had Cheryl come over to train them. Corene, one of those colleagues spoke highly of NavC saying it has “an edge” and is tried and true, well thought out and gives good results.

We know Cheryl Smith, a consummate educator, and were impressed by her education of coaches and leaders. When we heard she and Brent had developed workshops to train facilitators, we wanted to know more. We learned that the training “grew” leaders in having essential conversations that develop others. Cheryl sent us an invite to the online training, and we signed up. We didn’t even have to travel to learn!

Solution

The training was excellent and introduced us to virtual “Blackboard Collaborate” as a tool. Because our business was mature, we found Navigational Coaching to be a timely and opportune addition to continue growing our business. We use NavC as the “foundation” for a longer-term program. We believe that a workshop alone does not work. Participants get very excited in the short term, but don’t incorporate the skills into their work lives.

We build the relationship with participants before we meet them in the training. We do a one-on-one coaching session with each participant before the first session. This is focused on ascertaining their strengths and what they want to get from the programme.

We split the training into two separate days with about two weeks in between. This gives them a good solid real life practice time. When they come back for the second day of training, they’ve already experimented. They have real work situations to ask about. They’ve deepened their engagement and learning.

During the second day of the workshop, previous participants come back as subjects to be coached. What we discovered is that participants really valued that because it’s based on real issues of the workplace. Working with colleagues who have already been trained in Navigational Coaching is more powerful. The types of developmental conversations are real issues.

After the second day’s program, we provide four webinar sessions using Blackboard Collaborate. These four virtual sessions extend the learning. These run fortnightly to celebrate progress and pick up on key ideas like the functions, principles, and dimensions of NavCoaching. They are actually a group coaching situation—done virtually. We make sure participants get a lot of practice. We model coaching behavior and expect participants to coach during the sessions. In addition, participants can opt for one-to-one coaching (typically two sessions) or “shadow coaching” (observing as they coach others).

Results

We’ve seen exceptional results for our business since we added Navigational Coaching in 2011. We were previously using three other programmes, but we now prefer to use NavC with our clients. Participants get better outcomes with this offering. Here are the results we’ve seen for our own business since adding Navigational Coaching:

• Adding NavC has given us a 20%+ increase in our business—with an emphasis on the “+”. It’s a vehicle to both expand our business and deliver greater value to our clients. Delivering that greater value has expanded our business without additional marketing efforts.
• Navigational Coaching generates quite a bit of business. We get requests to work one-on-one with an individual in an organization where we are providing NavC workshops to others. We also get invited to do sections of in-house training programs that clients conduct. Those who have already gone through the workshops promote our business.
• In spite of budgetary issues within the organization, client companies keep asking us to do additional workshops. They are impressed the outcomes the organization gets from their NavC investment.
• We get a lot of referrals from previous clients. Word of mouth spreads our reputation. Previous participants market for us. Human Resources people ask us to present at conferences and to continue working with their leaders.
• NavC fits into all sorts of terminology and leadership development applications. It can be used by key players in rolling out a performance management process. It builds organizational leadership capacity. It develops leadership skills
• It’s a great “frame” for a facilitator. It’s relatively easy to learn with lots of flexibility. It’s simple to tailor to a specific client and can be embellished as needed. Cheryl and Brent encourage you to customize it to your own specific business needs. This is where training developed by trainers is especially beneficial.
• It is entirely relevant to what goes on in organizations. Cheryl and Brent “keep their finger on the pulse”, and their material is state-of-the-art. They are acutely aware of what is really needed and their programme is reality based.
• An unforeseen result is that NavC also develops the executive coaching skills of the facilitators. There are a number of facets in this programme we’ve not seen in any other training especially the systematic, developmental frameworks. It enhances your own one-to-one coaching and increases your own capacity as a professional coach.

Where To Next?

Now you have an idea about how Navigational Coaching could enhance your facilitation practice, find out how you can Learn to Lead Navigational Coaching.