Group Coaching
Group coaching within organisations is a safe, confidential space for small groups of colleagues to come together to explore the wicked, often relational, challenges they face in their roles.
Group coaching sessions are a great way to create psychological safety and a sense of belonging that allows the right (often ‘difficult’) conversations to happen and the best ideas to come to the fore.
When groups are formed across organisations, coaching is a way for leaders to find community, support and challenge with peers in other organisations.
In both cases, the agenda is set entirely by the group. It can encompass any reflection or exploration that supports members to bring their best selves to their senior leadership roles.
What is group coaching?
Group coaching benefits
Group coaching has a great bearing on organisational culture, particularly as it enhances psychological safety between colleagues, allowing them to be honest and effective and to hold boundaries that work for them. Specifically, it:
Improves collaboration, support and challenges between colleagues within and outside of the coaching space. In my latest programme, we recorded 75% of participants felt it did so ‘to a great extent’. To feel more closely connected and build deeper relationships with colleagues.
Enhances individuals’ sense of community and belonging - Gemma Cottingham, Headteacher, found it most valuable “to share our experiences with one another and gain support from colleagues with common issues arising.”
“We definitely became much closer as a group, and I personally was able to share experiences that I would never have done before.”
Jo Hall, Headteacher
Improves mental health and well-being - Michelle Scott, Executive Headteacher, said that what she found most valuable was “Sharing, feeling understood, feeling supported, sharing experiences in a non-judgmental way.”
Group coaching across organisations, where leaders come together to share with peers in similar roles but in different organisations, helps members:
Find community & belonging by developing an awareness that they are not alone, that their challenges are human, and that their responses are too! Meaningful, vulnerable conversations bind people together at a greater level of depth that sustains well beyond the programme.
Build their leadership skills and enhance their toolkit by learning and growing with the support and challenge of a group of peers who are invested in them and non-attached to their organisation.
Build their resilience as a result of feeling seen, nurtured and supported in a way that nourishes them as human beings. Members leave with more energy and resolve to sustain themselves, the people they lead and their organisations.
How does group coaching work?
Groups meet on average six times, once per month, for two hours.
I use an action learning set methodology to ensure equity of voice and a balanced blend of coaching and mentoring.
Each participant has a turn ‘in the hot seat’ during each session when they explore a topic of their choice.
As the coach, I offer tools and models, where helpful, to support individual and group reflection.
To hear more about how I can help, get in touch for a chat!