How To Start A Coaching Conversation

Transcript

Hi there, this is Blair from BravaTrak.

You'll recall in a previous post, I introduced the idea of taking a coaching approach in what you ask three distinct levels of questions, when you want to guide behaviour.

Those three levels are;

  • Level one, ask questions about the facts, situation, behaviour, and thoughts.

  • Level two, ask questions to get people to elaborate further by providing more in-depth explanation and assessment.

  • And level three, ask questions to get people to think about the consequences of their actions.

How To Start A Coaching Conversation When Running A Coaching Session With An Employee

Today, I want to talk about first level questions. They're the preliminary questions that open up a topic by revealing the facts, the situation, the behaviours and the thoughts of the other person.

They're used to gain a basic understanding of a subject, so they're the best questions to ask when beginning a coaching conversation. When you're coaching, these might be questions like;

  • "What are you trying to achieve?"

  • "What's your timeline for getting this resolved?"

  • "What have you tried already?"

  • "Who else have you talked to?"

Level one questions are important. You need to establish the facts about the current situation. But while the information they uncover is very helpful to you, they don't do much for the other person. For that, you have to get into second level questions. I'll talk about them in my next post.

For the moment, that's my take. What do you think?