February 2022

How are you viewing the role of agile coaching with individuals and with teams?

When do you make the time and focus on your leadership skills?

What if… you could focus your efforts on learning and then practice what you are learning, all within the same learning arc?

What will it take to feel competent and experienced in your agile coaching practice?

We know from our experience as Agile coaches that the following exercises will help you gain confidence and competence

skill drills
peer coaching
team coaching
ongoing group work
professional one-on-one coaching
one-on-one supervision of actual Agile coaching sessions in your own work environment

Let’s get this straight: scaling a coaching business or working as a leader in a large corporation can feel lonely. We know, as we’ve been there ourselves.

Connecting with and being surrounded with like-minded leaders can mean the difference between success and failure, confidence and doubt.

The TeamCatapult Cohort Program is an in-depth, 9-month program emphasizing rigorous practice accompanied with feedback opportunities in your own work environment.

Leaders and coaches gain competency in

Learning how to evaluate and assess where a team is at on their journey to high performance
Stepping in and helping teams have difficult conversations with grace and ease
Understanding the capacity to grow teams and individuals

How to Attain Transformative, Empowered Leadership Skills

“Find a group of people who challenge and inspire you, spend a lot of time with them, and it will change your life forever.”~ Amy Poehler

You can not become a leader all on your own. You need a tribe of people who you can go on this journey with. The Coaching Agility From Within Cohort offers this opportunity to leaders wherever they are!

In our program, the support from peers as well as cohort leaders is phenomenal. To attain transformative, empowered leadership skills, our cohort members experience the following as part of their cohort participation:

1 Weekly Group Cohort Calls

Weekly calls can vary in format to include case studies, triad and dyad practice, and coaching. The program includes over twenty group cohort sessions

2 Residential Retreat

At the residential retreat, cohort participants take a deep dive into the practice of team coaching. Participants take all of the learning in each competency and practice integrating it into their work with teams. This retreat prepares participants to level up their work.

3 Capstone Agile Coaching Stance

The program will conclude with the development and articulation of an Agile coaching stance, including how participants work with teams and why they do what they do.

4 Individual Professional Coaching with a Certified Professional Coach

One of the best ways to learn coaching is to receive individual coaching. These calls provide space for personal growth by providing rich time for reflection and feedback.

5 Reading and Journaling

Developing the skills of an Agile coach requires attention to your own development first. Each month, participants complete assignments designed to expand one’s knowledge and self-awareness.

6 Small Group Calls

Periodically throughout the program, there will be small group calls focusing on skills practice or on group supervision. These calls are designed to deepen overall understanding and awareness.

7 Supervisions

The program includes one-on-one supervision with a cohort co-leader. Each session assesses a video (or audio) that you provide, in a real-world situation and you get supervision and feedback.

At the end of the program, you will have 100 hours of coaching, team coaching, mentoring, facilitation and training practice!

After the Cohort

Our cohort participants don’t stop learning after nine months. They continue their journey together. Past participants may choose to be part of our Cohort Community, where one can continue to share, learn and grow leadership range in the community setting

From a cohort participant:

“Being in the course is an amazing opportunity…even if you think you have enough knowledge or experience, you will find more!”

Are You Ready to Grow Your Leadership Range?

Cohort members come from all places in the world, from all walks of life and have a vast variety of work and life experiences. What unites our participants is the drive to grow, to learn and to become a better leader.

We would love to talk to you and learn more about you.

Schedule a 15-minute meeting to ask questions, get more details and meet with a Cohort Co-leader.

Leaders lead companies, boards, teams, groups, cohorts.

In other words, leaders lead… people.

How do leaders do it? How do leaders connect to and stay connected with the people they lead?

Keep on reading!

1 Listening, Not to React, But to Hear

Leaders should be curious. They should listen with intent to hear, not to respond and react to what is being said.

How do you do this?

Intentional listening is a skill that involves suspending judgment while focusing on the person who is talking, giving them undivided attention. Intentional listening is a way of listening to understand what is being said.

Learn more about international listening and curiosity here.

2 Dare to Dialogue

Leaders, I challenge you. Dare to dialogue.

Having real conversations with real people is a leadership skill.

“In dialogue, like in debate, you can have a perspective, but your viewpoint doesn’t guide the conversation. In fact, in dialogue you suspend your point of view, not only to hear the other’s perspective, but to ask them more about it. This is the space of curiosity and inquiry and listening without resistance, because this is where new thinking and innovation live.”

Dialogue is where leaders gain greater insight and agility.

3 Shared Common Interests

The art of being with other human beings requires you to be human. That means showing up as a human and being willing to share that side of you with your team.

Leaders inspire by doing, by leading, by setting the right example.

If you are active on LinkedIn, you will know what I mean. There are so many wonderful leadership stories on LinkedIn these days, great examples of how leaders share common interests, and are showing up for their teams.

4 Body Language

While in 2022 more and more people are working from home, and meetings are often conducted behind a screen, body language continues to be an important tool for leaders to connect with the people on their team.

Sitting behind screens vs being in the same room, makes reading body language a bit more complicated.

In this recent article about hybrid meetings, we emphasized the need for the meeting facilitator to recognize the importance of the webcam!

“As the facilitator, you will have some specific requests for participants in order to make the session the most effective. Be sure to share these, along with other logistics and joining information, with participants ahead of time.”

One camera, one mic, one mouse per person

Be on camera
Be off mute
Be prepared to be called on

Whether you meet with the team you lead in person, virtually or in a hybrid form, being able to read body language is of utmost importance.

Why?

This “7-38-5 rule” states that 7 percent of meaning is communicated through spoken word, 38 percent through tone of voice, and 55 percent through body language. This 7-38-55 rule was developed by psychology professor Albert Mehrabian at the University of California, Los Angeles, who laid out the concept in his 1971 book Silent Messages (1971).

5 Keeping the Connection

Last but not least, leaders put effort into keeping the connection with their team! Everything you do, including the words you use and the energy you have, matters!

Leaders bring the weather!

“Early in my career, I worked at a small startup and we had a private chat channel. When the CEO arrived each morning, someone would give a weather report in the chat. It’s cloudy, it’s sunny, it’s stormy, literally what the mood of the CEO was. This weather report informed my plan and others for the day. On sunny days, I knew I could have important conversations that mattered. If the weather was stormy or cloudy, those were the days that I wanted to lay low and go home early if possible. As leaders, you don’t have to have a title to be a leader, but you bring the weather. So, your words, your energy, your tone, all matter. When you are frantically running down the road, too busy to pause and ask questions, you send the message that there’s no space for conversation here.”

Bring the weather, day after day and stay connected to your team by meeting in small groups like Ahmed Sidky did.

Leadership Lessons. A Journey to Agile Team Facilitation

We invite you, the kind of leader who wants to continue on their leadership journey to check our offering of workshops.

In particular, our virtual Agile team Facilitation Workshop touches on many of the leadership lessons mentioned in this article. If you are a team leader, don’t miss this chance to learn to design and lead engaging, purposeful and fun meetings…and achieve results every time.

Archives for February 2022

How to Feel Competent and Experienced in Your Agile Coaching Practice