Captain Hindsight – Cliff Notes for Coaching – Language and Tone

What I’ve learning (and wish I had known in hindsight) about being a good coach is:

Language and Tone:

Phrase things as “we”. You are working together. Make the person you are coaching feel like you are on their team, there to support them.

This leads to less “You did it wrong” language being used or “I am bad at this” thoughts occurring –  which are both self-esteem crushers.

Ask questions to see if they understand what you’ve said.

Don’t ask: “Does that make sense?” Many people will often say yes because they don’t want to appear stupid.

Try: “Ok, let’s move the browser to the left side of the screen. What keys do we need to press?”

This is the second of five ‘captain hindsight’ blog posts about things I wish I knew when I started coaching. Click here to read the other four posts in the blog series.