If you are a sales manager, you know firsthand the challenges of maintaining the right mix of elements for a healthy sales environment that delivers results. One of the key components is the ongoing development of your sales team through your own coaching skills. There are many aspects of coaching that set outstanding coaches apart from mediocre coaches and it all starts with setting a foundation built on trust and empathy.
Many coaches make the mistake of focusing primarily on the numbers and never build a strong enough personal relationship with their team members to be truly effective coaches. I recall working with a very well-respected and to large extent well-feared manager. His nickname was ‘The General’ as he was always very serious and always focused on the task or mission. No one wanted to be the recipient of his inquiries into why you didn’t have the parts necessary to support the production build for that day. The questions were direct and left no wiggle room for avoiding the painful truth. At the core, the questions were problem-solving based and not personal attacks, but it rarely felt that way especially when you got ‘the eyebrow’. When ‘The General’ heard something that didn’t make sense, he would oftentimes give you a look with one eyebrow lowered and one eyebrow raised that signaled he wasn’t buying what you were selling. Your goal then became to change topics or end the inquiry as quickly as possible. Almost always the discussion included suggestions, that most often felt like directives, for fixing the problem but they got lost in the pressure of the questioning and ‘the eyebrow’. During an off-site team building session with the plant leadership session, we did an exercise where we sat with every other team member in a one on one session to share feedback with each other. I knew ‘The General’ cared about the development of his staff and his motivation was to build the capacity in others to be proactive in putting in place systems to drive long-term improvement. I had this insight from reporting to him for a couple of years and we regularly had discussions about the development of each of the team members. The problem was none of the team members knew that he really cared about their individual growth and development especially when getting ‘the eyebrow’.
My feedback during our one on one session focused on him letting his people know that he cared about them as I knew he did and try to connect with them on a more personal level. The one line I recall specifically saying to him was “no one cares how much you know until they know how much you care”. I could sense my words struck a nerve with him and he took my comments to heart. Over the next several months, a different side of ‘The General’ gradually appeared and resulted in him being even more effective as one of the leaders of our senior leadership team. He made an effort to connect with his direct reports and peers on a more personal level, he began to share his dry sense of humor more often to everyone’s surprise and delight but most importantly, he in his own way conveyed the message that he cared for others on a personal level.
Trust begins to develop when employees understand that the person providing the coaching is truly vested in employee’s best interest and not the coach’s best interest. People are smart enough to detect when someone is using their positional authority to get them to ‘buy-in’ to their idea or worse, trying to manipulate them into doing something that is best for the coach. People need to know the coach really cares about their own personal growth and performance before they will truly open up and accept the coaching being offered.
Empathy is just as important as trust in that the coach must demonstrate a human side so the employee knows the coach cares for them as a person. Demostrating empathy as a leader doesn’t mean accepting poor performance or saying “it’s okay” or feeling sorry when someone’s performance is not up standard. Feeling sorry for someone is a form of sympathy or pity and high-performaners are not interested in receiving sympathy. Being empathetic is simply acknowleding the other person’s feelings or their human sides when discussing their performance. High performaners do want to know that they effort, contribution and they as individuals are appreciated.
Getting back to ‘The General’. What happened over time is the people began to ‘trust’ that ‘The General’ cared about them as much or more than he cared about making quality engines that day. They knew he was vested in what was best for them and not what was best for him personally. That increased trust led to reduced fear and better coaching conversations. He also opened up on a more personal level, was more empathetic and connected on a personal level better than in the past. The results were noticeable in both the relationships with and the performance of the people that reported to him. ‘The General’ became even more well-respected and was not nearly as well-feared yet no one still wanted to get ‘the eyebrow’.
