Five Benefits of ICF Team Coaching

“No one can whistle a symphony. It takes a whole orchestra to play it.” – H.E. Luccock

Despite playing together as a band Mick Jagger, Charlie Watts, Keith Richards, and Ronnie Wood (The Rolling Stones) for more than 50 years, they recognize the importance of practising together.

To internalize a habit we need to define a shared approach to working together.  We need to practice it over and over again till it becomes a part of our being. 

Before every tour, The Rolling Stones apparently commit to two months of rehearsing. They firmly believe in the opportunity to reconnect for picking up their collective rhythm and they perform with almost telepathic communication.

Collective rhythm… isn’t that something that your team is missing… If yes, then read along.

If they ever feel that the pace is dragging, a glance from Richards to Wood does it all. Together they will then step up the pace. Each member of the band realizes how they complement each other and yet are quite unique to the team. Being part of the Rolling Stones enables each member to accomplish their individual goals. 

The best teams are those which incorporate personal goals with the larger shared goal of the organization and understand the greater importance of achieving them while propelling the team forward.

Just like Rome was not built in a day, it takes an earnest, continuous and sustainable effort to build high-performance teams within the Organizational paradigm.

It sure takes time to build teams which can work in synergy for optimum outcomes. 

But before we dive deep into how these outcomes can be derived, let us understand the traditional meaning of the word team, and why some teams succeed while others fail. What are the dynamics that make or break a team?

A team is a group of people who come together to perform tasks which are either interdependent or interrelated to accomplish a specific objective. In that sense, all organizations are teams. But within the context of the organization, they are divided into sub-teams to perform very definitive functions for achieving the desired outcomes. Understanding the dynamics of the interrelationships in these units within the organizational structure and the impact of these on the quality of outcomes makes the team extremely important.

We must realize that teams don’t work in isolation and teams can be effective and efficient in delivering only if the members subscribe to shared objectives and goals. Teams have a far-reaching impact on employee motivation and organizational productivity.

For any organization to succeed, its teams need to function like well-oiled machines so that the necessary milestones are achieved. But many times, organizations fail to understand team dynamics which can disrupt harmony. Some of the reasons why teams fail to perform are:

If you feel that your teams are struggling, let us help your teams find their synergy!

Team Coaching is extremely beneficial as it unleashes the collective potential of the members of the team. Besides, Team Coaching helps teams to define goals, carve out a vision and foster team spirit.

Organizations the world over, understand how they can gain by working in teams and the role Team Coaching can play in leveraging the potential of the teams. Therefore most organizations want to harness this capacity of the teams through Team Coaching. It has yielded significant results for organizations in terms of increased performance, and trust among members besides nurturing skill sets.

● Team Coaching helps individuals to sharpen their skills so they can perform efficiently.

● Team Coaching also helps in developing healthy professional relations.

● Creates workspaces which are supportive, inclusive empathetic and non-judgemental

● Promotes a sense of camaraderie where individual team members feel valued and aligned to the cause of the team.

● Helps in employee retention as individuals feel included and a part of the organizational ecosystem. 

Increasingly organizations are recognizing the role of Team Coaching and the importance of team efficacy for sustained growth. Therefore Team Coaching has become a niche field under the umbrella of Coaching. Team Coaching has become an important intervention that Corporates are looking for in their teams to sustain rigour and align to the bigger goals of the organization and adapt to internal and external changes.

ICF Team Coaching encompasses within its ambit, the core competencies of ICF Coaching besides other modalities Team Coaches use for Coaching.

The ICF team Coaching is an extension of the core competencies prescribed by the ICF for Coaching.

ICF defines “Team Coaching as a partnership where teams are well aware of the interplay of dynamics”. With this deeply embodied, they embark on a path of maximizing their potential to attain shared goals. Therefore Team Coaching enables teams to work towards continued development requiring innovation, flexibility and alignment to the objectives.

Organizations have realized the role of high-performing teams in realizing organizational goals. In pursuit of sustainable outcomes, Organizations are looking to teams for delivering the requisite results. Team Coaching can play a very definitive role in getting the teams to function as a Unit to obtain the necessary results. Studies have shown that organizations stand to benefit from Team Coaching and this is mutual as all the stakeholders (the organizations, teams and individuals)  stand to gain from the Coaching engagement.

Team members feel recognised and valued: 

When team members take cognizance of the fact that their opinions stand valued without being judged, they tend to perform better.

Enhances Team performance: 

With efficient team coaching practises, the performance of a team is bound to improve as members feel aligned with the team and the goals. The team becomes more important than the individuals.

Helps in conflict resolution: 

Team coaching helps members to resolve conflicts if any and work as a unit in realizing the greater team goals.

Effective Communication: 

As members begin to trust and respect each other there is a better channel of communication between individual members of the team.

Helps members become flexible: 

Team Coaching enables members to accept change easily. As there is increased trust and faith among the members, they tend to become less rigid.

Great Teams make great organizations and  great teams need great leaders. So in short, for Organizations to be a melting pot for innovation and success, their teams and leaders need to be Coached to harness the immense human potential. 

The ICF team Coaching model embraces the ICF core competencies while recognising certain nuances of Team Coaching. However, the competencies have not moved away from the heart of the Coaching practice.

In the last decade, Google has spent millions of dollars on measuring nearly every aspect of its employees’ lives to build ‘the perfect team’.

The Company’s executives fervently looked to the perfect mix of individuals necessary to form a sterling team. They believed that building good teams was synonymous with organizational success.

Therefore in 2012, Google launched a project by the name Project Aristotle to find out what it takes to build efficient, sustainable and high-performing teams. They analyzed the data of several people across more than 100 teams across the Company.

The data clearly showed that: In the best teams, members show sensitivity, and most importantly, listen to one another.

Matt Sakaguchi, a mid-level manager at Google, was keen to put Project Aristotle’s findings into practice. He took his team off-site to reveal to them about his health. His colleagues then began sharing their own personal stories.

At the heart of Sakaguchi’s strategy, and Google’s findings is the concept of “psychological safety” – a shared belief that the team is safe for interpersonal conversations.

Google believes psychological safety is the most important factor in building a successful team.

Google’s Findings highlight that the best teams are mindful that all members should contribute to the conversation equally, and respect one another’s emotions. It is not always about who is a part of a team but more about how the team members reach out and align with each other.

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