Missed Coaching Play

You Don’t Want Dessert With That, Do You?

By Kelly Ketelboeter

Recently my husband and I were out to dinner.  At the end of our meal the server came over and asked, “You didn’t want dessert did you?”  My husband and I just looked at each other.  Was he really asking us a question?  Or was he saying, “Hey buddy, your wife definitely doesn’t need dessert!”  I prefer to believe he was asking us a question. Either way we did not want dessert. The server then went on to say, “They told us we have to ask each customer if they want dessert.  Isn’t that ridiculous?  If you wanted dessert you would ask for it.”  I just chuckled as he took our check and walked away.

Then I got to thinking and it hit me.  That’s probably how a lot of employees feel when they are asked to do something when they don’t know why it’s important or they don’t want to do it.  Our server was in fact attempting to cross-sell us dessert.  And he only did do so because someone told him he had to.

This is a classic case of managers managing staff rather than coaching them to get the results they want.  Just telling someone to cross-sell isn’t going to be enough for them to change their behavior.  In fact, you will get push back and attempts at cross-selling like I experienced at the restaurant.

This is one area where I believe a lot of coaches and managers struggle.  They don’t understand the difference between coaching and managing. They are more comfortable managing because they are good at it.  They don’t see that in some cases it is appropriate and more effective to manage and in other cases it is more appropriate and effective to coach.  So what is the difference?  What does coaching look like?  What does managing look like?

Coaching is the act of guiding people to reach their highest potential and achieve or exceed personal, team and corporate goals.

Managing is the act of handling, organizing or controlling something successfully.

As leaders sometimes we need to organize, handle or control something.  Other times we need to guide our people to reach their potential.  In the case of our server, I believe his manager was trying to handle or control staff to get them to increase sales by cross-selling dessert.  Obviously that back fired.

Check out the chart below on the differences between coaching and managing.  Ask yourself, what do I do well?  What areas are challenging for me?  What can I do to address those challenges?  Do I spend more time managing or coaching my staff?  What results am I getting?  What approach might get me an even better result in the future?

Coaching	Managing
You coach people.	You manage the process or task.
Improves or enhances performance.	Maintains performance and status quo.
Uses questions to lead employees to the answers for themselves.	Uses statements and tells the employees what do.
Asking questions rather than answering questions.	Answering questions rather than asking questions.
Proactive approach in helping employees take performance to the next level.	Reactive approach that’s more about putting out fires than improving/enhancing performance.
Solutions and answers are provided by the employee.	Solutions and answers come from the coach/manager.
Focuses on behaviors that will get the numbers and production.	Focuses on numbers and production.
You approach the employee to discuss successes and opportunities for growth.	Employees approach the manager.  Usually because something is wrong or they need help.

When it comes to coaching and managing, there is no right or wrong way to do it.  There is however varying degrees of effectiveness that will help you get more of the results you want.

How do you think the manager of the restaurant could have coached his employees versus managed them?  Maybe the manager doesn’t believe in cross-selling desserts anymore than the server.  That thought did enter my mind.  I would have loved to have been a fly on the wall when the manager “told” the employees what to do.

I can just picture rallying the troops before a shift starts and telling them, “Ask every one you serve tonight if they want dessert.  Be sure to have the dessert menu handy to show them pictures of our desserts and recommend something to them.  Tell them they deserve to indulge today with dessert. Now let’s get out there and sell some brownies!!”  Who knows what was really said to the servers.  All that really matters is what behavior is demonstrated by the employees.  In our case, it was obvious the server did not want to “sell” us dessert and again he only did it because he was told to.

Below is chart outlining coaching activities and management activities.

What Coaches Do	What Managers Do
Sharing results	Review information and results
Helps employees to achieve goals	Sets goals
Transactional coaching	Progressive disciplinary action
Positive reinforcement	Interaction only when something is wrong
Redirection	Process improvement
Effective confrontation	Performance evaluations
Working on the system	Working in the system
Creates opportunities	Reacts
Changes rules	Enforces rules
Seeks opportunities	Controls risks
Motivates people	Controls people
Provides a vision and challenges people	Follows direction
Inspires achievement and energizes people	Coordinates effort

In order to be effective we need both coaching and managing.  The challenge is knowing which approach is most effective for each different situation.  The more aware we are of coaching and management behaviors, the easier it becomes to discover the most effective approach.  Likewise, the more we challenge our own comfort zones and try different approaches, the more effective our staff will become in displaying effective behaviors to support your company.

I was once told that, “You can’t manage your way to success. You can only manage your way out of trouble. Instead, you coach your way to success.”  We want you, your employees and your company to be successful and you will get there by effectively and consistently coaching your staff to improve performance.

A version of this article was also posted on December 04, 2008 at CUES Skybox: You Don’t Want Dessert With That, Do You?.

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