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Posted By Clore Social Leadership,
30 July 2024
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Here at Clore Social Leadership we partner with coaches that are passionate about delivering impactful leadership development across the social sector with our Find a Coach offer.
The benefits of coaching for leadership development are undeniable. Numerous studies have supported this, reporting that coaching boosts productivity by 44%; 80% of people who experienced coaching reported increased self-confidence, whilst over 70% benefited from improved work performance and increased communication skills.
But what is coaching? Whether delivered in person or online, coaching provides an opportunity to address day-to-day challenges, overcome strategic roadblocks, and seize new opportunities in one 1:2:1 environment. The sessions are used to interrogate your chosen topic through lines of questioning, leading to an exploration of the potential solutions and next steps that can be trialled in real time.
"Coaching has helped me to pause and ask myself the bigger questions before running headlong into big decisions, and I’ve used the open questions in lots of strategically difficult moments since to great effect!" - Clore Social Leadership coaching participant
At Clore Social Leadership, we work with coaches from across the UK who specialise in a variety of topics that are commonplace in the social sector, including but not limited to, navigating uncertainty, seizing new opportunities, team wellbeing, future planning, women in leadership, behaviour change, resilience, goal setting and burnout.
If you are still on the fence about coaching, below you can learn more about the impact of coaching and how it can benefit you and your team:
Increased confidence: Coaching has been hailed for its positive impact on confidence; research found that for senior leaders coaching increased their confidence to navigate opportunities and challenges in their specific leadership role and increased their trust in their direct reports. With social sector leaders required to navigate ever increasing workloads, investing in your ability to delegate and communicate can only be a plus!
Emotional intelligence: Sometimes known as EQ or EI, emotional intelligence is commonly defined as the ability to show self-awareness, self-regulation, empathy, and social skills. Coaching provides you with the vital space to reflect on your own behaviour and how you read and react to the behaviour of those around you, equipping you to navigate a sector where emotional intelligence is vital not just internally, but when working with your beneficiaries and stakeholders.
Career planning and development: If you’re feeling stretched it can be tricky to find the time to consider your next career move, relating to your initial passion for your organisation's cause. Making space to discuss what your progression looks like with a third party can be invaluable. Your coach can support you in exploring opportunities and help you find an appropriate route to your next career move, reestablishing your driving force behind working in the social sector.
Goal setting: For many, contentment lies in having something to look forward to. However, ‘keeping your head above water’ has become commonplace for so many in the social sector. Coaching can provide you with the opportunity to discuss what you really want from your career, considering what goals can support you in seeing the bigger picture, aligning your professional ‘why’ with your personal values.
Conflict resolution: Conflict in the workplace is almost unavoidable. You are bringing together a diverse set of strangers and asking them to work towards the same vision, and once you consider the sensitive and complex issues so many in the social sector are grappling with - there is bound to be a difference in opinion. When conflicts do arise, it is easy to make snap decisions in the heat of the moment. However, coaching can provide a unique time to step back and reflect, either in hindsight or before the conflict is resolved, allowing you time to holistically evaluate what is really happening. The intention is that you can then take these learnings with you to your workplace in realtime to encourage a more constructive dialogue.
Incredibly, these aren’t all the benefits of coaching, improved productivity, communication, accountability, motivation, collaboration and employee retention are just some of the other benefits of coaching that are commonly cited by coaches, participants and organisations who engage with this professional development tool.
So if you think coaching could be for you, why not begin by exploring the experienced coaches on Find a Coach, all passionate about supporting the development of individuals from across the social sector, wherever you are on your career journey.
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Posted By Miranda Lewis,
19 July 2022
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In delivering management and leadership training for our clients, we come across people grappling with similar issues, irrespective of the organisations they work for.
Here we’ve set out ten of the most common challenges that come up for people in the voluntary sector. Of course, many of these are similar to the management issues in any sector. However, m2's experience suggests, that the challenges can be more acute in the hard-pressed, resource-poor and politicised context in which we all work. We also know that new managers are often not given the training and support to deal with these challenges effectively. This is why when we worked with Clore Social Leadership to develop the Management Essentials programme, these experiences were front of mind.
- Insufficient time and capacity dedicated to management: managers are frequently promoted because they are good at their jobs, without the necessary support in place to grow into their new role. In a sector with tight capacity, taking on management responsibility can be the only route to promotion but there is often little acknowledgement of the challenges in holding a delivery and management role.
- Discomfort with power dynamics: understanding, naming and discussing the power dynamics inherent in a management structure is often particularly difficult in a sector where there can be a discomfort about wielding power. This can be even more apparent in non-hierarchical organisations, where a deliberate lack of formal structure does not always equate to an absence of the interplay between authority and autonomy. These dynamics can make it more challenging for managers to feel comfortable questioning performance or offering advice.
- Decision-making: making decisions can also be impacted by this lack of clarity over power and who holds it, leading to over-consultation and under-engagement. For managers, not being clear as to which decisions they are empowered to make - and how - can be a significant source of stress. At the same time, team members can feel very frustrated by a vacuum created by indecision and procrastination.
- Balancing empathy and effectiveness: how to manage individual needs and the opportunity for flexibility whilst at the same time delivering an effective service is an ongoing challenge for many managers. It is one that has been particularly highlighted during the Covid-19 pandemic where personal circumstances became (literally) visible and have required additional support from managers. We have heard many managers and leaders talking about how they have taken on more work themselves during this period rather than place yet more pressure on staff. This may be a particularly acute issue in the voluntary sector where staff are deeply aware of the impact of reducing services upon the people they work with and for.
- Lack of consistency: finding ways of ensuring that difference is respected whilst equality is ensured can feel challenging to managers. Holding the balance between individual, team and task is not always easy - and made harder where there are any historic inconsistencies between teams or departments.
- Differing communication styles: organisational cultures can inadvertently prize particular communication styles over others without this being made explicit. This can prevent people with a different style from effectively contributing their ideas and energy, particularly in team or organization-wide meetings
- Organisational values in conflict with practice: challenge, disagreement and discussion are a necessary part of a sector grappling with systemic issues. This can, however, lead to situations where the values espoused are not put into practice, or as the recent controversies over racism, sexism and bullying in the sector have revealed, are in direct conflict with the reality staff are experiencing day-to-day. There can be a deep sense of betrayal for staff caught up in this - and stress for managers supporting them through this.
- Giving constructive feedback: giving feedback that enables people to develop and grow, without knocking their confidence, is an issue that arises in every training session we run. There can be particular anxiety attached to giving feedback around issues perceived to be about behaviour rather than performance, as this can feel so personal. Using organisational values as a means to open these conversations up can be a valuable tool – many organisations however (particularly smaller ones) have not necessarily had the capacity to formally set out their values, or as set out above, values are not widely put into practice.
- Lack of support for ‘middle managers’: particularly where values and practice are not aligned, middle managers can feel trapped and unprotected - caught between supporting their teams, and defending organisational approaches they may not agree with. Finding ways to manage upwards effectively is a key skill, but not one that is often nurtured.
- Lack of space and time for reflection: the pressures to deliver, and awareness of need, can make finding time to pause feel impossible for managers. Again, the pandemic has exacerbated this with the resulting lack of in-between spaces - time spent walking between meetings, travelling between client visits or commuting. This has made the opportunity to think about practice, self-awareness and strategy - rather than delivery - even more scarce.
Miranda Lewis is a Director and Partner of m2 consultants (www.m2consultants.uk) who deliver the Management Essentials Programme on behalf of Clore Social Leadership.
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Posted By Clore Social Leadership,
27 September 2021
Updated: 23 September 2021
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We believe that coaching is an important skill for leaders and managers.
To create a ‘leaderful’ organisation people need to co-create the ‘plan’ and in particular you need to enable yourself by adopting a ‘coaching’ style with your team. You will co-develop goals and objectives that are fully understood and have been built through a shared exploration of options. Once you have the plan you need to let go of some control and support and coach people to deliver results.
If you immediately think - “yes but...I just don’t have time, my team is under pressure, we’ll do this later” - think again!
People give all kinds of reasons: I feel underappreciated, I’m misunderstood, I don’t learn, grow and develop, I’m fed up with being micromanaged. Managers and their direct reports are usually frustrated by the same things - from different angles.
The conditions people have faced over the last year have also affected their expectations of you as their leader. As the workplace changes so do people’s daily experiences and their expectations of you as their line manager, leader - and all indications suggest that the skills of an Empowering Enabler have never been more important.
The social sector is ideally placed to benefit from the shift towards ‘leaderful’ workplaces, somewhere where people are trusted to take the actions needed to deliver on the mission.
The more you empower your team the more time you will have to focus on the future.
To anticipate the future needs of your clients, the focus of your organisation needs to serve the mission and to develop the right conditions for people to learn and be able to ‘lead’ from wherever they are. Your job as their ‘leader’ is to:
- Ensure that people know what they’re doing
- Understand why they’re doing what they are doing
- Develop each individual’s capacity to develop the skills and capabilities to have the confidence to figure out how they enact their tasks
Coaching skills are the key to unlocking the potential of your team.
Your team needs to understand what needs to be done and how to figure out how to do it. Your job is to support them. You need to listen, ask questions, be curious, support and, where necessary, move obstacles out of the way. Your people know what is in the way, you have the power to enable them.
If you're looking to develop your coaching skills, take a look at our 4-week Leader as Coach course. This short course will help you understand the key aspects of coaching to help your team lead social change.
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Posted By Clore Social Leadership,
30 November 2020
Updated: 07 December 2020
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As our Leading Beyond Lockdown programme draws to a close, we want to celebrate the participants who have inspired us with their dedication to their development and the causes they work for.
As part of the programme, we have had the pleasure to collaborate with Dr. Jeremy Hinks, Director and Leadership & Development Coach with Alpamayo Coaching Ltd. Inspired by the commitment and diversity of the programme participants, Jeremy writes about his experience with coaching on the programme.
“It was inspirational to speak with these activists and influencers, so committed to their respective causes. Hearing them name their challenges and then being witness as they chose to face them down has been a learning experience for me too.” Dr. Jeremy Hinks
Over the last few months, I have had the privilege to work in partnership with a group of leaders from the social sector, whose diversity, dedication, and commitment to their respective causes was a big inspiration. From the range of social issues they worked for, to their own life experiences and job titles, each participant brought a unique perspective to the table.
Whether they were new to coaching or had experienced it before, they were all excited about what the opportunity might offer to them, particularly aligned with the leadership training, group work, and networking opportunities that collectively made up the Leading Beyond Lockdown programme.
While the participants’ coaching objectives were uniquely individual, they shared a common interest - exploring how they could best fulfil their leadership role at a time when the sustainability of their organisations is threatened by the COVID19 pandemic.
Seeing the bigger picture
Some of our coaching conversations revolved around self-awareness and confidence-building for those who found themselves in new positions, or in old positions made to feel new by the change in relationship dynamics caused by the home working enforced on the majority by COVID19. Others related to more effective communication, decision making, and relationship building that harnessed difference effectively.
The ability to see the bigger picture was central to a lot of conversations. There was a sense that the ability to do so was often drowned out by the volume of work involved in the day-to-day running of the organisation. The importance of self-care was also often lost beneath wave upon wave of ‘doing this, supporting that, and delivering the other’. Bringing the importance of self-care back to the surface and drawing oxygen back into its lungs was a particularly satisfying part of these coaching partnerships.
"Bringing the importance of self-care back to the surface and drawing oxygen back into its lungs was a particularly satisfying part." Dr. Jeremy Hinks
All the coaching partnerships had a ‘whole of life’ aspect which was experienced in two different ways. Firstly, many conversations explored past experiences and reflected on how they were influencing current behaviour. Coachees saw a lot of value in becoming more conscious of their behaviours and feelings and to think about those that were no longer serving them well. Secondly, our conversations often explored how to achieve the balance between their work and out-of-work roles. Of course, this has become more challenging as COVID19 has required us to co-locate all these roles, challenging our ability to maintain the boundaries between them that are so important to our wellbeing.
Building trust and connections online
Forming a relationship built on trust via an online connection proved to be as possible as it is in face to face coaching. After all, we have all grown in our capability to manage the strengths and weaknesses of virtual communication.
It was also interesting how the relationship was influenced by coaching someone in their workspace at home. For example, the occasional presence of children, dogs, cats, deliveries, and unscheduled interruptions from a forgetful partner might have been a distraction. Instead, each interruption afforded an opportunity to learn more about each other and somehow this fostered a helpful level of intimacy not easy to achieve when coaching in an office environment.
Adapting to new uncertainties
As I write this, we have just entered a second period of lockdown in the UK, perhaps ironic given the title of the programme. However, the need to adapt to new uncertainties is a certain part of our future, whether it’s COVID19 lockdowns or an as yet unforeseen challenge.
As I reflect on the value of the coaching in the Leadership Beyond Lockdown I am in no doubt of the general benefits. Simply being on hand to help coachees face their challenges in a supported space where they are not judged, yet feel open to challenge, is of great value to them. It is the coaching equivalent of the ‘Hands. Face. Space.’ narrative which is used to remind us of our individual responsibility in containing the spread of the COVID19 virus.
I already know that each of them leave the coaching partnership with a greater sense of agency and clarity. Past experience suggests that there will be benefits from the coaching that will arise as time passes, benefits that will influence both their personal and professional life.
For me, one of the great aspects of Leading Beyond Lockdown has been the greater reach of the benefits of coaching into social sector organisations. These benefits can only be realised if its availability increases to meet the needs of an ever more diverse community of potential beneficiaries. To sum up, I’ll end with a great comment from one of my coachees on the accessibility of coaching and with thanks to all my coachees for having me work alongside them.
"I have to admit that I've viewed coaching as something similar to regular yoga practice or getting a personal trainer - probably really good for you, but reserved for those with certain privilege that working class me would find inaccessible, and I'm glad to have been proven wrong!" Programme Participant
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Posted By Clore Social Leadership,
30 September 2020
Updated: 07 December 2020
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Emily Lomax, Clore Social Fellow and Programme Director for our Emerging Leader Women & Girls and Experienced Leader programmes shares a unique insight into programme delivery and participant experience during the crisis.
It has been eight months since I read the awe-inspiring biographies from the 2020 Women & Girls Emerging Leader cohort and the Experienced Leader cohort. I was lucky enough to have been appointed as their Programme Director to ensure that they achieved, or hopefully exceeded, their learning priorities from the six-month programme.
I was due to meet them all at their first residential in May. As a Clore Social Fellow myself, and long-time facilitator for multiple Clore Social programmes over the years, I knew how much the participants would be looking forward to meeting each other and to forming the bonds which would challenge, inspire and support them not only in the months of the programme but for years to come.
But, as we all know, the World was to turn upside down. Not only was this residential cancelled, the whole viability of the programme was put into question. Would people have the desire or capacity to participate whilst juggling home and work – both envisaged to put them under pressure that we had never seen before. How would people cope and how could the programme fit?
In considering the next steps I frequently reflected on the centre of the Clore Social model – something that has become a mantra for me ever since I did the programme myself, guiding me through difficult decisions as a CEO and then in establishing my own organisation; the importance for social leaders to KNOW YOURSELF, BE YOURSELF AND LOOK AFTER YOURSELF. Now, more than ever, these things felt so important if social sector leaders were to be able to rise to the challenges ahead. Clore Social, in my mind, felt even more important than it ever had done before. These people are the front-line of making sure that social change is a priority and that people stay at the heart of decisions – we had an obligation to support and challenge them.
"Clore Social, in my mind, felt even more important than it ever had done before." Emily Lomax
The other thing that was in my head was how this wasn’t our decision alone – the Clore Social model goes on to talk about ‘working with and through others’. We needed to engage them in deciding what to do next. We therefore conducted a survey in early April asking for ideas and for an honest response on whether or not they would want to continue to be part of the programme – with no judgement if the answer was no. 91% of participants on the Women & Girls programme and 64% on the Experienced Leader programme said they wanted to continue and 33% on the Experienced Leader programme decided to defer until 2021.
Delighted that the programmes would go ahead, we now had the daunting task of re-shaping the content to be less dependent on the face-to-face elements, and to try to find ways to bring the magic of Clore Social relationships to life through virtual means. Louise Obi-Drake, Clore Social’s Director of Innovations and Learning, is brilliantly creative and knowledgeable and together we shaped a new way of doing things. The key changes were:
- Establishing a new programme of e-learning to support participants’ journeys and to help them to feel connected to the programme
- Re-writing the programme handbook so there was clarity of expectations and timings amidst all the uncertainty
- Being clear about what could be flexible and co-created, for example, the placement element of the programme is unlikely to be a week of being hosted within an organisation face-to-face
- Kicking off the action learning and coaching elements of the programme as soon as possible so participants could build relationships and seek space and support
- Re-shaping the residential into a series of online sessions to be held in May, where possible at the same time as the original residential, to aid planning
"This is the conversation I have been waiting to have all my life." Programme participant
Five months on and I am astounded by how much energy the participants have put into building connections and supporting each other. On a daily basis the programme’s instant messaging channels are buzzing with questions, suggestions, shared inspiration, honest requests for help and sharing when times are tough. These are unique times and participants have responded by stepping up and supporting each other. They have instigated new instant messaging channels to start specific conversations, have attended additional, optional webinars that we have arranged to add additional support and instigated so much supplementary learning.
Last week I asked for some informal feedback and was astounded by the flood of positivity – “This is the conversation I have been waiting to have all my life,” and “I finally feel like a leader.” These people are stepping up and out amidst all the chaos around them in order to make a difference to people’s lives. I am humbled.
They are also incredibly busy and at times struggle to find the space to focus on themselves and on the programme. And that is ok. They, I hope, are learning to be kind to themselves and that one of the joys of the Clore Social programme is that it is self-led and that you create your own path – focusing on the elements that will make the biggest impact for you – it isn’t about pleasing me, it is about what makes the biggest difference for you.
"I finally feel like a leader." Programme participant
A few observations of thing that have helped these inspiring leaders during these unstable times:
- Taking the time to plan
- Being kind to yourself if things don’t always go according to that plan. Not chucking the plan out at this point, but adapting and evolving – dealing with ambiguity is a really important skill as a social sector leader and this, in itself, is an opportunity for learning
- Being vulnerable and ask for help
- Collaboration is key. Ask for shared resources and ideas, no need to spend time reinventing the wheel when you have such an awesome network to draw on
- Finding ways to fulfil your learning priorities through your day job, and through your home obligations to save time and to connect parts of your life together. We only have one life after all so why not learn whilst being a parent to a reluctant toddler as well as when chairing a board meeting.
- The Clore Social model is relevant today and every day. Return to it when times are hard.
I am so excited to see what the next few months of the programme will bring and am so grateful to spend virtual time with these inspiring people – I just hope we get to meet each other sometime soon!
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Connect with Emily Lomax on Twitter and LinkedIn.
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