The Power of Coaching

At the Evelyn and Walter Haas, Jr. Fund, we're learning a lot about how coaching can help our grantees succeed. As part of a wide-ranging effort to promote greater understanding of coaching as a winning investment for the nonprofit sector, we've created a series of short videos that provide firsthand accounts about the value and impact of coaching, and how it works best; an online toolkit; and an independent evaluation of the Flexible Leadership Awards (FLA) program.

 

What is coaching?

Evaluator Bill Ryan shifts the question of coaching from semantics to where coaching fits in the field of leadership development for nonprofits.

Coach Gail Ginder and participants David Kakishiba and Gilda Gonzales address some of the initial concerns people have about coaching.

Coach Gail Ginder on what coaching is and how it’s different from consulting and therapy.

Bill Ryan discusses the prevalence of coaching in business and how quickly it's catching on for nonprofits.

Bill Ryan talks about the three central approaches that coaches bring to their craft: coaching as profession, coaching as practice and coaching as perspective.

Team-Up for Youth Executive Director Janet Carter talks about how coaching is different from other leadership support.

IMPACTS: How does coaching help me as a leader? Examples of how coaching has helped leaders change behaviors and address challenges

It's not always easy for EDs to get honest feedback from their staff about how they're doing. Janet Carter talks about how working with a coach has helped her gain greater self-awareness as a leader.

Though many EDs feel like their work is their life mission, their role is often accompanied by "the stress of making tough and unpopular decisions." Executive Director Gilda Gonzales on how coaching has helped her achieve balance.

Director of Community Development and External Affairs Lina Sheth discusses the impact that coaching has had on her ability to empower her own staff.

Gilda Gonzales finds coaching a unique way to explore the essential leadership question, “Am I the right person for my organization at this time?”

Evaluator Bill Ryan talks about how coaching helped one coachee become a stronger leader by helping her confront some of the deeper issues that were challenging the organization and its staff.

Coaching can help leaders address their toughest roadblocks. East Bay Asian Youth Center Executive Director David Kakishiba on overcoming fears to "get unstuck."

Coach Gail Ginder describes what is necessary in order for coaching to be effective - and talks about when coaching is not going to work.

Gail Ginder discusses the critical role of honesty in the coach-coachee relationship, sharing an example of a situation when a leader's behavior wasn't matching their intention

How do I know if coaching is right for me?

Executive Director Janet Carter describes how coaching helped her make the leap from the "number two" to the "number one" executive position.

Lina Sheth, Director of Community Development and External Affairs, discusses how coaching helped her develop a framework for often being one of the only leaders of color at the table.

Bill Ryan talks about what coaching can help individual leaders accomplish and what that change can mean for organizational effectiveness.

Gail Ginder talks about coaching a longtime leader through an executive transition in order to help set the organization up to succeed.

As a first time Executive Director, Janet Carter talks about how coaching has helped her become the head of an organization - responsible for working with a board, creating a vision and communicating that vision effectively.

Gail Ginder talks about when coaching is not a solution, including when it's used as a way of avoiding deeper organizational issues.

Bill Ryan on why coaching cannot succeed in a vacuum.

How does coaching work?

Based on his research into the coaching field as well as firsthand observations of nonprofit leaders, evaluator Bill Ryan identifies three key ingredients of successful coaching

There are a lot of qualified coaches out there. Gail Ginder gives advice on how to go about selecting one that's right for you.

Janet Carter shares what she believes is the single most important criteria for picking a coach to work with.

David Kakishiba reflects on how he and his coach worked together to develop an effective process.

Janet Carter talks about how, from the start, her coach helped her build a framework of understanding for working in her new organizational context by asking hard, meaningful questions.

David Kakishiba gives advice on what to consider when bringing in a coach to work with multiple people within an organization.

Gail Ginder talks about the importance of setting clear, shared goals when multiple coaches are brought into an organization at the same time.

Gilda Gonzales gives advice to other EDs who are considering coaching for their organizations, and talks about how to know if it’s working.

Janet Carter talks about the role of the supervisor in setting coaching goals.

Janet Carter discusses the initial process of setting goals and how she and her coach continued to track the impact of coaching.

Gilda Gonzales talks about the goals of coaching, her initial skepticism towards it and the unanticipated results it brought.

What should funders know about coaching?

As Bill Ryan explains, the FLA program is rooted in the question, "What kind of leadership development will improve organizational effectiveness that will produce social impact."

Bill Ryan talks about the Flexible Leadership Awards program's investment in coaching and how it evolved into a major strategy for leadership development.

Bill Ryan discusses the unique role that funders can play in strengthening social movements by investing in coaching for nonprofit leaders.

Janet Carter gives funders advice on how to approach coaching in a comprehensive way that will benefit every level of the organization.

Coach Gail Ginder shares three considerations for funders who are thinking about investing in coaching.

Bill Ryan talks about the process of evaluating the impact that coaching has had for the Haas, Jr. Fund's FLA participants.

Bill Ryan discusses Return on Investment for coaching: What are we learning about coaching, and how are we using what we're learning to make it work better?

Let us know what you think.

We encourage comments about these videos and the ideas, opinions and examples they share. What did you find helpful? What did you agree or disagree with? We also want to hear from those of you who have experience with coaching. What has your experience been - as a nonprofit leader, coach or funder? What has worked or not worked for you? What advice do you have for others? We are providing this forum for you to share your comments and thoughts with us and each other, to generate more conversation about the value of coaching in the nonprofit sector.

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Testing, testing.

Testing, testing.

super cool coaching videos

super cool coaching videos

I love this coaching page. It

I love this coaching page. It is awesome.

About Bill - Bill Ryan is a

About Bill - Bill Ryan is a consultant to foundations and nonprofit organizations, and a research fellow at the Hauser Center for Nonprofit Organizations at Harvard University. Both his consulting and research focus on nonprofit organizational effectiveness. He currently directs the Nonprofit Governance and Accountability Project, a joint initiative of the Hauser Center and Harvard Law School aimed at engaging Harvard researchers in critical questions related to nonprofit governance. He is coauthor, most recently, of Governance as Leadership: Reframing the Work of Nonprofit Boards. He holds a BA from Columbia University and an MPA from the Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University.

Evaluator Bill Ryan shifts

Evaluator Bill Ryan shifts the question of coaching from semantics to where coaching fits in the field of leadership development for nonprofits.

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