Question:
Assessment brief/activity
You have been asked by an organisation which has recently diversified its business to help with the implementation of a coaching and mentoring programme. You have been asked to provide a brief to the executive team on current thinking around coaching and mentoring and some early ideas on how you might support them with implementing a robust programme of coaching and mentoring that meets their current and changing business needs. You have met with the HR department to assess the situation and have discovered that there is no formal coaching and mentoring programme per se. Any coaching and mentoring that does occur is ad hoc. There are no qualified coaches and mentors in the organisation and line managers generally don’t see it as their role. There is a willingness to formalise coaching and mentoring in the organisation but uncertainty about how to go about it. Performance reviews in the organisation have identified the need for employees to develop better customer care and IT skills as a priority.
Activity 1
The executive team have requested a briefing paper as the basis for an initial discussion. In your brief you should include:
- An explanation of the terms coaching and mentoring, their similarities and differences, their respective purposes and key benefits for different stakeholders.
- At least three different types of coaching and three different types of mentoring that can be implemented in organisations.
- An evaluation of the role of line managers in coaching and mentoring.
- At least five factors that need to be considered when implementing coaching and mentoring.
Activity 2
After your meeting with the executive team, you have been asked to provide them with a summary of your assessment of the current coaching and mentoring arrangements and advice going forward. In your report you should outline:
- A set of recommendations based on your assessment
- A summary of how you could contribute to the further development of coaching and mentoring in their organisation.
OR A witness testimony of how you have supported the implementation of coaching and/or mentoring within an organisation
Evidence to be produced/required
Activity 1
An executive brief of approximately 1,500 words.
Activity 2
A set of justified recommendations and support proposal of approximately
1,500 words.
OR
A set of justified recommendations for the scenario in the assessment brief of
approximately 1000 words plus a signed witness testimony of approximately 500
words from a manager who can confirm how you supported the organisation with
the further development of coaching and/or mentoring
All reference sources should be acknowledged
correctly and a bibliography provided where appropriate (these should be
excluded from the word count).
Solution/Answer:
Activity 1
- Definition and differences between the Concepts of Coaching and Mentoring
In most organisations, coaching and mentoring tend to be adopted interchangeably. This is evidenced by CIPD (2020), coaching and mentoring is used as capacity development strategies offered to the employees. It is administered in a one-by-one engagement to improve employees skills, knowledge and performances. Coaching is defined as a short-term skills and knowledge acquisition by the employees while mentoring is a long-term strategy offered to the employees. This is the primary difference of the two approaches. The definition is supported in Lejonberg et al. (2018) study that identify the coaching and mentoring efficacies and deduced that coaching implementation is within a limited duration in a progressive management style with mentoring extending for a longer duration. Further, the steps of both strategies and eventual outcomes are both approaches that are varied and depending on approaches adopted. Dur to the relevance of human capital on sustainability and efficiency in contemporary business strategies, it is essential investing in coaching and mentoring. Their integration is also critical to ensure they are part of L&D programs.
The process does not only entail an implementation on short-term basis for generating performance and work function involvement. It also targets specific skills and assigned goals. Also, it positively impact personalised attributes which are inclusive of social interactions and levels of confidence. This is what is identified by CIPD (2020) as an undertaking lasting for a particular timeline and form the background of a progressive management style.
Albeit of the two concepts definitions being varied, a standard agreement prevails in regard to coaching applicability in contemporary organisations (see summary in figure 1).
Figure 1: Coaching Characteristics
As opposed to coaching, mentoring entail establishing a sustainable interaction between employees with an experience in knowledge sharing to support the other employees with minimal or no experience. The outcome of this is employees developing their skills to question, listening skills, clarifying issues and their reframing all associated with coaching. This definition is supported in CIPD (2020a) that identify effectiveness of mentoring through succession planning where the employees acquire knowledge from each other. A good example of this is the CIPD Steps Ahead Mentoring Program (CIPD, 2019) which has been established with an intention of harnessing mentoring strategies targeting jobseekers with the age of 19-25. Its implementation is inclusive of mentors in resourcing and capacity development areas to assist the mentees to improve their skills to be employed, to boost confidence levels and pursuing a strategic employment direction. For achieving their assigned roles, mentor seniority as compared to the mentee need to be put into account.
There are issues that are common informing on the necessity for actively facilitating coaching and mentoring in an organisation. These factors are ranked as their similarities. For instance, in a survey published in CIPD (2015) it establishes that factors influencing the coaching and mentoring use is inclusive of the necessity if including demand to improve performance management issues, prepare them and an active role support. Other than supporting the engaged learners with relevant solutions, both coaching and mentoring guarantee existence of an opportunity to self-reflect in assigned functions. The effectiveness level of both to achieve the reason they had been established for is defined by the providers (coach/mentor) and the end-user (coachee/mentee). In my organisation for instance, a regional finance director can act as a mentee by being mentored by difference a mentor in similar groups. This is with an intention of acquiring sufficient skills to deal with a board of management and present the information to the analysts and departmental budgets which is challenging. As opposed to this, coaches tend to take an opportunity of leveraging on the likelihood to enquire and open inquiry on the necessity of harnessing practices which is independently guided by the coach and coachee.
- Benefits of Coaching and Mentoring to different Stakeholders
Coaching and mentoring benefits is grouped into social and psychological contexts. Psychological contexts benefits are in line with Martin Seligman checklist that can be used to identify their success (Seligman & Adler, 2018). Based on this model, the focus of coachinga and mentoring is the employees strength as opposed to their weak areas. This identidy the scope of harbessingt he ability of the employers in embracing strengths and to establish relevant workplace practices. The view is supposed by CIPD (2020b) that note that by active coaching and mentoring, positive psychology of the employees is established which successfully leads to alteration of traditional management practices in their strategy of working by embracing holistic capabilities and positive workplace strategies. Secondly, socially, PERMA framework (Palmer & Green, 2018) notes
Email address: rankedtutorials@gmail.com