How Coaching Programs Help Boost Employee Engagement in the Workplace

Behind every great athlete is a coach cheering them on. The same goes for employees: to really bring out the best in them, you need to nurture their growth while supporting their physical and mental well-being. 

Employee engagement is about helping your employees feel appreciated. It’s about showing them their efforts are important and valued, and that they are an important part of the workforce and community. This can be accomplished in a variety of ways; from implementing employee health programs and total well-being technology to organizing motivational speakers and communication seminars. 

While workplace coaching won’t fix all organizational issues, it has gained attention as one key strategy for boosting engagement. This is a big step towards helping employees become star performers. 

Why is Motivation Important?

We all have off days, but when they’re more common than good days, there’s a problem. Disengaged employees are less productive, less enthusiastic, and more likely to phone in sick. This is bad news for the business, especially during difficult times when everyone needs to be on their A-game. 

Engaged employees are better workers. They’re happy to come to work. They see themselves as an important part of the company, and want to do their best, both due to a sense of pride in their job and because they want to see growth in the business. 

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“When you have a contented workplace, people are willing to put out more effort to improve operations during really difficult times. While I think every organization has their ups and downs, the downs are not as pronounced because everybody pulls together to try to get through the crisis. And, of course, this consistently more engaged performance inevitably reveals itself in the firm’s bottom line,” says Jerome Dodson, Founder of Parnassus Investments.

How Can Coaching Help Employees Feel More Engaged?

The numbers on employee engagement are dismal. A survey by Gallup revealed that 87% of the global workforce is disengaged. However, despite the worrying stats, it is something that can be changed with the right approach. 

According to Jim Harter, Ph.D., Gallup’s lead analyst for workplaces, the three areas that matter most in employee workplace engagement include the following: 

1. Having the opportunity to do what they do best every day. A high score on this means the employee feels they have been given a job they can excel in. Identifying employees’ strengths is the best way to put staff in the right role. 
2. Feeling as though they have someone at work who encourages their development. 
3. Feeling as though their opinions count at work.

Having a good manager goes a long way to addressing these issues, but coaching can also play a vital role—both for the employee and the manager. 

Coaching can help teams and individuals improve their health, skills, and morale. When people have the tools to do their job better, they are happier, more engaged, and more confident at work.

What Types of Coaching Are There? 

There are different types of coaching for different outcomes and roles within the organization. Here are some of the most popular:

• Performance coaching is a catch-all term for any kind of training that focuses on workplace performance. It can be for everyone within the organization, from junior executives to the top CEO. The coaching can be led by a third party expert, or by the manager themselves—or a mixture of both. These kinds of coaching sessions should be tailored to the individual.
• Development coaching is designed to strengthen the relationship between manager and employee. The coach lets the employee explain what’s important to them through listening, rather than telling. It’s about giving the employee the space to shape their own growth, with the manager there to support them. It may include various competency assessments and planning. 
• Team coaching is exactly what it sounds like. Sessions are usually led by a third party expert who’s brought in for a set amount of time. Lesson topics vary, but popular themes include emotional intelligence, negotiation skills, public speaking, and other ways to improve internal and external relationships. 
• Corporate health coaching is when a professional coach mentors and supports employees in cultivating positive lifestyle and health behaviors. Coaching can be focused on physical health, mental health—or increasingly, a mixture of both.

A healthy workforce is a happy workforce, and happy employees are more productive.: Offering health or wellness coaching to employees can increase morale, decrease burnout, and improve employee productivity. This is why it’s a good idea to include health coaching as a standard, and then add other coaching programs. 

How to Implement a Coaching Strategy 

For coaching to be successful, employees need to understand why they’re being coached. When explaining the benefits, take a positive stance and always assume individuals want to be fully engaged and do well at their job.

Next, identify a coach. This can be someone internal, or an outsourced expert, identified via their subject matter specializations. It can also be via a virtual service, such as an online employee health program or training tool.

Online health coaching services allow employees to access the care of trained professionals from the comfort of their own home. This flexible approach increases the likelihood of employees engaging with a coach since it’s easier and faster, with no travel time and no time wasted in a waiting room.

Before the coaching begins, start by working with the individual to determine what they want to achieve. You may also want to talk about how their role fits in with the wider company vision. Remember, this is a two-way conversation. Listening is a vital part of helping people feel valued, as well as building their trust. 

Next, set clear expectations, goals, and objectives, and make time for subsequent coaching sessions. To measure success, it’s important to record performance metrics both before and after. If you’re using an online tool, such as CoreHealth’s Wellness Coaching service, employees can communicate to trained coaches via video chat, schedule appointments, share lab results and action plans, and work towards points-based goals to help keep motivation and engagement high. 

Finally, remember to make your coaching accessible and flexible, whether you’re using an online coaching program, or bringing someone into the office. This will make it easier for your employees to join in on their own terms.

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Prioritizing employee engagement will always be important, especially now, and will continue to be in the post COVID-19 business world. 

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