Group Facilitator Readiness for Coaches

Individual 1-1 coaches who are moving into the group coaching realm often ask me "What are some of the core facilitation skills and practices I should keep in mind when working with groups?". Knowledge of how a group develops, along with core group facilitation skills and practices, plus your core coaching skills will provide a baseline foundation for you to deliver your own group coaching programs.

Here are some points to keep in mind when moving to working with groups:

• Create a theme and a rough road map - It may not be as detailed as a workshop agenda, but loosely consider what are the major activities or themes you are going to focus in on. With mulitple client agendas present, unless group size is very small (i.e. 3-4) it can be very challenging for coach and client if everyone comes wanting coaching around very different areas
• If possible, spend some time pre-program getting to know your participants. It may be as simple as a questionnaire or a short phone call. If you can't meet with them before, definitely spend time as a group talking about expectations and what people want out of the group coaching process
• Be aware of the process groups (and teams) move through. Bruce Tuckman's work and theory on group and team dynamics is critical to keep in mind when working with groups. Be ready for conflict, performance and lots of other interesting behaviors in between. Leave time at the end to celebrate. I go into much more detail about the impact of group dynamics on group coaching in my book Effective Group Coaching.
• Recognize that there will be a lot of different preferences in the room which may require different approaches, exercises and languaging.
• Remember that group coaching is based on coaching, and that you already bring a number of tools and exercises which can be adapted. One of your most powerful skills will continue to be the power of a question!

Later this week I will go into some basic group facilitation practices - things to do, and traps to avoid!

Have a great week,

Jennifer

Jennifer Britton, PCC, CPCC, CPT

Group Coaching Essentials - Next ICF CCE Accredited Group Coaching training program starts on Thursday July 22nd at 2 pm ET. Click here for more info or to register.

Early Bird rate for our next Group Facilitation Skills Training program (September 24-25, Toronto) on until July 30th.

Phone: (416)996-8326