Coaching Star Performers: Reframing Negative Drivers and Feelings

By Chris Edger

Most business coaching books take a generic approach, advancing catch-all models and concepts for all employees. But different employee cohorts have different coaching needs! This book addresses a crucial managerial segment, namely; Star Performers – small in number but highly critical to organizational energy, innovation and growth! Highly ambitious, goal orientated and driven they are – on the face of it – relatively easy to read and understand. However Star Performers often hide a dirty little secret! The origins of their success owe more to negative rather than positive drivers. They are (inwardly at least) less resilient than they (outwardly) seem! Fear, paranoia, self-doubt and self-loathing are frequently the negative feelings and motivators that cause Star Performers to over-index, outperforming their competitive set. However – in the end – these drivers can lead to major issues; burn-out, addiction and/or major conflict with other stakeholders. This book explores how coaches can explore the ‘hidden and blind selves’ of Star Performers to reframe these negative drivers into positive forces; enabling Star Performers to add value on a more sustainable basis!

• Language: English
• Publisher: Libri Publishing Ltd
• Release date: Jan 31, 2019
• ISBN: 9781911450368

Chris Edger

Professor Chris Edger PhD is a former Executive Director of blue chip businesses. Having founded the Academy of Multi-Unit Leadership in 2010, he has taught and coached over 800 corporate executives on his post-graduate leadership programmes. He is the author of eight books on leadership, the inventor of the ELQ9 perceptual gap model and holds four degrees and a Level 7 Advanced Award in Coaching and Mentoring (with distinction).

Book preview

1.png

Imprint

First published in 2019 by Libri Publishing

Copyright © Libri Publishing

The right of Chris Edger to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988.

978-1-911450-36-8 EPUB

978-1-911450-37-5 EPDF

978-1-911450-38-2 MOBI

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in any retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the copyright holder for which application should be addressed in the first instance to the publishers. No liability shall be attached to the author, the copyright holder or the publishers for loss or damage of any nature suffered as a result of reliance on the reproduction of any of the contents of this publication or any errors or omissions in its contents.

A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from The British Library

Design by Carnegie Book Production

Figures by Helen Taylor

Libri Publishing

Brunel House

Volunteer Way

Faringdon

Oxfordshire

SN7 7YR

Tel: [phone]

www.libripublishing.co.uk

About the Author

Professor Chris Edger is a leadership author, academic and high-performance coach. He is the author of ten books including: Effective Multi-Unit Leadership – Local Leadership in Multi-Site Situations (described by the Leadership and Organization Development Journal as 'one of the key books of its kind for this decade'), International Multi-Unit Leadership – Developing Local Leaders in International Multi-Site Operations, Professional Area Management – Leading at a Distance in Multi-Unit Enterprises (1st and 2nd Editions), Franchising – How Both Sides Can Win (shortlisted for the 2016 CMI Management Book of the Year and rated a ‘Top 5 Must Read’ book on franchising by Reed Commercial in June 2016), Effective Brand Leadership – Be Different. Stay Different. Or Perish, Retail Area Management – Strategic and Local Models for Driving Growth, Inspirational Leadership – How to Mobilise Super-performance through eMOTION, Courageous Coaching Using the BUILD–RAISE Model – A Practical Guide for Leader Coaches and Events Management – 87 Key Models for Event, Venue and Experience (EVE) Managers.

He holds four degrees: a PhD (ESRC Award) from the Warwick Business School, an MSc (Econ) with distinction from the London School of Economics, an MBA and PGDip from Nottingham Business School and a BSc (Hons) with University Prize from Brunel University. He has a Level 7 Advanced Award in Coaching and Mentoring (with distinction) and is a Fellow of the CIPD and Higher Education Academy. Appointed to Professorial status in 2008, Chris founded the Academy of Multi-Unit Leadership a decade ago (where he has coached over 900 corporate managers), teaching at the Warwick Business School (winning numerous teaching awards on the MBA Programme), University of Birmingham and Birmingham City University.

Described by some commentators as the UK’s leading expert on 'multi-site retail management', Chris frequently features in the media having appeared on and written for outlets such as Channel 4 News, ITV, BBC News Online, City A.M., Propelinfo, The Retail Gazette, Daily Mail, Guardian, Telegraph, Retail Week and Drapers. Previously Chris had a successful career in the retail and service industry spanning 23 years, incorporating Executive Director-level positions in the UK and internationally owned organisations.

Contents

1. Introduction 7

2. The Characteristics of Star Performers 8

3. The Philosophy and Key Qualities of

Courageous Coaches 18

4. Reframing and Magic Questions for Coaching

Star Performers 23

5. Coaching Star Performers Using The Build–Raise

Coaching Model 26

6. Case Study – The Star Performer Build–Raise

Coaching Conversation (Reframing Negative

Drivers And Feelings) 52

7. Summary and 26 Key Insights for Courageous Coaches 58

Bibliography 63

Figures

Figure 1 — Performance–Potential Model

Figure 2 — Johari Window of the ‘Self’

Figure 3 — Courageous Coaching Philosophy

Figure 4 — BUILD–RAISE Coaching Model

Figure 5 — Support/Challenge Model

Figure 6 — BUILD–RAISE Coaching Model

1. INTRODUCTION

There are thousands of books on coaching employees. Many of them are generic guides providing insights, tips and models on how you can get the best out of your staff through coaching interventions. Indeed, my previous book on coaching advanced a philosophy (Courageous Coaching) and a structured coaching model (BUILD–RAISE), giving Leader-Coaches a compelling coaching methodology (tried and tested on hundreds of corporate managers) that would help them get the most out of their people. However, not all employees have the same needs and levels of readiness. There are various ways that we can tailor our coaching approaches to the explicit and implicit requirements of specific cohorts of workers, namely:

• Stars (high performance/high potential)

• Pillars (high performance/low potential)

• Transitionals (median performance/potential employees who are ‘on the move’ between categories)

• Newbies (low performance/high potential)

• Detractors (low performance/low potential)

Subsequent books will deal with the other cohorts; this one will exclusively focus upon how you can COURAGEOUSLY COACH STAR PERFORMERS to optimal levels of performance using some crucial REFRAMING QUESTIONS within my BUILD–RAISE COACHING MODEL.

STAR PERFORMING employees are important. Although comparatively small in absolute number (totalling 5%–10% of the workforce), these high performance/high potential individuals provide energy and drive within organisations. They provide the talent pipeline for future leadership cadres and are a vital source of competitive advantage for organisations. Focused, driven and ambitious; they require targeted coaching approaches. Why? Because, in addition to the obvious reasons (retention, wellbeing and sustained performance), Star Performers are often highly demanding, difficult to manage and often have underdeveloped stakeholder management qualities, in spite of what they think themselves! Although they may be good at managing downwards to get the results they want, they are notoriously poor (due to their competitive nature) at managing relationships with co-workers, peers and other stakeholders within the business. Impatient and overly competitive