Similarities and Differences Between Coaching

This essay will discuss the similarities and differences between coaching, mentoring and counselling and give justification as to why each of these approaches may be appropriately used within the workplace. The essay will go on to look at each of the approaches and investigate and explain the different techniques used by each of the approaches, which, workplaces may adopt to assist and improve organisation performance. The essay will make reference to research, theory and models of coaching, mentoring and counselling and where appropriate provide organisational examples to support the findings.

In order to improve team and organisational performance organisations need to engage with employees, this can be achieved through the implementation of coaching, mentoring and counselling. Coaching is the process of developing an employee so they can reach their full potential through methods and techniques which enable the employee to improve barriers to their progression and develop what is effective to progression. Coaching can be defined as ''Developing a person's skills and knowledge so that their job performance improves, hopefully leading to the achievement of organizational objectives' (CIPD, 2010, as cited in Brockbank and McGill, 2012, p.74). Coaching is becoming increasingly popular with organisations ''Coaching is used by a majority of UK organisations - 63%, according to the CIPD's 2007 learning and development survey'' (CIPD, 2008, p.2). As stated by CIPD (2008, p.14-15), an example of an organisation which has successfully implemented career coaching is Orange a telecommunications company. Orange implemented career coaching in its organisation in order to support its people development strategy. The coaching enabled employees to take control of their own careers and offered career development to all employees. Employees applied for coaching themselves and employees who wanted to become coaches could nominate themselves along with agreement from line manager. Coaching may be implemented in an organisation like Orange to improve performance of individuals, manage underperformance and improve productivity. The benefit to Orange in this example was that, employees developed a high level of commitment to helping others develop and a high level of enthusiasm from both coaches and coachees was maintained, which would naturally in turn result in a motivated workforce, increased productivity with lower staff turnover.

Mentoring is a processed used by organisations to develop less experienced employees through the use of a mentor who is usually an expert with wider knowledge in the area which an employee is developing. For example, in the NHS, when a nurse starts employment in a new department they will be assigned a mentor who will be an expert in the department and who will guide the less experienced employee and build an on-going relationship with the mentee. ''Mentoring - a supportive and challenging relationship in which the mentor offers advice, guidance and support. The Mentor is typically an expert in an area or a leader within an organisation'' (Mullins, 2010, p.828). For mentoring to be effective within the workplace, organisations need to be committed and ensure mentors and mentees are fully prepared. In addition to the mentee benefiting, the mentor may also benefit. CIPD (2013, p.1) suggests mentoring is not just about the less experienced employee gaining wider knowledge but is more about a relationship between a mentor and mentee in which both parties learn from one another.

According to the British Association of Counselling and Psychotherapy (BACP,2007, p.3) counselling takes place in an organisation in a private and confidential setting between a counsellor and an employee when an employee may be experiencing difficulties, stress, and/or dissatisfaction which may result in the employee feeling they have no purpose or have lost their direction. Counsellors will help employees to explore options available and encourage them to make a choice which is best for the employee. Counselling may be used by organisations in situations such as but not limited to, to prevent staff absenteeism or to help staff return to work after absenteeism. Counselling may also be used by an organisation as to form part of a disciplinary. Organisations may use employee assistant programmes to provide counselling for employees.

As discussed by Mullins (2010, p.197) the similarity between coaching and mentoring is that both based on a supportive and challenging relationship, where building a rapport is key to the relationship working. The difference between coaching and mentoring is that a coach will seek to draw out the knowledge from within the employees, whereas a mentor will be an expert within an area and provide a deeper knowledge and understanding. The Dimensions of Mentoring Model, developed by Clutterbuck (1998, as cited in Brockbank and McGill, 2012, p.92) suggests that coaching is directive and challenging, whereas, mentoring although also directive is more nurturing and the counsellor is non-directive but challenging. Coaching, mentoring and counselling are all key to organisations wanting to meet development and learning needs of not only the individual employees but also the organisation collectively. Parsloe and Wray (2007, p.12-15) suggests mentoring can last for a long period of time, coaching is usually set to a time scale and counselling can be either long or short term. Mentoring is less formal and takes place as and when required, coaching is more formal and meetings take place on a regular basis and counselling can take place as part of an employer's requirement. A mentor generally has more skills/knowledge than the mentee, whereas, a coach does not necessarily have the knowledge of the area of employees work but they may have experience and transferable knowledge which will be useful in developing the coachee and a counsellor tends to only have professional experience. The schedule/purpose is agreed jointly by the employee being counselled and the counsellor, while with coaching the purpose is set by the individual but in agreement with the organisation and with mentoring the mentee sets the purpose and the mentor provides support and guidance.

Organisations which adopt coaching, mentoring and counselling cultures