Leadership Coaching

1. Coaching Empowers Leaders to Maximize Their Potential

Coaches are change experts who help leaders take responsibility for their lives and act to maximize their own potential.

Change Experts. Coaching is about empowering leaders to take ownership of their lives and reach their full potential. Coaches provide the support and accountability needed to make significant changes, helping individuals clarify their goals and develop strategies to achieve them. This approach contrasts with traditional methods like mentoring or counseling, which often focus on imparting wisdom or diagnosing problems rather than empowering individuals to find their own solutions.

Unlocking Potential. By focusing on empowerment, coaching helps leaders develop the skills and confidence to navigate challenges and achieve their goals. This approach is particularly valuable in today's rapidly changing world, where leaders need to be adaptable, resilient, and able to inspire others. Coaching provides a systematic method for developing leaders, fostering a culture of growth and empowerment within organizations.

Beyond Traditional Methods. Coaching emphasizes empowerment over imparting, encouraging leaders to take responsibility and lead with their own ideas. This approach is more effective at developing leaders than traditional methods that rely on imparting wisdom or providing solutions. Coaching equips leaders with the tools and support they need to thrive in today's complex and dynamic environment.

2. Coaching is a Relationship-Based, Goal-Driven, and Client-Centered Process

Coaching is a relationship centered on helping people discover and fulfill their destiny, which uses goals and action steps to move strategically toward that end.

Three Pillars of Coaching. The coaching process is built on three fundamental pillars: a strong relationship between coach and client, a clear focus on achieving specific goals, and a commitment to centering the process around the client's needs and aspirations. These pillars create a supportive and empowering environment for growth and change.

Relationship First. The coaching relationship is characterized by trust, transparency, and mutual respect. Coaches create a safe space for clients to explore their challenges, identify their strengths, and develop strategies for success. This relationship is not about the coach's agenda but about supporting the client's journey toward self-discovery and fulfillment.

Goal-Oriented Approach. Coaching is not just about talking; it's about taking action to achieve specific, measurable goals. Coaches work with clients to define their desired outcomes, break them down into manageable steps, and track progress along the way. This goal-driven approach ensures that the coaching process remains focused and productive.

3. Motivation Outweighs Information in Driving Change

Change is more a function of motivation than information.

The Power of Motivation. While knowledge and information are important, they are not enough to drive lasting change. Motivation, the internal drive to take action and achieve a desired outcome, is the key ingredient for success. Coaching recognizes this principle and focuses on fostering motivation by helping clients connect with their values, clarify their goals, and develop a sense of ownership over the change process.

Internal Drive. Coaching prioritizes buy-in and motivation over giving people the right solution. It recognizes that individuals are more likely to act on solutions they develop themselves, rather than those imposed upon them. By asking questions and encouraging clients to come up with their own solutions, coaches tap into their internal motivation and increase the likelihood of lasting change.

Personalized Change Agenda. God initiates change in our lives, and the Holy Spirit is skilled at getting our attention. We know what we need to work on, but what we lack is the energy and motivation to get started and then to follow through. Coaching prioritizes buy-in and motivation over giving people the right solution.

4. Coaching Works Through Influence, Not Authority

Coaching works through influence, not authority.

Influence vs. Authority. In healthy leadership and relationships, authority and responsibility go together. The client is the one who bears the consequence for his choices (he’s responsible and the coach isn’t), so the client should also exercise the right to make those choices (he’s the authority and the coach isn’t). Since the authority to decide rests with the client, a coach must function by influence, not by exercising authority.

Client-Driven Solutions. Coaching empowers clients to develop their own solutions, fostering a sense of ownership and responsibility. This approach contrasts with traditional methods that rely on the coach's expertise to provide answers. By functioning solely through influence, coaches create an environment where clients are more likely to take action and achieve lasting results.

No Blame-Shifting. Since the client chooses the goals and the steps, it’s not your fault if they don’t work. There is no room for blameshifting in a coaching relationship. If what the client decided to do isn’t working, the client takes responsibility for it and together you just fix it.

5. Transformation is Experiential and Relational

Transformation is a function of experience and relationship (teachable moments), not information.

Experiential Learning. Transformation is not primarily driven by classes, seminars, or books, but through significant relationships and pivotal life experiences. Coaching leverages both these key ingredients of transformation, engaging the unique life circumstances of the client within the context of a transparent, growth-oriented relationship.

Teachable Moments. Coaching zeros in at the place God is at work in the individual’s life: the transformational experience. It is in these teachable moments, when circumstances put us under pressure, that we are most receptive to radical change. And, when you combine a teachable moment with a transparent, growth-oriented coaching relationship, the potential for transformation is enormous.

Relational Support. The biggest reason Christians in general experience so little transformation in their lives is that they ignore the Bible’s relational mandate for how to affect change. We were never meant to live the Christian life alone. Christianity is an interdependent, community-oriented faith.

6. Coaching Develops Leaders and Multiplies Impact

Coaching keeps responsibility with the client, because taking responsibility for your own situation is one of the surest ways to foster lasting behavioral change and increased leadership ability.

Leadership Capacity. Coaching exercises people’s abilities in setting goals, taking action, taking responsibility, making choices, and problem-solving, naturally increasing their ability and capacity as leaders. By empowering individuals to take ownership of their growth, coaching fosters lasting behavioral change and increased leadership ability.

Responsibility and Growth. Our capacity for leadership is directly tied to our capacity for responsibility. The more responsibility we can effectively handle, the greater the sphere of influence we are ready for. Coaching keeps clients responsible, because taking responsibility is how you grow in leadership capacity.

Jesus' Model. You can develop leaders in the same way Jesus did: give them responsibility and then walk with them as they carry it out. Coaching provides the tools and the structure you need to do a great job of raising up leaders.

7. The Heart of a Coach is Rooted in Believing in People

Technique without heart is manipulation.

Skills Channel Character. Great coaching starts with heart. Skills channel character. What you give to others comes from your heart. Skills simply provide a conduit to give what you have more effectively. The bedrock of great coaching is what’s in your heart for the person you are coaching.

Imitating Jesus. The place in our own experience that most exemplifies the heart of a coach is our relationship with God. Powerful coaching comes from studying, internalizing and imitating the Father’s heart toward us. As coaches, we consciously choose to interact with our clients in terms of their destiny, not their problems.

The Power of Belief. Believing in people doesn’t work at a superficial level. You can’t do this by giving an encouraging word to an acquaintance as you pass each other in the hall. People do not truly feel believed in until they are truly known. The power of belief only flows fully through the channel of open, authentic, personal relationships.

8. Coaching Focuses on Becoming, Not Just Doing

God is more interested in who you are becoming than in what you are doing.

Long-Term Perspective. Transformational coaching is taking the long view in working with people. It prioritizes character development and long-term growth over short-term fixes. This approach recognizes that who you are becoming is more important than what you are doing, leading to more profound and lasting change.

Building People. As coaches, we can choose to focus on becoming or on doing: on preparing people’s character for eternity or on making sure things are done right today. In practical terms, we can build people or we can solve problems. Transformational coaching is about building people.

Leadership Capacity. Our capacity for leadership is directly tied to our capacity for responsibility. The more responsibility we can effectively handle, the greater the sphere of influence we are ready for. Coaching keeps clients responsible, because taking responsibility is how you grow in leadership capacity.

9. Coaching Requires a Unique Value Set

Coaching has taught me that my life isn’t about me.

Core Beliefs. Values are our core beliefs. They are the rationale for our decisions, the passions we live for and the explanation for why we make the choices we do. While a goal is something you set out to accomplish, a value describes who you already are. Values are part of our being.

Biblical Coaching Values. Becoming a coach involves a change of heart, or being, a values change is going to be part of the equation. And values change is powerful: when you embrace the coaching values, the way you work with others will automatically change. The ten fundamental biblical coaching values are: Believing in People, God Initiates Change, Leaders Take Responsibility, Transformation Happens Experientially, Learning from Life, Ministry Flows out of Being, Learning Community, Authentic Relationships, Own-Life Stewardship, and Each Person is Unique.

Living the Values. When you “get” the values and truly adopt them as your own, you’ll automatically begin to function like a coach. This approach is a far more powerful method of producing leaders, and yields long-term results that are orders of magnitude greater than merely solving problems.

10. Listening Intently is Key to Unlocking Client Potential

People can solve their own problems.

Intuitive Listening. The coach homes in on the most interesting, unusual or significant thing the client shares (this is called intuitive listening), and asks the client to go deeper at that point. The coach is leveraging the client’s discernment to identify and solve the problem, instead of trying to figure it out himself.

The Art of Listening. True listening comes from caring about what another person says. It’s tuning your own thoughts out because you believe it’s imperative to tune in to another person’s heart. Great listening technique can let you appear to care when you don’t, or it can be a window that lets a genuine heart for others shine through.

People Can Solve Their Own Problems. In this conversation, the coach believes that Doug has the ability to steward the life God has given to him. Therefore, identifying and solving a problem is simply a matter of helping Doug think it through and walking with him while he carries out his solution. Doug can solve his own problems without being told what to do by a coach.

11. Asking Powerful Questions Guides Clients to Solutions

Your own insight is much more powerful than my advice.

Asking, Not Telling. The coaching approach depends on the client to develop goals, solutions and action steps: each person is unique. We each have different gifts and personality types; we are at different stages in our personal and leadership development; and we have one-of-a-kind histories, callings and relationships.

Prioritizing Motivation. When we believe that in order to change, people need us to tell them what they need to do, we give advice. However, when we believe the most important factor in change is motivation, we ask questions and encourage people to come up with their own solutions, because we know that buy-in and motivation are highest for steps that we develop and choose on our own.

The Power of Questions. Posing questions instead of dispensing answers is a tangible way of honoring a person’s capacity to run their own life. It’s saying, “God gave you the gift of your life and I believe you can steward it well.” Coaches ask because they expect you to be able to arrive at a great answer-probably a better answer than the coach could give.

12. Support Structures Bolster Change and Growth

Coaching is a support structure for change.

Support, Encouragement, and Accountability. We need support, encouragement and accountability (S.E.A.) to function at our full capacity. That’s why leaders with a coach get more done. It’s the support system that coaching provides that makes the difference.

Accountability. It’s amazing how much difference accountability makes. It’s easy to put things off or let circumstances interfere with reaching our goals-until we know we are going to be asked about them! Whether you are dieting, developing a Bible study habit or trying to complete a task you’ve been avoiding at work, accountability makes it more likely that you’ll succeed.

Appreciation. Workplace studies have found that the top motivator for employees is not job security, promotion opportunities or even good pay—it’s appreciation. When what we do is recognized, cheered and affirmed, we perform at a higher level. Support, encouragement and accountability form a support structure the coach deploys to help the client get things done.

Last updated: March 17, 2025