Ep.028: 5 Coaching Habits of Excellent Leaders
The Five Coaching Habits of Exceptional Leaders: Creating a Reliability Advantage
Leadership is fundamentally an inside job. Before we can effectively coach others, we must first establish personal reliability. This reliability forms the foundation of trust, which is arguably the most crucial element in any leader-team relationship. When team members trust their leader, they're more willing to follow, engage, and commit to the organization's goals.
The concept of leadership as coaching isn't new, but it's often misunderstood or poorly implemented. Many of us can recall childhood coaches who made lasting impressions on our lives - from football coaches who taught us about punctuality and perseverance to basketball coaches who emphasized the importance of fundamentals before fancy plays. These early experiences shape our understanding of what effective coaching looks like.
In "The Five Coaching Habits of Excellent Leaders," authors Lee Colan and Julie Davis Colan outline a framework that creates what they call "the reliability advantage." This advantage emerges when leaders consistently apply five essential coaching habits that drive team performance. Let's explore each of these habits and how they contribute to organizational success.
The first coaching habit is explaining expectations and alignment. This involves clearly articulating goals, plans, roles, and rewards. As Brady Wilson noted in our discussion, this comes down to "organizational clarity." Leaders often know what they want, but they fail to explain it clearly or consistently. The absence of clear expectations is the primary cause of performance problems in most organizations. Remember the adage: "Proper planning prevents pitiful poor performance." When expectations are clearly set and regularly reinforced by the "chief reminding officer" (the leader), teams naturally align toward common objectives.
The second habit involves asking questions, which creates engagement. Rather than dominating conversations, excellent leaders facilitate open dialogue through thoughtful questioning. This approach requires genuine listening - not just waiting for your turn to speak while formulating your next point. Stephen Covey's principle "seek first to understand before being understood" applies perfectly here. By asking questions and truly listening to the responses, leaders gain valuable insights while simultaneously demonstrating respect for their team members' perspectives.
The third habit is involving the team, which builds ownership. When team members participate in decision-making processes, they develop a stronger commitment to outcomes. This doesn't mean leaders must implement every suggestion, but it does mean creating space for team input before making final decisions. The recent core values refinement at ServPro exemplifies this principle - by involving team members in narrowing down from many values to just seven, leadership ensured greater buy-in and adoption throughout the organization. As a result, these values now appear organically in conversations and social media posts.
The fourth habit is measuring results, which establishes accountability. Just as a sporting event without a scoreboard lacks excitement and direction, businesses without clear metrics struggle to maintain momentum. Effective leaders distinguish between key performance indicators (KPIs), which provide forward-looking guidance, and key performance metrics (KPMs), which offer retrospective evaluation. The balance between these measurements creates a comprehensive accountability system while avoiding "metric overload" that could distract rather than direct.
The fifth and final habit is appreciating people, which deepens commitment. Simple expressions of gratitude for team efforts go remarkably far in building loyalty. Practices like "Coffee with the CEO" sessions, where leaders begin by asking what's going well before addressing challenges, establish a positive foundation for constructive conversations. Different team members might respond to different forms of appreciation - whether that's public recognition, financial rewards, or additional time off - but all respond positively to genuine acknowledgment of their contributions.
By consistently applying these five coaching habits, leaders create a culture of trust and high performance. The reliability advantage emerges as team members align with clear expectations, engage through meaningful dialogue, take ownership through involvement, maintain accountability through measured results, and deepen their commitment through appreciation. This systematic approach to leadership coaching transforms not only team performance but also the work experience itself.
Chapters:
0:00 Reuniting in the Studio
2:10 Influential Coaches from Childhood
9:31 Leadership as an Inside Job
13:22 Five Coaching Habits of Excellent Leaders
21:43 Creating Ownership and Accountability
28:22 Appreciating People and Building Trust
34:14 Final Thoughts and Key Takeaways
Leadership is fundamentally an inside job. Before we can effectively coach others, we must first establish personal reliability. This reliability forms the foundation of trust, which is arguably the most crucial element in any leader-team relationship. When team members trust their leader, they're more willing to follow, engage, and commit to the organization's goals.
The concept of leadership as coaching isn't new, but it's often misunderstood or poorly implemented. Many of us can recall childhood coaches who made lasting impressions on our lives - from football coaches who taught us about punctuality and perseverance to basketball coaches who emphasized the importance of fundamentals before fancy plays. These early experiences shape our understanding of what effective coaching looks like.
In "The Five Coaching Habits of Excellent Leaders," authors Lee Colan and Julie Davis Colan outline a framework that creates what they call "the reliability advantage." This advantage emerges when leaders consistently apply five essential coaching habits that drive team performance. Let's explore each of these habits and how they contribute to organizational success.
The first coaching habit is explaining expectations and alignment. This involves clearly articulating goals, plans, roles, and rewards. As Brady Wilson noted in our discussion, this comes down to "organizational clarity." Leaders often know what they want, but they fail to explain it clearly or consistently. The absence of clear expectations is the primary cause of performance problems in most organizations. Remember the adage: "Proper planning prevents pitiful poor performance." When expectations are clearly set and regularly reinforced by the "chief reminding officer" (the leader), teams naturally align toward common objectives.
The second habit involves asking questions, which creates engagement. Rather than dominating conversations, excellent leaders facilitate open dialogue through thoughtful questioning. This approach requires genuine listening - not just waiting for your turn to speak while formulating your next point. Stephen Covey's principle "seek first to understand before being understood" applies perfectly here. By asking questions and truly listening to the responses, leaders gain valuable insights while simultaneously demonstrating respect for their team members' perspectives.
The third habit is involving the team, which builds ownership. When team members participate in decision-making processes, they develop a stronger commitment to outcomes. This doesn't mean leaders must implement every suggestion, but it does mean creating space for team input before making final decisions. The recent core values refinement at ServPro exemplifies this principle - by involving team members in narrowing down from many values to just seven, leadership ensured greater buy-in and adoption throughout the organization. As a result, these values now appear organically in conversations and social media posts.
The fourth habit is measuring results, which establishes accountability. Just as a sporting event without a scoreboard lacks excitement and direction, businesses without clear metrics struggle to maintain momentum. Effective leaders distinguish between key performance indicators (KPIs), which provide forward-looking guidance, and key performance metrics (KPMs), which offer retrospective evaluation. The balance between these measurements creates a comprehensive accountability system while avoiding "metric overload" that could distract rather than direct.
The fifth and final habit is appreciating people, which deepens commitment. Simple expressions of gratitude for team efforts go remarkably far in building loyalty. Practices like "Coffee with the CEO" sessions, where leaders begin by asking what's going well before addressing challenges, establish a positive foundation for constructive conversations. Different team members might respond to different forms of appreciation - whether that's public recognition, financial rewards, or additional time off - but all respond positively to genuine acknowledgment of their contributions.
By consistently applying these five coaching habits, leaders create a culture of trust and high performance. The reliability advantage emerges as team members align with clear expectations, engage through meaningful dialogue, take ownership through involvement, maintain accountability through measured results, and deepen their commitment through appreciation. This systematic approach to leadership coaching transforms not only team performance but also the work experience itself.
Chapters:
0:00 Reuniting in the Studio
2:10 Influential Coaches from Childhood
9:31 Leadership as an Inside Job
13:22 Five Coaching Habits of Excellent Leaders
21:43 Creating Ownership and Accountability
28:22 Appreciating People and Building Trust
34:14 Final Thoughts and Key Takeaways
Recent
Archive
2025
February
2024
2023
April
May
No Comments