What have our coaches learned over the first 4 sessions around organizational culture at ING that is useful for the remainder for the coaching engagement ?
Here are a few conclusions and observations gathered from our coaches:
“ING has an open culture. People are easy going and willing to provide feedback.”
“It is important to take it step by step, session by session.”
“The reporting structure is flat, it is easy to get access to people.”
“Leaders are very receptive and open to development and improvement.”
“Leaders are very engaged, open, and eager to adapt to this new way of learning and growing within the organisation. Leaders also love working in a structured manner."
What makes an attractive Coach Profile?
There are 3 main criteria:
Functional-level fit (e.g. having experience working in Fortune 500 companies);
Organizational culture fit (i.e. experience working with ING);
Personal rapport (clicking with the leader);
How can I connect to other coaches on the project?
We want to bring coaches together and support you in supporting our clients.
Within the eLearning we have included a few socialization points. One of them is “Discussions”, at the end of every course, where you’re asked to provide some feedback and to ask questions. For now, that’s a discussion forum, what we’re currently working on is a community platform. The key of this will be not only to exchange messages, but also to create and share success stories.
How to connect:
Go to the discussion section at the end of each course
Fill in your question
You can connect with coaches through here.
The Community platform is currently under development (estimated launch date Q2). It is a place where coaches will be able to have multilateral discussions.
Important
We advise our coaches to maintain confidentiality when it comes to their coaching with our clients, and to not share details of the coaching with others (coaches, leaders, and third parties) as this would infringe on your NDA with us. Clients are keen on NDA compliance, which requires us to do the same. Compliance, as a trend, has and will become stronger moving forward. We all need to respect that.
How many coaches and leaders participate in this project?
Kindly note that when it comes to the number of coaches and leaders participating in this project, we can not provide you with a specific number. Reason being this falls under the NDA that we have in place with our clients. In this case ING.
The number of leaders involved grows every week. Typically, global coaching programs of this scale begin with a couple hundred leaders, which then increases to several thousand leaders at the end of the first year and thereafter. Please note that these are all multi year projects.
The number of coaches varies heavily as well, since coaches work on different client projects at the same time. Typically, client projects start off with 20-40 coaches, which expands to 200 - 400 coaches as the project scales after the first year.
How often will there be community calls?
The community calls will be structured based on the demand. Content from these sessions will be accessible in our Knowledge Base.
Does the current coronavirus challenge (or another business or organizational challenge) impact the advancement of the coaching engagement?
In principle, it should not. As business goes on at present (even if it might be more challenging), so does leadership. Hence the coaching engagement should continue as initially planned (unless the leader is required to put it on halt). Now more than before the coach can help the leader navigate these challenging times as a leader.
Does working in the office versus working with remote co-workers make a difference in demonstrating new leadership behaviors?
In essence, this does not make a difference. The leadership growth areas will not change. However, what will change are certain details in the action plan.
Here is an example. If the leader is working on ‘more effective communication’, this will remain the same leadership growth area whether the leader is working with stakeholders in a co-located office environment or in a remote working relationship. The stakeholders of most leaders will work either remotely or in the same office with the leader nevertheless.
For instance, if the leader is working on ‘more effective communication’, then actions like ‘not interrupting people in meetings’ is the same for meetings in the office or online.
For leaders working remotely an added or changed action might be: ‘Confirm agreed actions after meetings in an email’, or ‘Schedule formal meetings online’ (since the informal chats across the desk in the office are not possible now). It might take more deliberate effort for the leader to demonstrate these actions and behaviors with remote co-workers, which is simply part of the new reality in which people need to lead. This is another great opportunity for you as a coach to support the leader in their development.