People Who Think They’re Great Coaches Often Aren’t

“I think I am a pretty good coach,” the executive across the desk said to us.

Impressed with his positive attitude about himself, we asked, “How do you know?”

He said he had attended a coaching course and learned many of the techniques of good coaching. That triggered a question for us. How many leaders believe they are better coaches than they really are? After all, the most critical test for measuring your effectiveness as a coach lies not in your belief about your own skills but rather on how the recipients of your coaching rate your skills (and on how their own competencies increase afterward).

We examined data on 3,761 leaders who assessed their own coaching skills and had the courage, afterward, to have others give them assessments as well. We analyzed those who overrated their coaching skills and compared the results with those who’d underrated.

What we found: 24% of the leaders in our sample had overrated their skills. Just as many adults believe they are far above average in their driving skills or in possessing common sense, this group believed they were above-average coaches.

We were curious about the effect of this overrating. The graph below shows the results. On average, those who underrated their skills were above average in their overall coaching effectiveness (reaching the 57th percentile). Those who had overrated themselves, however, were significantly below average, reaching only the 32nd percentile. This phenomenon was described by two Cornell psychologists, David Dunning and Justin Kruger, who observed that for any given skill, incompetent people fail to recognize their own deficiencies and don’t recognize the skill in others. The lower an individual is on any scale of measurement, the more out-of-touch they tend to become.

This means that those who overrated their abilities were in the bottom third, as viewed by others. In other words, if you think you’re a good coach but you actually aren’t, this data suggests you may be a good deal worse than you imagined. Bursting the bubble of your illusion of superiority could be highly advantageous to your continued development as a leader. In fact, this is the best reason to find a way to obtain honest feedback about your coaching skills.

The second reason to do so is to find out where, specifically, you could most improve in your coaching skills. Our data identified seven characteristics of those who overestimated their abilities most frequently. Do any of these apply to you?

• Poor listening. Few people describe themselves as poor listeners. True effectiveness of a listener relies on the perceptions of others. Effective listeners do it without judgment, have a strong desire to understand, and are willing to take the time to hear about the needs and concerns of others. An important test of being an effective listener is what your response is to feedback from others. If you get defensive and resist the feedback, you will not be perceived as an effective listener.
• Not a role model. Effective coaches are trusted and viewed as role models. The best coaches create an open, trusting environment by initiating positive interactions with others. Giving credit to others and looking for opportunities to recognize and praise others increases trust.
• Not collaborative. Effective coaches look for opportunities to cooperate and collaborate with others. Ineffective coaches, conversely, are competitive. Less-effective coaches look for opportunities to make themselves or their teams look good in front of others. They compete for resources and believe there are winners and losers in the organization.
• Don’t develop others. Great coaches help others develop new skills and prepare them for future opportunities. The reality is that helping another person develop new skills takes time and personal effort. Having the willingness to bring someone close and make the ongoing effort to coach them is an active demonstration of the desire and skill it takes to be a good coach.
• Fail to provide feedback. The best coaches are willing to give clear, honest, pointed feedback about what people need to do to improve performance. And they do it in a positive, enabling way. Ineffective coaches either avoid giving feedback or bombard people with so much criticism that they demotivate and discourage participants from trying.
• Lack integrity. Great coaches do the right thing. They honor commitments and keep promises. They do what is right regardless of personal consequences. Others know they will keep confidences. Ineffective coaches talk behind people’s backs. They say one thing and do another.
• Don’t encourage diversity. Great coaches respect others and values differences regardless of age, gender, or race. They do this not because of laws or rules in the organization but because they truly value and appreciate the advantages that diversity brings. Colleagues feel that they care.

Coaching skills are a great asset to any leader. Becoming a great coach begins with aspiring to be a good one. If you have attended some training, that’s a good start. But don’t stop there. Assess your specific coaching skills — and have your team assess them too. If your skills are good, you will find ways to make them even better. And if you need to improve, the way to start is to identify those blind spots.

-Jack Zenger and Joe Folkman

This article first appeared in Harvard Business Review. 

Download Zenger Folkman’s Extraordinary Coach eBook.