The Value of Coaching as a Holistic Approach to Wellbeing

This is a guest post by Jo Bristow from Connor, a London based executive coaching company.

Like many people, I have been actively trying to increase my health and wellbeing from both a physical and mental perspective in the wake of the pandemic. I, like many want to be able to cope better with the increasing pressures of modern life. Despite managing well already, I come from a mindset that there is always room to do things better. 

Because in the words of Justin Trudeau at the World Economic Forum in 2018, “Never has the pace of change been so fast, and never again will it be as slow as it is today.” That was before Covid-19 was even a thing. We can’t slow the pace of change, we can only increase our ability to be able to deal with it …… without it compromising our health and wellbeing. 

This morning, whilst driving to Heathrow to take a fit to fly test for an upcoming ‘reset and recharge’ break away (no better test to resilience than that process!), I was listening to a podcast from Dr Chatterjee’s Feel Better, Live More series that got me thinking. The subject was about several ways we can boost our ability to fight off winter viruses by making proactive changes to our habits and behaviours rather than reacting once we are infected.  Whilst this was in the context of our physical health, there were real parallels to ways we can proactively support our mental health and wellbeing, and how we need to take a proactive and holistic approach. 

Another important message was the fact that we generally know what is good for us, but often need to hear it several times to gain the momentum to act. Then, we need help to implement the changes as those habits and behaviours have become entrenched and we need longer term support to shift.  Moreover, the results aren’t always instantly visible, or recognisable therefore it is easy to lose motivation and momentum.    

That got me thinking about how often I hear this when working with individuals, teams and organisations going through change and how valuable and versatile coaching is a tool to support.

In the world of sports, every professional or aspiring athlete has a performance coach to boost both their physical and mental health to achieve their goals. But in the world of business this is often reserved for only the elite few, either in senior leadership positions or if they are identified as high potential. 

However, there is significant value to be had from extending the use of coaching within organisations to create a more holistic approach to employees' wellbeing and therefore their performance. 

But how can organisations think differently about this? Read on for 4 ways that coaching can support employees' wellbeing.

1. Provide career coaching services

One of the key pillars of wellbeing is doing work that is aligned with individual’s values and their purpose.  Going through a life disruption or period of significant change (such as during the pandemic), leads to individuals re-evaluating how their work and life interconnect.

Career coaching services support individuals with evaluating this and taking a more proactive approach to their career development. By setting clear career goals and working with a coach to achieve them can realise talent, boost retention, and enable better talent management. Furthermore, it gives them an outcome to work towards, that aligns with their purpose which also helps build resilience.

2. Promote people-centric leadership

Another pillar of wellbeing is having a sense of belonging, being cared for, and connecting into the organisation’s vision. The relationship between the line manger and the employee is critical for this as the manager plays such a pivotal role in bringing this to life. 

For this to be successful managers need to be more people focussed and less task focussed. They need to be more communicative in sharing and helping others interpret the organisational vision and what it means to them every day. They also need to be more empathetic to individuals needs and situation as everyone responds to changing times differently.

This will lead to richer conversations about wellbeing and a greater feeling of support from their manager. This is more challenging when working in a hybrid way and many managers have a huge skills gap.

There is huge value in leadership development training to develop these skills but as I have previously mentioned, people need help in changing their habits and behaviours over time. Having access to a pool of leadership coaching hours to either support programmes or to use independently is an agile way of doing this as it focusses on a manager’s individual needs. It gives them tools and support to be able to develop these behaviours and time and space to evaluate how to sustain them.

By giving people managers access to leadership coaching, it enables them to connect with their people in a deeper way, puts greater focus on wellbeing and strengthens the psychological contract between them, therefore increases employee engagement. 

3. Role model healthy behaviours

One of the crucial issues I find when working with people on their wellbeing is the system they are operating in. We can give the individuals support in how to manage their wellbeing but if the system is working against them it can feel like pushing mud uphill! 

Within the organisational context, the culture is often defined by the behaviours of the people at the top. Frequently, in small and medium sized organisations, people moving up into CEO roles are not provided with any CEO training and coaching in advance of taking up the role and can end up setting an unhealthy tone.

In larger organisations, they may receive a form of CEO training and / or coaching but as before, need to hear the messages several times and receive coaching support in sustaining good practice to avoid slipping into unhelpful habits that may impact the rest of the organisation. 

Therefore, when looking at creating a holistic approach to wellbeing, organisations need to invest in their senior teams as well as individuals to ensure they are role modelling good behaviours around wellbeing.  That means creating healthy boundaries between work and home life, demonstrating healthy physical and mental health practices and being open and authentic about their personal challenges to reduce the stigma around mental health. 

4. Create a coaching style of leadership

The final aspect of creating a holistic approach to wellbeing is demonstrating a coaching style of leadership. This encourages ownership of our own well being and empowering people rather than telling them what they should and shouldn’t be doing.

Being able to be the master of our own destiny is another important aspect of building our resilience to change and coaching is a vital tool to enable managers to support their people with this. 

Supporting individuals and teams with their wellbeing is a hot topic on all organisation’s people strategy. This needs a holistic approach to achieve the benefit to all, to avoid burnout and enable people to remain productive. Coaching is a powerful and adaptable way of delivering that by extending its use throughout the organisation. 

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