International Coaching Week continues and today I take a look at the ‘Top Success Factors’ reported by DBM in their recent research study, conducted in partnership with the Human Capital Institute (full copy available at inquiries@dbm.com).

The first area they identify is ‘making the match’. The survey offers a number of factors including ensuring the coach has a sound coaching methodology, identifying coaches with business experience and industry/company knowledge, ensuring the right chemistry between coach and client (including organisational culture), managing the expectations of coach and client and allowing the interview to take place in person.

The second area is one they describe as ‘time and touch’: allowing 4 – 6 months for the client to develop new behaviours and emphasizing primarily face-to-face coaching with a blend of over-the-phone.

The third area is measurement (‘measure, measure, measure’), including assessing progress against initial objectives, soliciting an evaluation from the coach (or do they mean the ‘coachee’?) and seeking out anecdotal evidence of changes and the impact of changes.

I might have some questions about the detail. (In my own practice, for example, I have some senior clients with whom I speak for half an hour on a weekly basis and others I meet, face to face, on a fortnightly or monthly basis for 90 minutes. I can’t say that I have found face-to-face coaching to have been more successful than coaching by phone). At the same time, it seems to me that it helps to start coaching with a clear idea of what you want coaching to achieve, to match coaches and clients with care, to allow time for clients to make changes and to monitor results along the way.