Aligned with this month’s theme of collaboration, I wanted to zoom into some practical tips for your next collaboration.

As I mentioned in last week’s post around the different ways we collaborate and partner, it’s likely that collaboration is a central theme for many coaches in their work, whether they are co-designing programs, partnering with their clients or supporting teams in boosting their collaboration.

In fact, collaboration in and of itself may be an earlier step in the process of building more resilient and adaptive organizations. Take a look at this article on the 2016 book – Beyond Teams: Building the Collaborative Organization. 

With many team coaches working with teams in a systems perspective, this is likely an important read.

As we step back to the collaborative relationships we are fostering, what is the intent you want to create? What are you looking to co-create together. As I have written before, many collaborative partnerships don’t just happen. They are planned.

As coaches we are great at using questions to co-create and guide us through the varying stages of relationships. With this in mind, I share several questions to explore at the different stages of a partnership or collaboration including:

Before you begin:

• What’s important about collaborating with this task or project?
• What value-add is there by collaborating?
• What are you bringing to the partnership?
• What are the skills and qualities you are looking for, from a partner?
• What are you hoping to have happen?

As you meet with your partner:

• What ‘s possible for you as you collaborate?
• What do you each bring to the partnership?
• What’s important for the two of you to explore together as you get started?
• What are the goals and roles of this partnership?
• What is your shared vision?
• Practically, and tactically, how will you work together?

As you roll out the work, be sure to build in time together as a checkpoint along the way:

• What’s working? What’s not working?
• What are you creating with each other?
• What do your clients value?
• What’s important to tweak and adjust?
• How is what you are doing, modelling collaboration for them?

These are by no means comprehensive, but will likely get the conversation flowing!
As we go to wrap up the month, what’s important to note about collaboration?

Enjoy!
​Jennifer
​
Jennifer Britton - GroupCoachingEssentials | Potentials Realized 
Instagram @CoachingBizBuilder
Join us for an upcoming ICF-CCE approved program including Group Coaching Essentials (8.75 CCEs), Advanced Group and Team Coaching Practicum (10 CCEs), the one day Virtual Facilitation Essentials program (8.5 CCES) or the PlanDoTrack Facilitator Training (24 CCEs). 
Author of Effective Group Coaching (2010), Coaching Business Builder (2018), Effective Virtual Conversations (2017) and From One to Many: Best Practices for Team and Group Coaching (2013). Check out my author page on Amazon for all publications.
Email: [email protected]

Collaboration might not necessarily spring to mind when you think of yourself as a coach, however, collaboration is an important way to scale and expand your business. It is one way which can help you expand your reach and also expand your revenue.

What are the different ways we may be collaborating?

Let’s look at five different ways:

#1 Partnering with your clients - Partnership is at the heart of the coaching relationship. As a coach we are there as a thinking partner. We are there to create a thinking and dialogue space. What’s important about the partnership you have with your client? How does that relationship become additive – i.e. the sum is greater than the sum of it’s parts?

#2 Partnering with other coaches - sometimes we may be partnering with other coaches. Whether we have decided to come together for a marketing event such as doing a trade show booth together.

#3 Creating a program or product with another coach - One of my favorite collaborations this year has been with my co-host of the Remote Pathways podcast, Michelle Mullins. When you go to co-create programming be sure to consider your WIIFM – What’s in it for me? And how your skills are complimentary. If you are too similar it might create a gap of skills needed for the project or program.

#4 Co-Facilitation - Co-Facilitation or Co-Coaching is very common when coaches scale their conversations to teams. Having two sets of eyes, two voices and potentially two different types of coaching toolkits, can be invaluable. What are you doing around co-facilitation this year? For more on this topic, be sure to check out the digital chapter I wrote a decade ago which accompanies Effective Group Coaching. You can find a copy here. (use code 4411 when prompted)

#5 Growing your own team – At some stage, coaches may decide to grow bigger than themselves and may bring on sub-contractors or staff. What is important for you to focus on in growing your own team? What roles do you need? How can people support you? What direction do  you need to provide?

Enjoy the conversation and focus,
Jennifer

In my current writing and speaking at Remote Pathways, I often use the phrase “no person is an island”, to remind us that even if we spend most of our time alone – as we do particularly as solopreneur remote coaches – much of our work as business owners and coaches brings us into the realm of partnering and collaboration.

Collaboration comes from the Latin root – Collaborare – which means to LABOUR TOGETHER.

There are many shapes collaboration can take on the part of coaches – from co-coaching when working with teams, to co-designing program offerings, to partnering when you launch a business.

There are many benefits to collaboration from:

• Being able to bring two voices, perspectives, and sets of eyes to our clients
• To being able to magnify our impact and resources
• To offset some of the weaker skill areas we bring. Strengths research continues to show that it’s easier to magnify strengths than to grow weaknesses
• To be able to offer programming at a much greater scale than we could alone

This month over at the Remote Pathways podcast I co-host with Michelle Mullins, we are exploring collaboration. Please take a few minutes to listen in to the latest episode.

Each episode also has a downloadable resource you might be interested in, particularly this episode on Collaboration. Be sure to check it out! 

Enjoy your focus and let us know how you are collaborating – what makes it work, and what gets in the way – over at the Conversation Sparker Zone. 
​
Have a great week,
Jennifer

One of the emerging themes I identified back in my book, From One to Many: Best Practices for Team and Group Coaching, was Design Thinking. While this was several years ago, Design Thinking has now exploded into business practices everywhere. As a longstanding program designer, myself, it’s been natural to be integrating many of the principles and practices of Design Thinking into my own way of doing things.

In this week’s blog post, I wanted to share a little more about design thinking to get you thinking about how you might incorporate it into your program design, or conversations with clients.

“Design is the action of bringing something new and desired into existence—a proactive stance that resolves or dissolves problematic situations by design. It is a compound of routine, adaptive and design expertise brought to bear on complex dynamic situations.” —Harold Nelson

As we step into a new year, and new decade, what is it that you want to create? My guess is that there are probably many design opportunities for you on the horizon.
Design Thinking has emerged from many areas, and is a human-centered approach to any program design. If you’ve worked with me before, you’d know my affinity to the Group Coaching Design Matrix and how it gets us thinking through WHO our client really is.

CEO of IDEO, Tim Brown defines Design Thinking as:
“Design thinking is a human-centered approach to innovation that draws from the designer's toolkit to integrate the needs of people, the possibilities of technology, and the requirements for business success.” — Tim Brown, CEO of IDEO

Design thinking is grounded in several principles:

• It needs to be human-centered
• It should be fun and creative
• It is a mixture of analytics and intuition

IBM has created what they call the Design Thinking Loop – Observing, Reflecting and Making.

Design Thinking usually consists of five or six steps including:

1. ​Empathize – who is your client and what do they want. Next call we will explore one of Design Thinking’s most popular tools – The Empathy Map
2. Define – What do they want, what do they need
3. Ideate – what’s possible
4. Prototype – build a prototype and test it out. Program design may be
5. Test – Test it out – what works, what doesn’t. Iterate again!

 
And the cycle continues….
 
What’s important about thinking about your program design in this fashion?
 
For more on this topic, check out https://designthinking.ideo.com/

Best wishes,
​Jennifer

It's the first day of the month which means that it's time for another new edition of the 1BizStepaDay series. This month we turn our attention to Collaboration and Partnerships.

The 1BizStepADay series is one that I started last year. Each month I publish this 30 day series of daily prompts, inviting you to take focused action on a daily (or regular) basis around your business. It's aligned with the theme of Coaching Business Builder that Daily Steps + Consistent Action = Momentum.

Please take a minute to download this month's 1BizStepaDay here and also let us know WHAT you enjoy about this series. Many of you have been following since the series started in early January 2019.

What's the focus you want to put around relationships and collaboration this month? Perhaps you want to:

• Co-design a new program
• Build relationships with people in a new geographical or industry area
• Reach out to clients who are alumni of your group coaching work
  

Coaching is a high touch profession. Relationships are key to success. What is important about focusing on relationships and collaboration this month? I hope that you will take some time to think about your key relationships and what could use further attention.

Download this month's 1 BizStepaDay on relationships here.

For more on partnering and collaboration, including several questions you will ant to consider exploring, check out chapter 11 in From One to Many: Best Practices for Team and Group Coaching (2013) or chapter 12 of Effective Virtual Conversations. You'll find both books over at Amazon. Enjoy this month's resource!
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton - GroupCoachingEssentials | Potentials Realized 
Instagram @CoachingBizBuilder
Join us for an upcoming ICF-CCE approved program including Group Coaching Essentials (8.75 CCEs), Advanced Group and Team Coaching Practicum (10 CCEs), or the PlanDoTrack Facilitator Training (24 CCEs). 
Author of Effective Group Coaching (2010), Coaching Business Builder (2018), Effective Virtual Conversations (2017) and From One to Many: Best Practices for Team and Group Coaching (2013). Check out my author page on Amazon for all publications.
Email: [email protected]