Kaye Thorne

London: Kogan Page, 2004.
144 pages. Paperback. £18.99.
ISBN: 978-0-7494-4168-2

Reviewed by Joanna Bawa

Coaching for Change is many things, but here are some of the things it’s not: it’s not a coaching manual, it’s not about how to become a coach and it’s not about how to become a better coach if you’re already one.

Rather, Coaching for Change is aimed squarely at that vast raft of individuals working in HR, general management, organisational consulting, training, facilitating and similar, who find themselves tasked with the unspecified ‘transformation’ (for which read ‘improvement’) of people performance within a challenging organisational environment. The book’s aim is to provide ways to approach this task with an emphasis on coaching, whether ‘coaching’ appears in your job title or not. And although the book does discuss the coach-coachee relationship, the focus is consistently on the development of teams within organisations rather than the coaching of individuals through private ‘life’ issues.

Thorne writes from experience, which is evident in her move away from lengthy theoretical expositions in favour of short paragraphs, bullet points, lists and summaries. It’s the sort of book a harassed manager won’t feel threatened by and may actually read. The focus on practical considerations and approaches is extremely reassuring, taking the mystery out of coaching and allowing non-coaches to realise they possess many of the skills required to contribute to performance transformation. It also supports the reader in the identification of colleagues or associates who possess more general coaching attributes (such as listening skills, non-judgemental and non-directive interaction style, goal-oriented approach) as a way to begin creating a ‘coaching landscape’.

When dealing with the vast topic of organisational change, Thorne is specific and relevant, providing only the most important information and expressing complex processes in simple steps. For example, the question ‘So How do you Support Transforming Performance?’ is answered in a fivestep process: 1. Accurately assess readiness to change; 2. Clearly state the overall strategic direction; 3. Identify the key stages on the journey; 4. Gain commitment from others to the common goal; and 5. Establish a process to learn and grow. Each of these steps could be (and probably is) a book in itself, but Thorne deals with the entire issue in just seven pages. Her format of an overview paragraph plus a list of ‘Questions that you may want to consider’ for each step doesn’t allow space for philosophy or subtlety - but this is a book for people who are actually doing it, and who need concrete guidance to get them started.

The risk of writing about coaching and the coaching process in such a concise manner is that it can lose its distinctiveness as a discipline and become just another nice management thing to do. Thorne avoids this by reiterating the specific attributes of coaches and the coaching approach and connecting these with organisational goals such as better talent management, clearer business strategy, and improved employee morale. Her discussion of dealing with setbacks, creating options and exploring alternatives will be familiar to every coach, and her regular use of ‘questions to ask’ and actions to check-off converts potentially vague areas of difficulty into a realistic action plan. The secret to carrying change through against resistance, she reminds us, is ‘Don’t Give Up!’ expressed here in the Don’t Give Up! Action Plan - simple yet powerful advice to get individuals back on track and moving towards goals.

Thorne’s section on coaching conversations is dotted with pithy quotations and examples from the work of other, well-established coaches. Almost the entire raison d’être of corporate coaching becomes clear from her citation of Daniel Goleman’s citation of Marcus Buckingham’s comment: ‘People join companies and leave managers’; and her regular references to trust and respect reinforce the importance of good relationships to successful organisations.

The book concludes with a series of case studies which are honest enough to include a realistic appraisal of the challenges that organisational change creates; and the difficulty of quantifying the benefits of coaching - even where participants agree it’s been a positive experience. It would have been nice to see more of a discussion of outcomes (desired and actual) and what organisations can realistically expect from coaching, but these are enormously diverse and possibly beyond the scope of the book.

A short, readable text, Coaching for Change may not be a comprehensive resource for those implementing performance transformation - but it’s certainly an excellent place to start.