Why Are Coaching Evaluation Forms Important?
You may have heard this term before: you’re only as strong as your weakest link. Well, a business is only as strong as its weakest employee. That’s why companies employ the use of a coaching evaluation form.
This form’s main goal is to identify and target problem areas in how an employee performs his or her assigned duties. It will then help you assist in recognizing the strengths and abilities of your employees and help guide them in applying them correctly.
Coaching questions aim to generate process-oriented consulting and focus on professional issues. Coaching questions are part of a form of consulting to accompany and support your employees in their professional development.
Yet, a company isn’t just its goals and objectives, its core comprises of people who get up every morning and clock the nine to five, day in and day out. People aren’t robots; they have flaws and performance issues. But unlike machines, you can’t put in a line of code and fix all their problems. Rather, they need gentle guidance—a nudge in the right direction every once and a while, and that’s what a coach is for: to not only help employees realize their personal career goals but help guide a company towards future success.
Your company will benefit from the structured guidance of company coaches, and your employees will enjoy a more fulfilling professional experience.
This article will inform you about the following topics:
1. Typical topics discussesed in coaching evaluation forms
3. Evaluating coaching effectiveness
5. Examples of coaching evaluations
6. A mobile solution for coaching evaluation forms
Typical Topics Discussed in Coaching Forms
Coaching forms promote self-reflection and improves the self-perception and behavior while participants benefit from a sustainable learning effect. A coaching evaluation form is used in a wide variety of areas and can vary greatly in content. The most important topics in coaching evaluation include:
- Professional reorientation
- Personal position-fixing, strength analysis and direction-finding
- Management tasks and competencies
- Dealing with conflicts
- Career and professional development
- Decisions and changes
- Management of virtual conferences
- Stress management and targeted burnout prophylaxis
3 General Coaching Types
Depending on the respective goal of the questions, a distinction is made between different types of coaching. The three most common coaching categories are as follows:
1. Goals Coaching
Goals serve as professional and personal milestones to gauge growth. Goals coaching is carried out with the support of a coaching guide. To help aid the process, a coaching evaluation form is used to support the coach in defining, maintaining, and achieving set goals. The coaching protocol summarizes the professional opportunities and includes a coaching plan for implementation.
2. Development Coaching
By using development coaching, a person is supported in recognizing his or her potential strengths and developing them further.
3. Values Coaching
A coaching guide can help shape company values. Picking the right values to focus on are especially important because they can affect the employees, working atmosphere, and ultimately the success of the company. These beliefs and attitudes create a company image that you want to represent to the outside world. Unfortunately, many companies are unable to implement this strategy successfully. However, through coaching evaluation forms and appropriate questions, these values can be easily established.
How to Evaluate Coaching Effectiveness
We’ve already discussed the importance of conducting a coaching performance audit, but how do you know if it’s paying off? Measuring success is difficult in any field. After all, how do you calculate something that’s abstract and intangible?
The answer to evaluating coaching effectiveness is actually simpler than you might think—make it into a measurable value. Here’s how you can do that:
- Outline your goals
- Agree on the objectives
- Come up with a plan of execution
- Set deadlines
- Review progress report
At the end of all these steps, you should have a quantifiable outcome by asking yourself, have the proposed goals been accomplished by the deadline? It will be the responsibility of the leader to keep the team on track, so this is where it comes in handy to have a coaching evaluation form. This way, you can assess and identify which areas need the most attention and act accordingly. Better yet, all the information is organized and in one place when it comes time to make the progress report.
What do You Do if Your Coaching is not Effective?
If you’re not seeing the desired or expected results of your coaching, then it’s time to reevaluate your strategy.
It’s important to keep in mind that each employee is different. What might have worked for one employee might now work for another. The best thing to do in this situation is to tailor each coaching session to the employee’s specific learning style.
Having each employee take a quick learning style quiz might be helpful in determining how to best meet the needs of each individual person.
Another strategy to consider is adding more tools to your toolbox. Coaches and leaders are there to guide and assist the client to reach their fullest potential, but it’s ultimately the client who is responsible for meeting their own goals. One of the best pieces of advice in coaching is to let the client do most of the work.
That being said, a coach comes prepared with a strategy and techniques that will help the client or employee along the way. Some useful approaches to coaching are to:
- Ask open-ended questions
- Set Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, and Time-based (SMART) goals
- Frequently follow-up
- Be an avid listener
- Use motivational speech
At the end of the day, the most important thing is that everyone is satisfied with their work. If that’s not the case, then something needs to change. How you implement the change will be up to you, but it will be easier to frequently assess and recess and make small directional adjustments than to make major corrections down the road.
How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time.
How to Write Feedback for Coaching
Constructive criticism goes a long way in improving an employee’s base skillset, but a lot of people don’t know exactly how to provide criticism in an effective way. Despite their best efforts, it still might come out more destructive than constructive—which doesn’t help anyone.
It’s a natural human reaction to bristle at the first sign of rejection, but here are some tips on how to provide feedback that that will encourage improvement instead of causing your employees to shut down and become unresponsive to suggestions:
- Use I Statements
This might feel a little silly to use in a professional setting, but it takes the accusation out of the comment and makes a statement look more like an opinion. If you do have to make a suggestion that might be a little hard to swallow, it’ll go a long way in softening the blow. This strategy will help employees be more open and receptive to hard-to-hear criticism. - Open Up a Dialogue
Don’t just criticize them and then ostracize them. Make it a two-way conversation. Maybe they have a reason for why they’re doing things the way they are. Maybe it’s an even better way than you initially thought. You won’t know unless employees feel safe enough to open up a discussion, and it should give employees the chance to defend themselves if they feel the need to. Besides, evaluations aren’t just for the sake of evaluations; they should be used as a learning exercise where employees get the chance to grow and improve. - Use Encouragement
In life, we often have to take the bad with the good, but don’t forget to include the good! Everyone likes to hear words of encouragement every now and then, especially if they have to hear news that isn’t exactly pleasing. Words of encouragement are meant to motivate and embolden the mood of everyone in the vicinity. - Remember to Praise
There’s no faster way to insult someone than to focus on everything they’re doing wrong. Focus on some key aspects of the job that they’re doing well in and tell them. Everyone likes to be praised, and it can be helpful to get an idea of what’s being done well so they can continue that behavior. - Use Neutral Words
The key here is not to use emotionally charged words when writing the coaching assessment. Neutrality is best in this case. Think about how you would like to receive criticism and write the evaluation with that in mind. It’s all about how you phrase what you want to say.
For example, don’t write, “Your work lately has been mediocre at best. Pick up the pace.”
Instead, use positive action words and follow them up with a suggestion.
For example, “I think you’re capable of producing higher quality work. I think if you sanded down the wood a little more before painting, it will have a smoother finish and the result you’ve been looking for.”
- Follow Up
This will provide a good opportunity to reinforce positive behavior. By following up, it shows the employee that you actually care and take an interest in their work. It’ll also register that their work is being monitored and spur them into putting their best foot forward. - Be Specific
It’s important to be as specific as possible. Otherwise, you run the risk of having an employee misinterpret or completely misunderstand your suggestion. Stay away from general statements. Instead, incorporate real-life examples.
Human emotion can get in the way of providing employees with the feedback that they need and deserve to improve their skill proficiency. It’s only natural to become frustrated if an employee seems unreceptive to the comments and suggestions you’ve taken the time to carefully craft out. Not everyone is a patient teacher—or learner—for that matter.
Know that if an employee feels attacked or reprimanded, it will hurt their confidence in their abilities to perform a task up to business standards, and it will ultimately impact their productivity and quality of work. Promote a positive work environment by keeping these quick tips and tricks in mind while writing your evaluation.
How to Fill Out a Coaching Evaluation Form Example
With all that to keep in mind, now it’s time to start writing your own executive coaching evaluation form.
But where to start?
First, pick out the topic and type of evaluation you’ll be performing. Use technology where you can and make life easier by using a coaching evaluation template.
Below, you’ll find a coaching session evaluation example:
Brief description of coaching sessions:
Last session, the employee, Rebecca Jones’, goal was to increase her sales by selling four additional insurance policies per week. Prior to coaching, she had consistently been unable to meet the minimum quota of 10 insurance policies per week.
Results:
Rebecca Jones sold a total of 9 insurance policies last week, four more than the week prior.
What do you think went well?
Rebecca Jones exhibited a friendly attitude while interacting with clients. She’s highly skilled at creating rapport, which I believe was a significant contributing factor for attaining the three additional sales goals.
What do you think could have gone differently?
I believe Jones can continue to increase her sales to meet next week’s quota by reviewing the different insurance policies and plans that our company has to offer.
Additional manager comments or observations?
It was my impression that a few potential clients were dissuaded from signing because they lacked the necessary information to make an informed decision. I noticed that two clients were on the verge of signing but ultimately decided against it—which otherwise would have put Jones at her goal. With some additional guidance, I believe Jones could very well be one of our top performers.
Employee Commitment
I commit to [specific behavior]
“I commit to selling an additional five insurance policies per week to get to the minimum quota of ten insurance policies.”
In an effort to [improve/maintain what goal or metric]
“In an effort to meet my goal, I will review the various insurance policies and plans, so I am more informed when I discuss their options with the client.”
Beginning [specific time this will start]
This goal will be set for the beginning of next week (12-12-2021) and conclude at the end of the week (12-17-2021) where we’ll reassess the progress and attempts made to meet this goal.
Signature
Employee signature agreeing to commitment
Rebecca Smith
Manager signature agreeing to support the employee’s efforts around this commitment
Samantha Lee
A Mobile Solution for Coaching Evaluation Forms
Given the extensive coaching questions that are required, filling out paper-based coaching evaluation forms present challenges. On the one hand, filling it out is time-consuming, and on the other, paper lists make it difficult to keep track of changes and analysis.
Digitalization of coaching evaluation forms simplifies the process of giving feedback and enables users to gain actionable insights. Lumiform is a powerful digital application that automatically creates paperless coaching protocols according to a consistent pattern.
- The results from the evaluation are automatically processed into a report – this saves the complete postprocessing.
- Save time by analyzing all data more efficiently and identifying areas that need your attention more quickly.
- The very simple operation offers no margin for error. The app offers less complex system of documenting and filling out checklists than a paper or Excel lists.
- Lumiform offers over 2,000 ready-made templates, so you can start using digital coaching evaluation forms immediately.
- All coaching evaluation forms are safely stored in the cloud.
Try Lumiform for free
