Harvard Business Review Guides Ultimate Boxed Set (16 Books)

Chapter 4

Holding a Coaching Session

by Amy Jen Su

Coaching sessions are conversations between you and your employee in which you identify areas for growth, create development plans, perform exercises, and check in on progress. A coaching session can kick off a specific development process around a particular skill or behavior as needed; you can then hold further sessions to follow up and monitor progress. A coaching session can also be a regular, more general conversation about the employee’s growth.

Coaching sessions are distinct from other types of conversations you may already be having with your employees, such as performance reviews or regular check-ins. Table 4–1 compares and contrasts the focus and time frames for each of these; you’ll ...