Soft Skills for Hard Benefits

...Continued from December Newsletter

Who works in a company where the biggest investment is in the desks? Or the water-cooler? Or the printer? The biggest asset most companies have is their staff. So why neglect them, why not make the most of those bright minds that stood out at interview?
Around the globe, HR is fighting to keep their best people as new opportunities open up to them post-recession. How are they doing this? They are bringing in external coaches to coach their A-team, to work out what motivates them and find ways to put it into practice. Managers and directors are also training in coaching to learn to perform more effectively.
“But it’s too expensive...” we hear you say. In fact, recent research shows the opposite. Coaching in business has been proven to produce a large return on investment. For specific case studies from the ICF please click here. This will be explored further at the conference this week and we look forward to bringing you further news on this topic.
Aside from ROI, coaching has been proven to have significant links to individual skills and behaviours, team performance, productivity and employee job satisfaction as found by a meta-analysis published in this month’s International journal of coaching. With the large amount of evidence supporting the benefits of coaching, it’s not can we afford to, but can we afford not to? Coaching really is a soft skill which produces hard benefits.