Manager Coaching That Drives Performance

Recruitment managers face a constant judgement call: when should you give someone the answer, and when should you help them find it themselves?

In this TRN World session, Jamie Burrows explored how coaching can be used to improve recruiter performance, develop greater ownership and create teams that are increasingly capable of solving their own problems.

The starting point is recognising that coaching is not simply another word for training or mentoring. Each has a different purpose, and knowing when to use each one can fundamentally change how people develop.

Training, mentoring and coaching are not the same thing

Training is primarily about transferring knowledge. If someone does not know how to use your CRM, structure a sales call or complete a particular recruitment process, they need someone to teach them.

Mentoring is different. It draws on experience. The mentor has encountered situations the other person has not and can share what they have learned to help them navigate similar challenges.

Coaching shifts the dynamic again.

Instead of providing the answer, the manager asks questions. They remain curious, challenge the individual's thinking and help them reach a solution.

That distinction matters because continually telling experienced recruiters what to do can create dependency. Coaching gives them an opportunity to think through the challenge themselves.

Coach people when they have the knowledge to find the answer

Coaching is not automatically the right management approach.

Think about how someone develops a new skill. At first, they may not even know what they need to know. As they learn, they begin to understand the task but still lack the skills to perform it. Eventually, they can perform it with conscious effort before reaching a stage where the skill becomes largely instinctive.

The management approach should change alongside that development.

Someone completely new to recruitment may need considerable training. As their knowledge and experience grow, mentoring becomes increasingly useful. Once they have developed genuine competence, coaching has a much bigger role to play.

Trying to coach someone towards an answer they simply do not possess is unlikely to be productive.

For an experienced biller who already understands their market, clients and recruitment fundamentals, the situation is different. Their manager may create more value by asking the right questions than by providing another instruction.

Structure coaching conversations around GROW

One practical framework managers can use is the GROW model:

Goal - Reality - Options - Will or Way Forward

The framework is simple, but it gives managers a useful structure for moving a conversation from a problem towards action.

Importantly, recruiters rarely present their challenges neatly.

Someone is unlikely to approach their manager and clearly explain their goal before objectively describing their current reality. They are more likely to say that business development is not working or that they cannot secure enough client meetings.

That is the reality.

Rather than immediately giving them an answer, move the conversation back to the goal.

What are they actually trying to achieve? What would a successful outcome look like?

Once that is clear, examine the current position. What is happening now? What have they already tried? What is preventing progress? What support might they need?

Then explore the options.

What could they do differently? What else could they try? What have they seen other successful people in the business do? What other approach could they take?

Finally, establish what they will actually do next.

A coaching conversation does not need to become a lengthy management meeting. This process can happen in a few focused minutes.

Let recruiters generate their own solutions

The options stage is particularly important because experienced recruiters often know far more about solving their problems than managers give them credit for.

A manager's instinct may be to save time by giving the answer.

If a consultant cannot generate enough new business conversations, it is easy to tell them to pull up a list of lapsed clients, start calling and use a particular message.

That might solve today's problem quickly.

It does not necessarily develop the consultant.

Instead, ask them what they think they could do. Keep exploring until they generate several credible options. Then ask which approach they believe is most appropriate.

The difference is ownership.

The consultant is no longer executing the manager's solution. They have identified an approach and chosen to act on it.

Over time, that can change the conversations taking place across the business. Instead of continually approaching managers with problems and waiting for instructions, people begin arriving with potential solutions.

That is where coaching can start saving managers time rather than consuming it.

Build ownership rather than relying on supervision

Responsibility, accountability and ownership are related, but they are not interchangeable.

Responsibilities are assigned. They are the things somebody is expected to do as part of their role.

Accountability means being answerable for an outcome and taking action to ensure the job gets done.

Ownership goes further because it involves choosing to take responsibility for that outcome.

This distinction becomes particularly important when somebody is underperforming.

The instinctive response can be to increase monitoring. Managers start watching every metric, checking activity throughout the day and repeatedly asking what has been completed.

That may create a short-term increase in activity, but it is difficult to sustain.

A more valuable question is how you can help someone move from knowing their responsibilities, to accepting accountability, to genuinely taking ownership of their performance.

Coaching can be part of that process because the individual is involved in identifying the solution and deciding what they will do.

Use KPIs to support performance, not control people

KPIs can carry negative associations in recruitment businesses, particularly when they have previously been used as a form of excessive supervision.

But removing measurement altogether does not solve the problem.

Three approaches create difficulties: having no meaningful KPIs, setting them but never using them, or becoming so focused on metrics that recruiters are managed almost entirely through activity numbers.

The more useful approach is to treat data as a tool that helps people understand and manage their own performance.

Successful recruitment activity needs both volume and quality.

Large quantities of poor activity are unlikely to produce the required outcome. Equally, a small amount of excellent activity may still be insufficient.

Coaching allows managers to explore that balance with the individual.

What activities do they believe will produce their goal? How much activity is required? How consistently does it need to happen?

When recruiters understand the relationship between their own activity and outcomes, performance data can become something they use to manage themselves rather than something imposed on them by management.

Make accountability factual and specific

Coaching does not remove the need for difficult conversations.

Once someone has committed to an action, managers still need to hold them accountable. The challenge is doing that without allowing the conversation to become personal or emotional.

Two simple structures can help.

The first is SBI - Situation, Behaviour, Impact.

Identify the specific situation, describe the behaviour and explain the impact. If information was not updated before a pipeline meeting, for example, focus on what was missing and how that affected subsequent planning.

Avoid turning an observable behaviour into a judgement about the person's character.

The second framework is BEEF - Behaviour, Example, Effect, Future.

Start by identifying the behaviour you are seeing. Give a specific example supported by facts. Explain the effect that behaviour is having and then clarify what the future could look like if it continues.

For a recruiter whose business development activity is insufficient, that means discussing the actual level of activity, connecting it to the resulting pipeline and being clear about the consequences of continuing on the same path.

Both approaches make it possible to have direct accountability conversations without attacking the individual.

Create teams that think for themselves

Effective management is not about coaching every person through every situation.

Sometimes people need to be trained. Sometimes they benefit from the experience of a mentor. Sometimes managers simply need to be clear about expectations and accountability.

But when capable recruiters repeatedly receive instructions rather than questions, businesses risk creating dependency.

Coaching offers a different route.

Ask people what they are trying to achieve. Help them examine what is really happening. Challenge them to generate options. Get them to choose the next action and then hold them accountable for delivering it.

Done consistently, the result is not simply a better coaching conversation. It is a team increasingly equipped to think, decide and take ownership of its own performance.

Speaker: Jamie Burrows

For more information about Jamie Burrows Training for Recruiters, visit their Partner page here.