January 25, 2023

What Determines Coachability?

By Ken Giglio, Principal of Mindful Leadership

How many coaches does it take to change a light bulb?

None – The light bulb will change when it’s ready.

This old joke has a ring of truth for coaches working with leaders and for leaders working with their direct reports. Leaders will change when they are ready. And, when they are ready to make changes in the way they think and act to become more effective, we call them coachable.

“Are they coachable?” is a question I hear often from HR and OD leaders as they grapple with whether or not to invest in a coaching program for a leader. As a supervisor of other coaches, this question becomes a critical lens through which we can look at what is happening with a coaching assignment that is drifting, stuck, or derailing.

What determines coachability? There are some opinions and frameworks offered in response to this question but scant research. Though there are no coachability assessments currently used by coaches or organizations, several validated tools, like the Hogan Assessment, identify aspects of one’s personality that make us more or less coachable.

One survey of coaches of varying backgrounds offers these 5 factors for determining coachability—openness, growth orientation, security, external resources, and vulnerability. In this article, I’ll share those that stand out as most resonant from my experience as a coach and supervisor.

Growth orientation was by far the factor most identified by coaches as needing to be present in a leader for them to be considered coachable. The most engaged leaders I coach are motivated to change as they enter the engagement and know generally or specifically the goals they want to focus on. They hit the ground running and use the coaching to maximum effect, seeing it as an investment in themselves and their careers. I find these leaders a pleasure to work with and true partners in their own development. They are advocates for coaching, the light bulbs that seek to change themselves, and they are at the forefront of creating cultures of coaching.

Openness, which is basically openness to feedback and other perspectives, is, from my experience, a key prerequisite for anyone to be considered coachable. Being open means listening, hearing, and allowing feedback, not because it is the truth about oneself, but because it is how others perceive our actions. The leaders who are open will take in feedback and change their behaviors based on what they heard. When I first meet a potential client, openness to feedback is what I am looking for most as I determine coachability. If a leader is using ‘they’ a lot to describe what is most challenging in their world, then they may not be ready for coaching. When I hear something like, “I could have done some things differently,” then I move the leader into the possible coachability category.

Too many coaches, and leaders, in my experience, either assume openness is present in the leader or try to persuade the leader to be open to change. The result is mostly wasted time and money. I have learned from my own mistakes that openness is an intrinsic readiness process, which is complicated by many factors, such as a leader’s past experiences with criticism that was disguised as feedback. And, too often the organization isn’t clear enough with the potential coaching client about the initial coaching outcomes. The conditions for coachability are in part the responsibility of the organization in the way they frame coaching from the start. (More on this in a follow-up post.)

Vulnerability, when looking through the lens of coachability, is the leader who is open and has the courage to acknowledge, with humility and transparency, that they are hitting a wall and don’t know a way forward. In short, being vulnerable is the courage to be oneself no matter what happens. These are the leaders taking the most risk by exposing their uncertainty and admitting their mistakes. They are aware they are in pain and let others know about it so they can receive the help they need. In the compassionate hands of a coach, leaders who exhibit a measure of vulnerability are the most likely to make deep, lasting changes. They need to regain their footing and use their difficulties as a catalyst for leaving behind ineffective ways of thinking and acting.

There is a lot at stake when organizations decide to invest in coaching. All companies want to see their leaders succeed and increase their effectiveness, and yet not all leaders are ready to change. When growth orientation, openness, and vulnerability are shown in a leader, we effectively can have a high level of confidence that they are coachable.

From your experience, what would you add as key factors for determining coachability?