Coaching Conversations in 2025
Coaching Conversations with Tim Hagen, where we teach leaders and managers how to coach their employees. This is the ideal podcast for leaders, managers, and aspiring leaders to improve their coaching and leadership skills to create a more positive coaching culture within their teams.
In 2025, we're doing weekly podcasts on various coaching topics and strategies that will rotate throughout the month, as opposed to 2024 where the weekly episodes featured a monthly theme. Coaching Conversations will continue to have four episodes per month and we're going to sprinkle in masterclasses, which will be lengthier, workshop-style formats.
We also invite you to join the new FREE e-publication, the Workplace Coaching Times founded by Tim Hagen. This weekly newsletter contains expert insights on coaching strategies on specific topics like sales coaching, leading with empathy, and self-awareness techniques, and much more. We're a community of leaders, managers and coaches transforming workplace challenges into coaching victories—one conversation at a time. Subscribe here: https://coachingtimes.beehiiv.com/subscribe
Coaching Conversations in 2025
The Future of Workplace Coaching?
Welcome to Coaching Conversations
We have created a NEW and Innovative line of books called Workplace Coaching Books. These books use QR codes with embedded audio and video lessons speaking directly to the reader. Each book comes with assessments and journal based coaching pages where they document what they've learned and what they've applied. In addition each book comes with the self analysis link that prompts them to share what they've learned and what they've put into action leading to greater learner application a
Coaching Talks is a dynamic leadership development speaking series customized to your needs. Need help spreading the value and application of workplace coaching? Let us help:
We provide many styles of speaking services:
- We provide virtual keynotes
- We specialize in 4 part virtual series (we always customize)
- We have a unique feature called "Speaker Tracks" where we send to all audience members reinforcement lessons after the talk (to the pc or cell phone), thus keeping people on track after the talk
Get More Info Here: https://form.jotform.com/241193119118149
So, what is the future of coaching? What is the future of coaching in the workplace? You know, there's so many things coming, and I just went through a training module. And yes, as an expert in coaching, I am constantly looking for different things to facilitate coaching. And I actually created from a video a really good module from a guy who runs a newsletter company talking about, you know, a group coaching concept that I had not really thought about in the context that he talked about. And its identification is having these cohorts, almost like cohort sprints, but have only a focus on one transformational focus. So one of the things that I just did is I created a four-week program for a company for new managers. And it was around just giving feedback, becoming more confident in giving feedback. That's it. That's our only focus. So for four weeks, what we did is we focused on different ways to deliver feedback, build trust with feedback. So each session had an imperative, but the overarching focus was the transformational focus of getting new managers to be comfortable and more confident giving feedback. That's it. And we measured it and we had practice sessions, we had um peer-to-peer sessions outside of our group sessions. We had an online course that they could take as a preemptive uh measure to prepare for the cohort. So I think we have to expand our horizons, but I think we have to go back to the fundamentals. And I go back to my infamous Tim Hagen numbers. 85% of people lack self-awareness. So don't tell someone they got to get better at feedback. Ask them what's your comfort with giving feedback? Questions drive self-awareness. Number two, when we facilitate change, most people will not arbitrarily facilitate change for themselves on their own. They just won't. So you have to facilitate activities like let's practice that feedback conversation. Let me go first. Third, we have to also realize that people are at their most motivated state 76% of the time, according to a study done at Harvard, when people are progressing. Show people into the office for the good stuff. Put a note on their desk, send a card home. You will blow people away. And so I think foundationally, we just developed a course called spot coaching, which is our uh version of observational coaching. Now we've always done it, but we've really kind of structured it differently. Go spot the good stuff. Help people feel good about getting better. Foundationally, does that have long-lasting results? No, but it nurtures nudges during the day that ultimately creates trust where there are opportunities to deliver constructive insight, feedback, or coaching. And then last, I think the biggest thing is, you know, we have this thing called artificial intelligence. And we use AI all the time. But I think what we're going to see is a collaborative effort. And I think about AI, and it's probably an awkward parallel to the pandemic. You know, when the pandemic occurred, I can't tell you how many calls I got from people talking about the virtual world. I've never done the virtual world. We've never done training virtually. And I said, it's just a different place to do what you already do well. I think with AI, we have to understand a couple fundamental things. And that's that when you use an AI tool, and let's say a leader says to an employee, here, use this AI tool. I do think there's a tremendous value there because I think an employee might be more willing to say, how do I deal with a difficult boss? versus actually talking to the boss. They might get some insights to have that conversation. But I think these things will always bring us back to what? That human connection and human interaction. Number two, how can AI help human-based coaching? Now, here at Progress Coaching, we have, I think now, seven AI tools that build out specific coaching plans from a coaching plan for job description or a training course or for leader-to-employ expectations or group coaching topics. We built all that. Now, what we're also building out is Convo Builder, where we're actually having people say, here's a person I'm coaching, here's their typical responses. What does the ideal conversation look like? And what we do is we highlight very specific points like here's a question, here's a pivot in the conversation. If they give you that rebuttal, here's a response. And what we're really doing is preparing for what? Human-based conversations. And I think we have to be very conscientious, very conscientious, that if we go all in on AI, we got to be careful. We have to be careful because at the end of the year, there's this thing called a review. And one of my clients coached to me and said, I want in our group coaching for you to mention our end-of-the-year review every session. I want this to be a challenge for people to constantly think about as employees. Do I know where I stand with my boss? That's not only on the boss. And the client, when she she instructed me to do this, I'm like, wow, this is a really great point. If you have AI doing the coaching, that end-of-the-year review is going to be really clumsy and awkward. Because if you just get a merit to crease across the board and say, well, we can only give you 2% this year or whatever it is, what's going to happen? Human reactions can be, you haven't spent a minute of time with me. You're going to rely on that AI tool. I hated that thing. It's going to get weaponized. Now, I'm not against AI, but I think we have to build around our AI strategy. What are we trying to accomplish? And what are the right processes, procedures, the right AI tools that will allow us to do that? Start with strategy, then choose AI. Don't start with AI and then build strategy. What are your thoughts?