The Argument Against Coaching Cultures

N Evans The International Journal of Coaching in Organizations 2011

In recent years, a number of articles and books have been written on the subject of how to create a coaching culture in the belief that this will have a positive effect on organizational performance and other outcomes such as employee morale and retention. In this article, it is argued that this is a leap of logic derived from evidence that coaching improves employee performance. In fact, the author argues that while coaching cultures may result in improved employee satisfaction, they may actually have a negative effect on organizational performance. As such, organizations that are striving to use coaching to improve their performance are better served by focusing on the purposeful development and use of coaching skills or, alternatively, embedding coaching as part of performance-oriented contexts such as innovation cultures.