Team Coaching: The Key to Sustained Team Performance Improvement
In today's complex business environment, high-performing teams are crucial for organizational success. Yet, many leadership teams struggle with collaboration, communication, and alignment despite having talented individuals. Team coaching offers a structured approach to diagnose and address these challenges systematically. Unlike one-off team-building events, effective team coaching creates sustainable change through ongoing support and development.
What Is Team Coaching?
Team coaching is a facilitated process that helps teams improve their collective performance by enhancing how they work together. Unlike individual coaching that focuses on personal development, team coaching addresses the goals, dynamics, processes, and relationships that impact team effectiveness.
Dr. Peter Hawkins, a leading authority on team coaching, defines it as "a process by which a team coach works with a whole team to help them improve their collective performance and how they work together, and also how they develop their collective leadership to more effectively engage with their stakeholders" (Hawkins, Leadership Team Coaching)
Types of Team Coaching
Team coaching comes in several forms, each addressing different team needs:
Diagnostic Team Coaching: Focuses on assessment and awareness of team dynamics and performance patterns.
Developmental Team Coaching: Helps improve team alignment, collaboration, and day-to-day dynamics.
Systemic Team Coaching: Addresses the team's relationship with its wider organizational ecosystem and stakeholders.
When Does Your Team Need Coaching?
The first requirement is that the team is an actual team and not simply a group of individuals. A team works toward a common goal, with mutual accountability and coordinated efforts. In contrast, a group of individuals may collaborate occasionally or help each other, but lacks the shared goals that define a true team. While a group may benefit from developing shared values or norms, they don't need team coaching because they aren’t really a team.
Team coaching is especially helpful for the following types of teams:
Newly formed teams or teams with new team members
Teams with a new team leader
Teams with high-stakes deliverables
Cross-functional teams
Teams experiencing the following dynamics:
Inconsistent execution or missed objectives
Unproductive conflict
Siloed thinking and lack of collaboration
Poor decision-making processes
Low psychological safety or trust issues
Difficulty adapting to change
Lack of alignment on goals or priorities
The most telling sign is when a team is moving in different directions or collectively underperforming. This often indicates systemic team issues rather than individual performance problems.
The Team Coaching Process
Effective team coaching typically follows a structured process:
Assessment and Diagnosis
The process begins with a comprehensive assessment of the team's current state. Using tools like the TeamUp Assessment provides objective data on critical dimensions of team effectiveness, including psychological safety, structure, reliability, execution, and belonging.Discovery and Intake
Following the assessment, individual interviews with team members provide deeper insights into team dynamics, challenges, and aspirations. These confidential conversations reveal nuances that might not emerge in group settings or structured assessments.Group Debrief and Goal Setting
The coach presents assessment findings and interview themes to the team, facilitating a discussion about strengths, challenges, and improvement opportunities. From this understanding, the team establishes specific, measurable goals for improvement.Ongoing Coaching and Development
Rather than a one-time intervention, effective team coaching involves regular sessions over several months. These sessions might include:Skill-building workshops
Real-time coaching during team meetings
Process improvement facilitation
Conflict resolution support
New behavior practice and feedback
Progress Measurement and Adjustment
Regular check-ins track progress against established goals and adjust the coaching approach as needed. Many organizations conduct follow-up assessments after 6-12 months to measure improvement quantitatively.
Read about how coaching your team as a collective makes it stronger.
Beyond the One-Day Offsite
While team offsites can generate enthusiasm and insights, they rarely produce lasting change without intentional follow-through. Research shows that approximately 70% of change initiatives fail, often due to lack of sustained focus and support.
Selecting the Right Team Coach
When selecting a team coach, consider these factors:
Relevant Experience: Look for coaches with experience in your industry and with teams facing similar challenges.
Assessment Approach: Ensure they use validated assessment tools and methods to diagnose team dynamics.
Theoretical Framework: Understand their approach to team development and ensure it aligns with your organization's values and needs.
Methodology: Clarify their coaching process, including assessment, feedback, and development methods.
Chemistry: Ensure the coach's style and approach resonate with your team's culture.
Working Effectively with a Team Coach
To maximize the impact of team coaching:
Secure Leadership Commitment: The team leader must fully support the process and be willing to model vulnerability and change.
Allocate Adequate Time: Sustainable change requires consistent attention and practice.
Maintain Transparency: Be open about the purpose and process of the coaching engagement.
Ensure Psychological Safety: Create conditions where team members can share honestly without fear.
Connect to Business Outcomes: Link team development goals to organizational priorities and performance metrics.
Embrace Accountability: Establish clear expectations for behavior change and follow-through.
Team Coaching - from Google to Regroup
At Google, I built and led global team development programs, which operationalized the research from Project Aristotle. I saw that teams across the company struggled with execution (meetings and decision-making) and psychological safety (feeling safe to speak up). Teams needed clarity on purpose, goals, roles and processes as well as alignment on productive norms and behaviors like giving feedback, asking for help and active listening. Working with a team coach, teams were able to gain clarity, alignment and develop more positive behaviors, which helped them improve performance.
Similarly, at Regroup, we help teams develop through the stages of team development to get unstuck and become high performing. Our team coaching approach blends structured frameworks with real-time facilitation to address both what a team is working on and how they’re working together. We guide teams in identifying unproductive patterns, clarifying goals and roles, and strengthening trust and collaboration. By focusing on both alignment and dynamics, we help teams unlock greater effectiveness and resilience, especially during times of change or growth.
Conclusion
While one-day interventions can provide valuable insights and momentary alignment, sustainable team improvement requires ongoing support and development. Team coaching bridges this gap, transforming temporary insights into lasting change.
By starting with a comprehensive assessment like the TeamUp Assessment, establishing clear development goals, and engaging in sustained coaching, teams can break free from dysfunctional patterns and develop the collaborative capabilities needed for high performance.
For additional perspectives, read about coaching your team through uncertain times.
In today's complex business environment, this investment in team effectiveness may offer the most significant return on leadership development budgets.
Questions for Reflection
For CEOs and COOs: How much of your organization's performance challenges stem from team dynamics rather than individual capabilities? What would be the ROI of improving your leadership team's effectiveness by 20%?
For CHROs: How do your current team development initiatives address sustained behavior change rather than just momentary insights? What systems do you have in place to measure team effectiveness?
For CFOs: How do you currently measure the cost of team dysfunction in your organization? Have you calculated the financial impact of delays, rework, and missed opportunities due to poor team dynamics?
For Team Leaders: When was the last time you received honest feedback about your team's dynamics from an objective third party? What patterns might be obvious to others but invisible to you?
For Executive Teams: How frequently do you find yourselves revisiting the same issues without resolution? What would it be worth to permanently resolve your three most persistent team challenges?
If this article has sparked ideas about how team coaching could enhance your team's performance, we’d love to continue the conversation. Reach out and share your thoughts—we’re here to help!
