Coaching in the Field of Child Welfare - Background
Background | Approaches | Models | In Organization | Framework and Foundation
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The Need for Coaching
- Tenets of Coaching
- Dimensions of Coaching
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The Benefits of Coaching
- Coaching Pays
- The Coaching Pyramid
- Why Coaching Works
- The Coaching Zone
- Skills of Master Coaches
The Need for Coaching in Child Welfare Services
Social workers must constantly use critical decision-making skills as they face a multiplicity of needs and issues when working with families. Implementation science researchers claim that “human services are far more complex than any other industry” (Fixsen, Blasé, Naoom, & Wallace, 2009, p. 531). When making a program or practice change in the field of child welfare, all practitioners must adopt the change. The practitioner is the focus of the change itself (Fixsen, et al., 2009). Child welfare staff need advanced critical decision-making skills that cannot be taught in a one-time training.
The coaching process mirrors the synergistic family–professional relationships promoted in early intervention and encourages staff to adopt a self-correcting perspective, which promotes continued learning and improvement in professional practices by fostering the perspective that an individual’s skills should be examined, discussed, and refined because they are tools of the early intervention profession.
~ Gallacher, 1997, p. 203
Tenets of Coaching
Coaching thrives when all parties involved understand and follow a core set of principles. These tenets, adapted from the work of Kathleen Gallacher (1997), guide and ground the parameters of what is useful and appropriate in a shifting set of relationships and circumstances:
- Coaching is most successful when it is voluntary.
- Enrollment is a process (for details see Chapter 6: Coaching Models). Enrollment occurs when the coach and learner create and agree upon clear outcomes, identify potential challenges to the coaching process, and mutually express commitment.
- Coaching flourishes best when it is separated from supervision and/or performance evaluation.
- Coaching is an ongoing process that requires time; learners must be able to spend time in the learning process.
- Coaching requires an atmosphere of trust and experimentation and a strengths-based learning environment that encourages growth.
- Coaching is individualized to each unique learner.
- Coaching is most successful when it is evidence-based. Evidence-based coaching, a term first used by Grant (2003), refers to “the intelligent and conscientious use of best current knowledge integrated with practitioner expertise in making decisions about how to deliver coaching” (Stober & Grant, 2006, p. 6).
- Coaching increases success in the organization. Coaching an individual social worker improves job performance and development while profoundly impacting the success of the child welfare organization.
Dimensions of Coaching
Coaching varies along several dimensions (Gallacher, 1997). The following questions are important in identifying relationships prior to coaching as they drive individualized coaching strategies:
- Will coaching occur between an expert and a novice?
- Will coaching occur between peers in a reciprocal relationship?
- Will coaching occur between individuals or among members of a team of learners?
- Will coaching focus on the improvement and integration of pre-identified specific skills or on a process by which the coach and learner together identify the goals, objectives, and outcomes of the coaching process?
The most obvious characteristic of formal business coaching is that it is being used explicitly – during the session both parties are clear that they are engaged in ‘coaching’ and are committed to this process as well as the outcome.
~ McGuinness, 2008
Jarvis (2004) describes the individual benefits of coaching that result in greater outcomes for children and families.
Coaching Pays
The potential social return on investment (SROI) that coaching can provide to the learner and the child welfare organization is significant. The concept of return on investment may be difficult to fully quantify in social services as it is usually directly linked to fiscal outcomes. Return on investment (ROI) is typically examined as the net benefits derived from the purchase divided by cost, expressed as a percentage. This essentially details the profit gained by investments. This hard profit line can be difficult, if not impossible, to apply in child welfare; however, the social ROI can be defined. Positive social gains are brought to the organization by implementing coaching. For example, by increasing social worker confidence and abilities to engage families, rates of timely reunification may increase. If coaching leads to workers with enhanced skills, then organizations will be more effective as a whole, which translates into more effective use of fiscal resources as measured by improved outcomes — and improved outcomes for children and families.
The Coaching Pyramid
One way to conceptualize the value of coaching and social return on investment in child welfare agencies is to visualize the Coaching Pyramid (see Figure 2.1). Leedham (2005) developed the Coaching Pyramid from three primary sources of information: an analysis of the literature on ROI, the results of a survey provided to more than 200 executives who received coaching, and a small case study of six business executives who invested in coaching to improve the performance of employees.
The foundation of the Coaching Pyramid (tier 1) consists of (a) a skillful coach who provides clear feedback, listens, and builds trust with the learner; (b) a qualified coach who has the necessary knowledge, qualifications, and effective abilities to coach; (c) a structured coaching process by which both parties understand and agree upon the coaching goals; and (d) a safe and supportive coaching environment that provides a place to reflect and think.
Once the foundation is in place, the learner will reap primary benefits (tier 2) including (a) clarity and focus, which provide a sense of clear direction and purpose; (b) self-confidence, which leads to improved competence and success in working with families; and (c) motivation to achieve, which fosters greater accountability and an enhanced desire for the learner to succeed.
Tier 3 shows how the primary benefits of tier one lead to the enhancement of skills, knowledge, and understanding and improvement in working relationships. Tier 4 of the pyramid, Results, represents the ultimate improved organizational accountability and ROI.
Organizations that encourage authentic learning, set clear expectations and measurable performance objectives, and provide expert help and emotional support will perform more effectively and efficiently than those who do not (Nissly, Mor Barak, & Levin, 2004; Scannapieco & Connell-Carrick, 2007). These factors are more important to retaining staff and decreasing turnover than workloads, salary, and worker characteristics (Douglas, 1997). Ultimately, collaborative learning organizations have better outcomes, which benefit all workers and clients served by the organization.
Why Coaching Works
The University of Kansas Center for Research on Learning evaluated a group of 87 teachers from different schools. The results of the study indicate that 85%of those teachers who received ongoing support from instructional coaches implemented newly learned instructional methods. In another study conducted by the same group, research indicates that teachers who did not receive such support implemented newly learned strategies at a rate of only 10% (Joyce & Showers, 2002). Interestingly, learners can demonstrate new skills in the artificial classroom training exercises, but to transfer learning to everyday work remains low without follow-up coaching.
In her synthesis of coaching research, Gallacher (1997) describes aspects that lead to authentic learning:
- Support and encouragement through the opportunity to review experiences, discuss feelings, describe frustrations and check perceptions with a partner.
- Opportunity to fine-tune skills or strategies through technical feedback and technical assistance from a coaching partner.
- Time and encouragement to analyze practices and decision making at a conscious level.
- Ability to adapt or generalize skills or strategies by considering what is needed to facilitate particular outcomes, how to modify the skill or practice to better fit interactions with specific families or practitioners, or what results may occur from using the skill or practice in different ways.
- Opportunities to reflect on what learners perceive or how they make decisions, which help improve their knowledge and understanding of professional practices and activities.
Ziskin (1970) likened clinical practice (one-shot training) to learning how to play golf in a dense fog. Hitting the ball has some feeling and immediate effect, but there is no reliable information to help correct the drive. One could labor for years on a fog-bound driving range without demonstrating any improvement in actual golfing skill.
Optimally, during coaching enrollment will be high and learning opportunities complex. The figure below depicts this “coaching zone,” where the learner and the coach are making great progress (adapted from UCSF Mentoring Toolkit).
- If the learning opportunities are complex, but enrollment is low, learners may retreat from the process. To take meaningful learning risks and meet challenges head on, learners must be committed.
- If the learner’s enrollment is high, but learning opportunities are not challenging, learners will most likely receive significant validation for their work, but the coaching will fall short. And clearly, if enrollment is low and learning opportunities are not challenging, meaningful change will not occur.
Figure: Coaching Zone (adapted from UCSF Mentoring Toolkit)
| STRATEGY | MASTERY ABILITY |
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Ability to Set Goals |
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Observe and Assess Skill Level |
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Provide Feedback and Facilitate Reflection and Transformation |
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Embed Principles of Adult Learning Into all Work With Learners |
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