Train the Coach Trainer programme

Objectives

Tanglin Trust School in Singapore has a long tradition of providing British-based learning with an international perspective. The school had already begun a journey towards a coaching culture through basic training on a peer coaching model, and came to us looking for more formal training leading to an ILM qualification and a train-the-trainer programme.

Solutions

Working closely with Benyna Richards, the Director of CPD at Tanglin, we designed a programme to produce groups of ILM accredited coaches, the most committed of whom could go on to train as trainers.

Outcomes

The programme commenced with 12 participants attending our ‘Performance Coach Training for Schools’ course and becoming ILM certified coaches.

Then three of those accredited coaches, Sarah Aldous, Flora Xu, and Krista Magee, attended a second course, acting as mentors to the new participants and observing how the training was delivered.

The three apprentice trainers received extra mentoring and tuition from our trainer, and completed special assignments where they practised delivery of the training.

A third course was delivered by our trainer, with the three apprentice trainers taking part in the delivery of the programme. Our trainer observed and assessed that by the end of this third course, they were each ready to deliver as lead trainers themselves.

The three apprentice trainers produced a variety of elements to be assessed, including case history, discourse, coaching log and supervision log, in order to qualify to deliver the course internally under licence. They are now delivering courses themselves at Tanglin.

The entire programme took place within the space of 16 months, due to the high level of teaching skill and commitment from both the trainees and the apprentice trainers.

Comments from participants

“I’ve been really impressed at how well the ‘face to face’ sessions have worked on Zoom.  James is clearly very comfortable with the remote format and it feels like we are all ‘in the room’. I have two key takeaways as a coach: 1. Active listening is incredibly powerful. I learned to resist jumping in with advice. 2. Having an EXACT goal has a massive impact on individual motivation and performance.” – John Ridley, Director of Learning, Tanglin Trust School Singapore

“The course was fantastic.  I plan to incorporate this into my everyday interactions, line management, as well as continue with some private coaching clients. It was so valuable and really highlighted the value of coaching to me.” – Sophie Harle, Director of HR, Tanglin Trust Singapore

“By the end of the coaching course, I felt a kind of euphoric feeling, that something similar to magic was possible. I now believe that with the right language, attitude, and purpose everyone is capable of coaching and being coached.” – Donavan Zegna, Head of Integrated Technology in the Junior School, Tanglin Trust School, Singapore

“I have thoroughly enjoyed this course and it has definitely made me think differently about how I approach my role as an educator. Enabling children or adults to solve their own problems, through targeted guidance is incredibly empowering and I look forward to continuing to learn how to become a better coach and teacher as a result.” – Matt Hastwell, Learning Support Teaching in the Junior School, Tanglin Trust School, Singapore

“I thoroughly enjoyed the course particularly the sessions toward to end of the course. Generative Thinking has been huge for me in my current and future role. I also find myself having more sporadic coaching conversations with peers.” – Courtney Conlon.  Job title: Assistant Head of Year, Tanglin Trust Singapore

“James was a great trainer for the course. He has excellent knowledge and was able to explain the content in a high level of detail and provided practical examples to help understanding. James was patient despite the varying levels of knowledge within the group and encouraged interaction at all sessions.” – Richard Arlett, Activities & Sport Director, Tanglin Trust Singapore

“I found the ‘Imagine you have achieved it, what does it feel like? What would be the benefits?’ question very helpful as it created a future focus as well as revealing what motivated the other person. This positive approach meant that my goal become something to achieve rather than something to avoid.” – Benyna Richards, Director of CPD, Tanglin Trust School, Singapore

“My goals for this course were twofold: to encourage and inspire others to become coaches at our school, and to become a coach trainer. Thanks to the changing partner system I was able to encourage the others on the course as I met with them. Through a bit of support, I hope that I was able to help the others explore the transformative power of coaching.’ – Sarah Aldous, Head of Faculty for Mathematics and Computing in the Senior School, Tanglin Trust School, Singapore

“Learning how to coach has been a rewarding, memorable and life enhancing experience. I feel very privileged to be working with Sarah and Flora on becoming a Coach Trainer and playing a part in establishing a Coaching Culture at Tanglin.” – Krista Magee, Film Technician in the Senior School, Tanglin Trust School, Singapore

“My active listening skills have definitely improved throughout the duration of the course. I listened to the silences between the words, which created a solid foundation for this specific coaching session. Besides following the GROW model, I also kept my focus on the solutions, rather than the problem; this enabled my coachee to remain excited and, consequently, she was more willing to delve deeper into her consciousness, acquiring greater awareness, as well as gaining greater depth as regards her understanding of the issues and solutions.” – Flora Xu, Teacher of Chinese in the Senior School, Tanglin Trust School, Singapore

“Training to be a coach has been significantly a very positive experience and has improved my growth as a person, improved my well-being, helped me focus on attaining my goals in alignment to my values. Coaching has created a self-awareness and that has helped me overcome my obstacles and in turn have smoother transitions into discovering my strengths and weaknesses. Training to be a coach has helped me realise that all processes big and small are based on attaining the right rhythm of collaboration and solutions.” – Nivedita Tanwar, Teaching and Learning Assistant in the Infant School, Tanglin Trust School, Singapore

“I came into this course having done a couple of coaching sessions around the GROW model and therefore felt quietly confident about my understanding of coaching: it was all about following the path through the GROW structure and echoing back words the coachee had said. With the power of hindsight (and at many, many points during the course) I have reflected on how naive I was and how much more there is to being an effective coach.
     As I have done more practice I have appreciated that you can move between the 4 elements and it is about allowing the coachee to lead the conversation and go where it most benefits them, not about working methodically through each stage of the GROW model in turn.
     What I found particularly powerful was the setting of goals, using the EXACT model making sure that the goals have a focus, and that is something the person is motivated and energised to achieve.” – Edward Duncan, Head of Year in the Junior School, Tanglin Trust School, Singapore

“I found the process both enriching and enjoyable. I feel there is tremendous scope to implement coaching into so many of our conversations around school.” – Anna-Louise Brutti, Head of Year in the Senior School, Tanglin Trust School, Singapore

“The sessions have been fascinating and insightful, seeing how the GROW model can motivate and create positive energy resulting in real change in a coachee’s perspective and the way they can look towards their future.” – Nicky Hodges, Head of Year in the Junior School, Tanglin Trust School, Singapore

“I have a new way of thinking about initial contracting, and its impact and importance upon the foundations of the series of sessions that follow. Total clarity on both roles, coach and coachee, are essential to possible success together, and is time worth investing and revisiting to ensure that everyone is on the same page.” – Hayley Ann Fry, Music Teacher in the Junior School, Tanglin Trust School, Singapore

“I believe this course has helped me to develop my coaching mindset and further fuelled my passion to help others be as effective as they can be. It has grown my understanding and competence and I hope to be able to ignite passion in people and lead my team as effectively as I can using the principles I have learnt.” – Andrew Martin, Head of Rugby and Learning Support Teacher in the Infant School, Tanglin Trust School, Singapore

“The Generative Thinking meeting coaching approach is something that I will definitely continue to use when conducting or facilitating meetings. Allowing each contributor to share a goal, we were able to acknowledge and build upon each other’s ideas without writing any off. It was an eye-opening experience for me as the Head of Department as quite often it became a snowball effect of exciting ideas. We now have some actionable points that have had ownership opted in on by team members.” – James Bleach, Head of Design and Technology in the Senior School, Tanglin Trust School, Singapore

“I felt that I helped my coachee much more effectively by utilising various coaching tools. Open questions gave time to provoke her thinking to develop her awareness around what she really wanted. Asking my coachee permission was critical as I felt it created trust and respect, enabling my coachee to become more comfortable in our shared space. The GROW coaching model gave us a framework to allow us to continue towards positive achievements. Most notably, in this case, I feel that the benefit of intuition and emotional intelligence was key in helping my coachee to recognise and become more aware of her own true goals and ultimately take action. This experiential learning, reflecting on sessions overall, and focussing on key moments such as that described, has allowed me to truly begin to develop my practice and even more so, my coaching mindset.” – Denise Kearns, Learning Support Teacher in the Junior School, Tanglin Trust School, Singapore