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Leadership Mirror

Leadership Mirror · Explore · 6 min read

Coaching & Developing Others

Helping someone do more of the thinking

When you help someone solve a problem, who leaves better able to solve the next one?

A colleague brings a problem and you can see a possible answer. Offering it may feel helpful, especially when time is short. Sometimes it is exactly what they need: a missing fact, an example or a decision that only you can make. In other moments, the answer ends the conversation before they have examined their own options.

Helping someone solve a problem involves working with their thinking. Solving it for them transfers that thinking to you. Both can be appropriate, but they produce different opportunities to develop capability. This exploration considers how curiosity, clear teaching and reflection can work together. Use your Mirror as a starting question about which response you reach for, then inspect what the particular person and task need.

What might be happening?

Giving advice can meet several needs at once. The colleague receives a next step, the work moves and you contribute expertise. You may also feel useful and competent. When advice becomes automatic, however, you can miss what the person already understands and what kind of help they were requesting. A question about permission may receive a lesson; a request for a fact may receive a long coaching conversation.

Begin by clarifying the help needed. Are they asking for information, an accountable decision, a sounding board or support with developing a skill? That simple distinction can save time and make your response more relevant. It also allows you to state your role clearly when you cannot transfer a decision or when a safety procedure requires direct instruction.

A coaching question should create space for thinking. Ask what they have tried, what options they see or where they are stuck. Listen to the answer before choosing the next question. A series of questions designed to lead them to your predetermined solution can feel like a test. If you already need a specific action, explaining it directly is fairer.

Consider someone preparing a presentation who says it is not working. You might ask which part they want the audience to understand and where the draft loses that thread. If they cannot identify the problem, a short demonstration may help. They can then revise the next section themselves and explain their choice. The conversation combines teaching with an opportunity to practise.

Development also depends on what happens after action. Return to the problem and ask what the person noticed, which assumption changed and what they would repeat. A correct outcome reached by accident offers different learning from a sound decision that met an unexpected obstacle. Examining the reasoning helps both of you plan support for the next task.

The leadership tension

Helping

An answer, demonstration or timely intervention can remove a real obstacle. Repeatedly doing the thinking can keep the next problem dependent on you.

Enabling

Questions and supported practice create room for independent judgement. Questioning without information or instruction can leave someone feeling tested or stranded.

Choose the response that helps the work now and, where possible, leaves the person more capable afterwards.

Research lens

A few useful ideas can help make sense of this behaviour. The practical connections below are Greymatter’s interpretation of the research; these sources do not validate your Mirror result.

What coaching research can tell us

Research-supported construct

Theeboom, Beersma and van Vianen’s meta-analysis examines coaching and individual outcomes including skills, well-being, work attitudes and goal-directed self-regulation. It reports positive effects across the categories studied. The evidence concerns coaching interventions in organisational settings; it does not establish that every manager’s informal question produces the same results or that questioning is always preferable to instruction.

A practical implication is to treat a developmental conversation as purposeful work. Agree what the person wants to address, support an action and return to what happened. A useful question is part of that process rather than an outcome by itself. If the conversation feels pleasant but produces no clearer understanding or next step, check whether its purpose needs sharpening. Use observable learning to judge the value of your approach.

Source: Tim Theeboom, Bianca Beersma & Annelies E. M. van Vianen (2014) (opens in a new tab)

Self-efficacy and supported practice

Research-supported construct

Bandura’s self-efficacy theory concerns a person’s belief in their capability to carry out an action. It describes sources of that belief, including mastery experiences, observing others and verbal persuasion. Confidence is therefore more than receiving reassurance, and it can be specific to a task. Someone may feel capable in familiar work but uncertain about a new presentation or conversation.

For development, create a manageable opportunity to act, with the information and support the task requires. Demonstrate a step when needed, then let the person practise and examine what happened. Feedback can help them identify the part they handled and the part they still need to develop. A small successful attempt offers evidence they can use next time. The aim is realistic confidence connected to capability, rather than encouraging certainty beyond their experience.

Source: Albert Bandura (1977) (opens in a new tab)

When this helps and when to watch it

When this helps

  • The person has useful knowledge but needs space to organise it.
  • There is time for thinking and a manageable opportunity to practise.
  • The problem offers a genuine choice within their authority.
  • A review can turn the experience into learning.

When to watch it

  • Questions conceal an answer you have already decided.
  • Essential knowledge is missing and no instruction is offered.
  • The person needs an urgent decision rather than exploration.
  • The conversation creates insight without an opportunity to act.

Experiment

Try it this week

The one-question pause

  1. When a colleague brings a routine problem this week, first clarify the help they want. If they are looking for a sounding board and the decision sits within their authority, pause before offering your solution. Ask what they think could work or what they have already considered.
  2. Let the answer finish. Ask one follow-up that helps them examine their reasoning, such as what makes an option workable or where it could fail. Supply a missing fact or a brief example if that is what is blocking them. Avoid stretching the exchange into a questioning exercise when a direct answer is needed.
  3. Agree a manageable next action and a time to return to it. At the review, ask what happened and what they would carry into a similar situation. Notice how much of the reasoning they did and what support made it possible. Keep the experiment within ordinary work responsibilities and use required procedures for serious or sensitive issues.

Reflect afterwards
What changed when I delayed my own solution, and where was a direct explanation still useful?

Think about it

  • When does helping someone become taking the work back?
  • Do my questions follow their thinking or steer them towards my answer?
  • How often do I return to what someone learned after trying an action?

Being useful does not always mean being the source of the answer. It can mean making the problem clearer, teaching a missing skill or helping someone examine a decision they will own. Look for a growing ability to explain choices and transfer learning to the next task. That is a more informative signal than how many coaching questions you asked.

Explore further

These are three curated starting points. External resources open in a new tab.

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