Connectivity Consulting Logo
Enabling culture change with leaders and teams to sustain inclusion, innovation and high performance

How everyone can GROW to be a leader

by | Sep 24, 2019

close up of lion's face
In times of change and uncertainty, it is only natural to want look to a leader for guidance.

However, navigating through change, and mitigating any adverse effects can be a big job for one person.

That’s why we should be empowering all of our people to GROW to be leaders.

Empower more leaders 

Very popular within the coaching community, the GROW model is a great leadership tool which works across disciplines and industries.

The GROW model is a coaching framework which everyone can use to unleash their potential and uncover a world of possibilities, regardless of their seniority within a business.

The more leaders we can empower, the more stable your organisation will be in times of change.

Use more initiative

Instead of anxiously waiting for direction, and burying heads in sand, your people will be able to use initiative and take responsibility for the continued success of your business.

The GROW Model was devised by prominent performance consultant Sir John Whitmore in the 1980s and is an acronym for the four key stages of GROW coaching: Goals, Reality, Options, and Will.

Employees can be asking themselves, ‘What is the reality?’ and ‘How are we going to take things forward?’ Instead of having one manager driving progress, you can have lots more taking responsibility and challenging each other to navigate a path through change.

This way, people aren’t just passively sitting around waiting for instruction. Rather than having one person in charge of making everything happen, and lots more hanging on their every word, your network of people can be active and productive.

Weather any storm

This can be particularly useful in times of threat or change. Let’s take a storm as an analogy.

Say there’s a team of people who know a hurricane is coming.

If, instead of the majority hiding under a table waiting for one person to tell them what to do, they could each show initiative and take responsibility.

One could be checking the building, another could be finding out information about the storm and how long it will last, making sure vulnerable people are accounted for etc.

With shared responsibility, the team and their property would weather the storm far better.

More safe hands 

And the same can be true for your business in times of change. The more you can empower your people the more pairs of safe hands your business will be in.

Traditionally, a coach or a leader might have used the GROW coaching questions to help raise awareness or responsibility.

But the GROW model can also be used to promote confidence and self-motivation, and by empowering your team to engage in some self-coaching you can improve productivity and satisfaction.

Encourage self-coaching

By training your teams to ask themselves a few simple questions around:

Goals – Can we set an objective that we are challenged and inspired by?

Reality  – What is the current situation? Are there any internal or external obstacles in the way?

Options – What are the possibilities? What are our strengths? What resources can we draw upon?

Will –  What will you do and when? How will you measure its success? How committed are you?

Everyone can contribute to success 

The key is to enable your people to use self-reflection to set goals, move through the stages flexibly, and even revise the goal according to any new circumstances that might arise.

The final ‘Will’ element is important, as it can set the stage for success, by encouraging commitment to the action.

When you empower all of your people to GROW, progress does not have to be dependent on leaders or coaches, and everybody can contribute to the success of your organisation.

So why not give it a try, and if you want some help with how to GROW… give us a call, we’d be more than happy to help.

[et_pb_divi_related_posts_module header_text=”You may also enjoy reading…” posts_count=”3″ posts_source=”categories” _builder_version=”4.4.8″ module_alignment=”center”][/et_pb_divi_related_posts_module]