WORKPLACE PERFORMANCE COACHING FOR EVERYONE

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What is e-coach?

Product Description

Programs & Services

How it Works

Licensing & Pricing

 
 

White Paper

   

 

Topics

 

Introduction

 

Background

 

e-coach Was Designed to Respond Like a Real Coach

 

The History of e-coach

 

Initial Research

 

Prototype Content Was Designed to Support Essential Workplace Competencies

 

Advisory Board Provided Additional Input and Supported Product Development

 

Prototype Was Tested With Actual Users in Various Corporations

 

Research Finding Confirmed that the e-coach Concept and Content Satisfied the Needs of Individual Workers

 

People Want and Need More Coaching at Work

 

Most People Think that People in the Workplace Would Use an Online Coach if it Were Provided.

 

Organizations Need to do More to Provide Help and Advice to People

 

Sharing Data is Important to the Vast Majority of Users

 

The Prototype Content is Useful "as is"

 

It Appears to Us the People Will Use the e-coach Tool More When They are Encouraged to Do So.

 

Remaining Questions

 

Next Steps

 

Conclusion

 

 

 

e - c o a c h

Closing the reinforcement and performance gap for traditional and e-learning approaches.

 

 

By Grace Ahrend, Fred Diamond, and Pat Gill Webber 

Developers of e-coach.

Introduction

Based on our extensive learning and coaching experience, we designed, developed, and tested an online coaching tool called e-coach.  This paper shares all that we learned through the development and testing of the e-coach concept and design, and it explains the theory behind the product.  It should help the reader to understand what we learned about the value of on-line coaching for reinforcement and learning; how organizations can now use e-coach to promote successful on-the-job use of skills and ideas presented in traditional and e-learning courses or acquired elsewhere; and how e-coach supports the creation of workplace learning cultures.  It identifies questions about the use of online coaching that remain unanswered and summarizes the conclusions we have been able to reach concerning possible future directions for the further development and use of this product.   We offer this discussion as our reflections on experience and to share our degree of understanding of what we believe is possible and what is not after testing the product with over 300 different users in more than fifteen different organizations.

 

 

Background

 

A persistent and ongoing challenge to the success of workplace training and learning comes from the lack of a reliable way to reinforce concepts and skills taught in classroom or e-learning experiences in order to promote successful carryover of what has been learned to the job and produce real performance results.  Many types of useful and good training exist, but consistent, readily available, and targeted follow-up reinforcement and coaching support is far less pervasive.  Neither the methods – nor the individuals who would be able to provide them – are available to most workers in most organizations.

 

Performance support tools, such as checklists or process steps, have come a long way in providing some specific help for using certain types of learning.  But these support tools are not always available when they are needed, and they do not address the need to provide reinforcement or support ongoing learning.  Many types of learning portals provide access to thousands of learning activities that theoretically could promote and support ongoing learning in a virtually endless list of areas.  However, these gateways to information do not help someone who has taken a specific course to get specific help in identifying the next logical areas of study to pursue.  Nor do they currently offer the kind of help and suggestions that would help learners to significantly narrow the search for what they need.  Chat rooms exist for sharing learning, but again, these discussions are not specifically related to individuals’ discrete learning experiences or to an area of learning an organization may want to reinforce or promote.  And personal coaching -- by managers and organizational leaders as well as paid professional coaches -- has increased, but it is definitely not being provided for everyone as needed.

 

Our understanding and appreciation of this ongoing and persistent set of workplace training and learning issues led us to develop the initial concept for coaching that we called e-coach.  We believe e-coach addresses the needs discussed above because it operates as an effective – and affordable – generic personal coach that provides a way for organizations to make coaching support available and promote collaborative learning.   e-coach is ready and willing to offer advice, support, and development ideas for any employee at any time – 24 hours a day – whenever an employee needs it.

 

e-coach was designed to reflect our belief that no online coach can or should replace the use of human coaches in the workplace.  Therefore, e-coach is not meant to be a replacement for the human touch.  Rather, it was designed to be an effective adjunct to learning and “live” coaching that can be beneficial for everyone in the organization because it reinforces and strengthens good, solid ideas provided elsewhere.  We view it as a tool that can provide a baseline of coaching support for learning for those for whom coaching may not be readily, easily, or at all available – the vast majority of individuals who are receiving traditional or e-learning training in today’s companies.

 

 

e-Coach Was Designed to Respond Like a Live Coach

 

We created a unique web-based coaching construct that enables any individual with access to a workstation to access coaching and the kind of development support generally considered an integral part of the coaching experience.  We designed it to “respond” or “coach” in three ways: 

  • The first way is designed to support a person who is having a problem in an area covered by e-coach and who wants immediate help and advice for handling it.    In e-coach, this coaching function is called FAST ANSWERS because it provides immediate help in the form of answers to specific questions as well as concise advice for handling typical situations.

  • The second way provides assistance in self-paced and self-directed ongoing development.  When used this way, e-coach offers additional information and insights when a person feels that he or she would benefit from knowing more about a given subject or skill.  e-coach provides ideas for practice and for determining the strength of one’s skills, resource lists of helpful materials, and job aids specifically designed to promote independent learning and personal development.  It does not provide direct instruction as a training course would, because it is not designed to be a standalone course in a given competence.  Instead, like a personal, live coach, it supports learners in learning more about a subject and putting everything they know and understand into practice.   This e-coach function, which serves as a source of additional information and insights for those who feel they would benefit from knowing more about a given subject or skill is called KNOWLEDGE CENTRAL.

  • The third way provides access to others who can also help – individuals who learners can talk to about what they learned or the best way to handle real situations that require the use of new knowledge or capabilities.  This area of e-coach is called LEARNING CONNECTION, and it gives every user the ability to ask questions, explore ideas, offer advice, and learn from others through interaction and collaboration with colleagues throughout the organization – and beyond.  We believe this capability provides strong support for organizational learning as well as individuals.

The History of e-Coach

At the outset, we knew there was a need for ongoing reinforcement for training and learning, and we understood that managers and leaders in organizations are limited in both their coaching abilities and their desire to coach.  We were also aware that learners themselves, as a group, are not necessarily self-directed when it comes to using or strengthening new skills.  Although a certain group of learners do appear interested in pursuing learning and development activities on their own, most are not – and, consequently, do not.  Previous research with senior leaders responsible for leading change in their organizations contributed to this understanding and provided a strong basis for concluding that there is a need for support and help for workers who want to learn and need to learn.

Early on in our exploration, we also came to realize that online learning, which was “exploding” at that time – and which is still rapidly expanding daily – is no more successful in developing new attitudes, skills, or behaviors that may be required for on-the-job results and change than traditional learning approaches.  Specifically, we began to understand that, typically, individuals respond to it in the same way that they respond to traditional learning.   As a result, while online learning has the ability to provide greater opportunities for initial learning, it does not in any way address or eliminate existing – and persistent – problems associated with lack of follow-up or targeted reinforcement needed to make the learning experience really “work.”   Therefore, even for those who use online learning, the same needs for coaching and support remain.

 

At about the same time we became convinced that online training programs do not eliminate the need for effective coaching and follow-up support for training, we also recognized that the Internet would provide an ideal medium for delivering the coaching that is needed to make any training effective and for making it widely – and economically – available.  Consequently, our focus shifted to talking and thinking about how we could provide coaching to support existing training as well as learners themselves rather than more training.  We felt that the time for developing an effective coaching solution was right because the Internet provided a tool that would enable us to simulate coaching-type interactions to provide essential help and support – and deliver it to anyone in any organization with access to the Internet.  We also recognized the potential for using the same tool to assist those who do coaching – coaches themselves – because it could also give these individuals the help they would need to effectively coach others.  These insights were the genesis of e-coach.

 

Based on our own professional experience and what we had learned from preliminary research, we felt comfortable going forward on the basis of a number of assumptions about the need for coaching for reinforcement and development support and the usefulness of a web-based coaching tool for providing it.  These assumptions were confirmed and validated as a result of qualitative and quantitative research activities we have engaged in over the last two years as we developed e-coach from an initial concept into a working prototype that evolved into the product offering we have now launched.

 

Initial Research Included a Review of Current Offerings and Gathering Input from Learning Experts

Initially, we completed a thorough review of current offerings in the market to determine that there was no product already available that we felt provided the type of support that was needed.  Once we completed this research and made a determination that nothing like what we had in mind was out there, we began to brainstorm concepts and ideas for a possible online coach and to discuss what we were considering with nearly fifty different people in learning, training, and related fields.  We asked questions, we listened to feedback, and we continued thinking about what was in the marketplace and what was needed.  By the end of six months, we had an idea for a prototype, and we formed an Advisory Board.

 

Prototype Content Was Designed to Support Essential Workplace Competencies

We developed the prototype as a “generic” tool to provide reinforcement and coaching support in the essential workplace competencies that we believed – and research confirmed – are what most knowledge workers in all types of companies need to succeed today because they are fundamental for outstanding performance and success.  In the prototype construct, we clustered these competencies into four comprehensive categories:

  • People Smarts content provides coaching support for interpersonal skills and strategies that enable individuals to be effective with executives, colleagues, and customers.  People Smarts competencies include “Getting Along With Peers,” “Interacting With Senior People,” “Teamwork,” and “Handling Conflict.”

  • Personal Savvy content reinforces essential personal capabilities, such as time management and self-directed learning skills.   “Managing Priorities,” “Managing Change,” and “Solving Business Problems” are some of the competencies supported in this section of e-coach.

  • Business Sense content covers a number of up-to-date business competencies every person needs to succeed in today’s fast-paced, competitive business environment.  The competencies in this category include “Consulting Skills” and “Customer Retention.”

  • Technology Advice content familiarizes the user with his or her organization’s technical resources and provides help for using them effectively with up to ten links to a client organization’s own technology resources.

Advisory Board Provided Additional Input and Supported Product Development

The members of our Board reviewed our initial design and offered suggestions that helped us to create the final version of the prototype that was subsequently tested.  Although the membership of the Board varied at different times, it was always made up exclusively of learning experts and business executives from various companies and learning institutions such as Lucent, Columbia University, Citigroup, Highmark, Toys-R-Us, The Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, Carson/Thompson Financial, and Avon.  Board members were not paid or offered any financial incentives to support e-coach or its design.  They participated as individual training and learning professionals who were interested and concerned parties only.  As individuals and as a group, Board members confirmed the need for a product like e-coach and recognized the promise of it.  Consequently, they supported our efforts to design the prototype and try it out in a variety of organizations.

 

Prototype Was Tested With Actual Users in Various Corporations

Once we had a prototype version of e-coach to work with, we were able to test the product with actual users in organizations.  We gave individuals who had been selected to participate in the test unlimited access to e-coach for a limited period of time (an average of four to six weeks).  We provided a number of online surveys in the tool, and invited users to complete and submit any or all of them as they used the product throughout the test period.  In addition, we sent a Wrap-Up Survey to every test participant at the end of the test period.   In this way, we collected four different types of data from surveys used during two rounds of testing by asking users to:

  • Comment on content and specific coaching advice offered.

  • Respond to a survey that asked about their needs for technical consulting and coaching help.

  • Provide insight into their backgrounds, work history, and experience to determine how the product worked with different types of users.

  • Provide general insight into the current state of coaching at their organizations; the current and potential need for a product like e-coach in their organizations; and their opinion about their organization’s overall interest in the concept of online coaching.

We collected a fifth type of feedback by speaking directly to them on the telephone and by conducting face-to-face focus groups at two of the companies that tested e-coach.

 

Research Findings Confirmed that the E-Coach Concept and Content Satisfied the Needs of Individual Workers

We received considerable feedback related to how users feel about e-coach in response to surveys we embedded in the test version of the product and a Wrap-Up Survey we sent to all individuals who participated in both rounds of testing when each test period ended.  The overwhelming majority of this feedback was extremely positive.  For example, individuals said:

  • “I really liked the look and feel of the text.” (User comment sent in)

  • “There isn’t anything like e-coach on the market today.  It fills a real need and should do real well in the marketplace.”  (User and Advisory Board Member)

In a nutshell, the message we heard from users was that the content is “good” (e.g., “clear” and “easy to understand”); the concept is “exciting”; and the tool is effective because it provides “a convenient way to access the information.”  Also, many users told us they wanted more “detail” – they would like to see the content “expanded.”   While this could be interpreted as a somewhat negative comment, we see it as a positive one also.  We think users were telling us that they liked the content they saw so much, they wanted more of it!

While we learned about the product itself from survey feedback, survey findings coupled with data we gathered all along from various qualitative research activities that were an integral part of our work throughout the development and testing of e-coach during the last two years also increased our understanding of the usefulness and value of online coaching in the workplace at this time.  This knowledge enabled us to validate many of the assumptions we had made at the outset.   For example, we now know with the greatest amount of certainty that:

People want and need more coaching at work.

Of all the questions we asked in the course of our research -- in focus groups, surveys, and informal conversations about coaching -- the one most people responded to was “Do people want and need more coaching than they get?”  And the nearly universal answer was a loud and clear “Yes!”  Consequently, we think people definitely want a place to go for quick, short, and sound answers when they need them.  Even though some users indicated that they don’t necessarily want others (such as their managers) to know they need this help, fewer than five people in the hundreds we either surveyed or spoke to directly felt that there was no need for more coaching at work and that whatever coaching may exist is adequate.  Rather, the vast majority of those who responded to a Wrap-Up Survey we sent at the conclusion of the test period, indicated that (1) “there was a need for timely help and support in the form of coaching”; (2) they would seek it if it [coaching support] was available”; and (3) “nearly everyone needed it [coaching support] at one time or another.” 

Most people think that people in the workplace would use an online coach if it were provided.

Our experience and our research indicated that the vast majority of people would use an online coach if one was available and offered good advice:

  • There is no doubt an online coach would be used if the coach had answers that made sense and would help me with my job.”  (User in a follow-up conversation)

  • I would say that this is something I already knew in the back of my mind -- but it was helpful to have it written down for me.”  (User comment sent in)

  • I think this was well worded and thorough.  It also took the culture into consideration by indicating that the person needs to know what is expected.  This is very good -- Thanks!”  (User comment sent in)

This was an especially gratifying finding, because receptivity to online learning of any kind is still a hotly debated issue.  Although the use of online learning tools is growing, online learning still presents many challenges because it does not appear to eliminate the problems typically associated with traditional classroom learning approaches.

Organizations need to do more to provide help and advice to people.

If anything struck us as surprising, it was the call for even more help and support that we heard from a significant number of users who liked e-coach and felt it was useful but also felt there was room for more in-depth and detailed information and that users would welcome it.  Their views are summed up in comments such as these:

  • “Answers need to go into even more detail.” (User comment sent in)

  •  Suggest even more ideas to help people.” (User comment sent in)

  • “Despite all the help that is out there, people still need more.”  (Advisory Board Member)

We heard the same message from users who completed the Wrap-Up Survey.   Only one-third of those surveyed felt enough information and help related to ideas for more learning and how to be more effective was being provided to employees in their organizations.

Between the comments calling for more information and this survey result, we feel confident in concluding that most organizations can and should do more to provide more information and help, including more detailed and in-depth help and support for specific topics and issues.  Many companies have resources for doing this, but, generally, they are too broad and not really relevant to the specific needs of an individual seeking help with a particular issue at a given time.

Sharing data is important to the vast majority of users.

Most of the individuals with whom we shared our ideas initially, as well the majority of our Advisory Board members, supported our idea for a design feature that would allow users to share information and ideas.   The majority of survey respondents also indicated that sharing ideas and getting to know what others thought about situations was “very important.”   We heard comments such as:

  • “The idea of sharing and learning together is key for our company and would be a useful addition to the e-coach design.” (Advisory Board Member) 

  • “If we don’t share and grow from lessons learned, we aren’t learning.”  (Advisory Board Member)

  • "I want to know what others think of what I am doing.”  (User discussing uses of e-coach)

There were a few people, however, who felt “neutral” to “negative” about the desirability of having a place to discuss and share openly with others.  One Advisory Board Member put it this way:  “Our company may not like the idea of people sharing too openly in a forum like the learning connection.”  A few others indicated that anonymity would be important. 

Based on all of this input, we concluded that the usefulness of a feature that enables users to share with others might not be universally accepted at this time.   Apparently there are still companies that are not ready to allow people to share openly, so we cannot assume that a product with a discussion feature is right for every organization.  It may be that only the Fast Answers and Knowledge Central functions of e-coach are appropriate for some and that any company that would use e-coach would need to consider its readiness for a learning-connection space.

The prototype content is useful “as is.”

Many people felt the content delivered in the e-coach construct -- the prototype of e-coach that we tested -- had value and would be appropriate for certain audiences.  They said things such as:

  • “Responses are excellent for a person new to the workforce.” (User comment sent in)

  • “The example used to demonstrate the recommendation was excellent and concise.  It can be used successfully by most employees.”  (User comment sent in)

  • “I love the short, to-the-point answers.” (User comment sent in)

 Many of these users even said in the Wrap-Up Survey that they thought their companies should consider leasing the e-coach prototype – if we were to make it available for leasing.  Because of this largely positive response to the content in the generic version, we have already released e-coach Version 1.0, and it is currently available for companies that want to lease it.

 

The e-coach construct is also a valuable tool that can be used without generic content as a template for “packaging” and delivering information to follow up on any topic or learning experience.

 

Many people who saw and used the prototype told us that the e-coach construct alone -- the Fast Answers, Knowledge Central, and Learning Connection template – could also fill an important market need because it offer organizations an excellent “container” for organizing, packaging, and delivering any material they might want to make available as follow-up or reinforcement to any traditional or electronic learning experience.  Some of the comments related to this finding were:

  • e-coach would be great with our product knowledge – we have thousands of people who need updates on our products and services . . . we would really like to talk to you about a custom version for our products.”   (Professional colleague discussing a learning need in his firm after seeing the e-coach prototype.

  • “I want answers that are a bit different – more detailed and in-depth for senior people.  (User comment sent in).

  • “We would need answers tied to specifics in our organization.”  (User comment sent in)

We discussed these observations with our Advisory Board and other colleagues in the learning and training business, and they agreed that potential users were telling us that the e-coach construct – the “container” itself without generic content – along with our ability to synthesize information and material and present it in a clear, concise, easy-to-understand way – had value all by itself.  Based on these findings, we decided to expand our offerings.  In addition to the generic version of e-coach, we will also be available to create custom content versions based on any existing learning programs or materials for which an organization may want to provide online follow-up and reinforcement.

 

It appears to us that people will use the e-coach tool more when they are encouraged to do so.

 

We had an opportunity to test e-coach with a group of students at a leading university who had just completed a course dealing with leadership and managing interpersonal relationships.  As part of this test, after the class was over, we sent the members of the class follow-up messages that contained links to specific material within the e-coach prototype that was directly related to material that had been presented in class.   We do not have any quantitative data to indicate that this group of users actually used more of the ideas and suggestions provided in e-coach than users in other tests we conducted, but it was our belief that they did.  Therefore, we have decided to work with all purchasers of e-coach — generic or custom – to provide them with ways to prompt users with tailored messages designed to increase traffic and use of e-coach material.   Since we know that people in corporations are overwhelmed with data and information, it makes sense that they will be more inclined to look at something relevant to what they are learning – and are presumably interested in – when it has been brought to their attention than if they merely have access to a tool, but do not know exactly what it has to offer.

 

 

Remaining Questions

 

We have learned a great deal that has us embarking on the journey of providing a tool we believe has already demonstrated its usefulness to the market.  Now our goal is to continue to work collaboratively – with one another as well as with others – to continue to build on the knowledge we already have as we help companies and individuals to realize the greatest possible value from their learning investments.   At the same time, we recognize that the work we have done leaves some remaining questions unanswered.  For example, at this time, we cannot say with any certainty:

Could e-coaching replace other forms of coaching in the workplace?

We see e-coaching as one tool that belongs in the assortment of coaching tools that can be useful for providing workplace coaching and reinforcement.  But we do not believe that e-coaching will ever fully replace a fuller, more diverse approach to coaching at work.  What we don’t know, however, is to what extent online coaching can and should be used in conjunction with other approaches.  We see the role of e-coaching in the workplace as similar to the role of e-learning.   Regardless of how much e-learning may become available – or the sophistication of it – there will probably always be a place for action learning, traditional types of seminars, discussion groups, retreats, and other types of formats, and we think the same is true for e-coaching.  Therefore, we would no sooner assume that e-coaching could or should replace all of the existing approaches than we would be inclined to suggest as much for e-learning.   Since so much coaching – as learning – is social in nature and requires face-to-face interaction in order to work, we feel a suggestion that all coaching or learning be done on-line would be naďve and unsubstantiated by any serious research or thought.

 

Our guess is that certain types of coaching that are currently provided by live coaches will someday be delivered as effectively by an online coach like e-coach and that e-coach will become a more “sophisticated” coach.  For example, artificial intelligence will no doubt make it practical for coaching done via an e-coach type interface to respond to users much more specifically – and individually.  Certainly businesses are offering limited forms of such interaction now with on-line quizzes and the like providing standard answers to requests as diverse as what mutual fund to buy to which blouse would work best for me given my size, shape, and budget.  Therefore, as technology evolves and changes, e-coach will, too, in order to take full advantage of emerging capabilities.   As it does, the question that we continue to try to determine an answer to is “To what extent will people take advice and support from an online coach rather than a person—and to what extent would certain people actually prefer that?”

How much customization is necessary?

Since the 1970s when management training became common place at work, the old question of buy or build has been with us.  We think that some combination often makes the most sense.  Why start at ground zero?  But then again, why stop with what is in the box—why not go beyond it and develop things really pertinent to your own world? 

We think e-coach is a natural for customization, we just don’t know to what extent customization is necessary.  We have some limited data to suggest that a follow up to a specific course given by someone who is considered a hard-to-reach expert in his or her field, for example – and to whom class participants might not otherwise have access – would lend itself to a tailored or custom version of e-coach that would ensure continued access to that person when learners get back to the workplace.  We want to do more work on this, but our instincts tell us that colleges or other organizations that charge for attendance at a seminar or workshop could expand their reach significantly by providing a custom e-coach follow up directly tied to the content of the course and using either the same or associated professors or instructors to provide a measure of ongoing follow-up reinforcement and advice through the Learning Connection.    We are making this process available now with customization.

How best can we integrate e-coaching and live coaching?

We all know that organizations continue to struggle to get more managers and leaders to do more coaching, and we believe e-coach could help to actually train coaches or make them more effective.   In our opinion, the presence of a tool like e-coach could actually support more live coaching by providing both a process and content to managers who need one or both in order to do more coaching.  In addition, our experience suggests company’s may be able to raise the quality of coaching by using a tool like e-coach.  It is possible that having a tool like e-coach available might make a mediocre coach more effective and a superior coach even better. 

How many different vendors should e-coach support?

We are not sure how many additional materials and programs e-coach should direct users to or provide access to beyond the ones offered in the prototype.  For instance, the current version is linked to AMA (American Management Association) books and courses that users can consider.  These links were well received by those who used them to look at the suggested resources they provided access to, and we plan to keep them in.  However, we do not know if we should expand the selection of suggestions by adding links to additional offerings, too.  We’re also not sure if e-coach should recommend internal courses within a company that is using e-coach.   We’d like to do more testing to be certain that what we ultimately provide is the right “fit” for users, so they will feel they are being given enough suggestions without being overwhelmed.  We want to provide more than one option, because we think choices are good, but we don’t want to offer so many that people will feel that they are getting so many choices that they aren’t getting help.

 

 

Next Steps

 

We are now ready to take what we have learned and begin to work with companies to allow e-coach to help people to use the learning they are getting, find new ways to keep learning, and continue to improve their satisfaction and results.  Therefore, the generic version of e-coach (v1.0) -- the one that is based on the prototype that received favorable feedback in our tests -- can now be licensed.  (Details are available at our sales site, www.e-coachonline.com.)  The option to customize e-coach as a targeted follow-up to any given course or group of courses is available.  (Examples of how customization would work are provided on the site.)

 

Above all, we will continue to collaborate with others to continuously increase our understanding of the place of online coaching tools in the array of learning tools available today.   And with their help and input, we will keep on testing e-coach and using what we learn to continue to make it even better.

 

 

Conclusion

 

As the search for tools to support real learning and change and the creation of learning organizations continues, we believe e-coach will be part of the solution.  e-coach may not be a cure all or universal answer to all learning challenges.  However, it can provide an effective way to target and solve the pressing need for specific follow-up and support to important and expensive learning experiences organizations are providing.  It can also offer a practical way for individuals to share knowledge, ideas, and resources.  And because it provides a place to share – especially around specific, shared learning experiences – e-coach could help individuals to use what they know, learn effectively, and continue to learn more at the same time it helps companies to create true learning organizations and achieve important learning and business objectives.

 

 

Grace Ahrend, Fred Diamond, and Pat Gill Webber are co-founders and Principals of E-Coach Associates, Inc. an organization formed to promote coaching and collaborative learning in the workplace.  ECA licenses e-coach and is actively engaged in ongoing collaboration with leaders in business and education to continuously increase understanding of the role of online coaching tools in the array of learning and performance improvement tools available today.

 

 

 

Conclusion

__________________________

As the search for tools to support real learning and change and the creation of learning organizations continues, we believe e-coach will be part of the solution.  e-coach may not be a cure all or universal answer to all learning challenges.  However, it can provide an effective way to target and solve the pressing need for specific follow-up and support to important and expensive learning experiences organizations are providing.  It can also offer a practical way for individuals to share knowledge, ideas, and resources.  And because it provides a place to share – especially around specific, shared learning experiences – e-coach could help individuals to use what they know, learn effectively, and continue to learn more at the same time it helps companies to create true learning organizations and achieve important learning and business objectives.

 

 

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