Building a Coaching Program for 13,000+ Employees
Project Background: The Career Coaching Program (CCP) demonstrates that I am the "go-to person" when senior management wants to launch a new training initiative. The charge was to create a coaching culture in the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO). I researched other coaching programs in the U.S. Federal government to benchmark the USPTO's nascent coaching program. I focused on career coaching because the annual training needs assessment indicated that employees valued career development the most. I created the business case for the CCP, created the selection process for the first cadre of coaches, selected the coach training vendors, and aided the cadre in gaining coaching clients.
Program Features: The CCP is aligned with the International Coaching Federation's (ICF) coaching competencies and ethics requirements. I chose two coaching training vendors based on the speed of their programs. One training vendor had an intensive, face-to-face two-month coaching training program; the other offered a nine-month online coaching training program. While the coaches were undergoing training, I recruited clients for the coaches so that they could build their hours toward ICF coaching certification.
Why Does This Program Work: From the start, I insisted on strict adherence to the ICF's guidelines and competencies for coaching. Benchmarking with other established coaching programs allowed me to build the coaching cadre and achieve early client successes quickly. Thanks to the selection process, the first cadre was a group of outstanding, devoted professionals who improved the coaching encounters.
My Role: I was the program manager for the CCP. I created the program structure, chose the vendors, created the coach selection process, oversaw the coach training, marketed the coaches to the 13,000+ USPTO employees, and evaluated the results of the coaching sessions.
Coaching Culture Project Plan: Milestones and Tasks
June 20191. Investigate performing a coaching culture and psychological trust assessment for the USPTO to set a baseline measure of the existing coaching culture. June 72. Build a cadre of USPTO employees who are already certified coaches. Use this cadre as advisors for developing the internal coaching culture training. June 283. Recruit an executive-level champion for a coaching culture. June 284. Review the ETD’s Leadership Development Program courses for supervisors and managers to determine which courses already teach one or more coaching competencies. The ETD will use the International Coaching Federation’s (ICF) coaching competencies framework as a benchmark. June 28
July 20191. If no course exists for one or more coaching competencies, ETD will develop new courses for missing coaching competencies. Create a list of new courses with course objectives and curriculum. July 192. Work with Stacey to incorporate coaching behavior skills in the Supervisor Certificate Program. July 263. Start a community of practice for supervisors and managers to learn more about coaching skills. Hold lunch-and-learns and coaching demonstrations at various USPTO events. July 264. Work with the USPTO's sister bureaus to exchange best practices and knowledge on how to build an active coaching culture.
August 20191. Build an ICF-accredited coaching training program by designing and developing the courses. Maybe have a pilot class of coaching trainees go through the courses to build the required hours for accreditation. August 16 SWOT2. Create a career coaching mini site on the Learning Center. Reference the site in periodic articles in the USPTO Weekly. August 303. Career coaching pilot preparation.4. For non-managerial employees, create a peer-coaching course. August 30
FY 20201. Career Coaching launches.2. Have business unit managers and senior managers model coaching behaviors and advocate for a coaching culture at the USPTO.3. Develop and deliver a coaching track for the 2020 Leadership Forum.