Barriers to successful outcomes from coaching

Barriers to successful outcomes from coaching

Dr Alison Carter, Institute for Employment Studies, UK1

Dr Anna Blackman, James Cook University, Australia Ben Hicks, Institute for Employment Studies, UK

Abstract This paper is second in a series on coaching effectiveness. 644 industry professionals who were current or former coachees responded to a questionnaire. In this paper wee identify barriers faced by coachees during the period of their coaching and suggest a categorisationframework: Difficulties with coach; Organisational culture, Personal issues; Coaching relationship; and Coaching model/process. We found significant differences in coachees’ perceptions of coaching effectiveness based on whether or not individuals took part in coaching voluntarily. We also found differences in barriers reported based on respondents’ gender, country of residence and organisation size.

Originality/value of the research This research helps close the literature gap on coaching effectiveness through its focus on the barriers to successful outcomes from business coaching and provides coaching businesses, participants and coaches with information from the coachee perspective that have not been available before.

1 Corresponding author: Dr Alison Carter, Associate Fellow, Institute for Employment Studies, UK [email protected]

To cite this paper please use this reference: Carter, Alison, Blackman, Anna, and Hicks, Ben (2014) Barriers to successful outcomes from coaching. In: Proceedings of the Fourth EMCC Mentoring and Coaching Conference, pp. 112-131. From: Fourth EMCC Mentoring and Coaching Conference, 26-27 June 2014, Paris, France.

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1 Barriers to successful outcomes from coaching

Keywords Coaching effectiveness; barriers; coachee; international; empirical research

IntroductionThere is a widespread belief among business coaches that there is no such thing as a barrier to successful outcomes from coaching: all ‘barriers’ are just presenting issues that become part of the coaching dialogue. But this transition from barrier to enabler pre-supposes that barriers are articulated and understood. Business coaching has become a topic of academic interest and there has been a growing number of empirical studies published since 2005 (e.g. Ely et al., 2010, Jarvis et al., 2006). This emerging empirical literature offers an opportunity to begin to assess the many claims made for and about business coaching. The Coaching for Effectiveness survey was developed based on the variables identified in the literature and to test the extensive number of claims made in the literature. While barriers have been identified in the academic and practitioner literature from an HR, business and coach perspectives there has been little from the coachee perspective. The survey also provided the opportunity to explorethis new area of enquiry.

Literature review and research questionsPrior to 2005 there was a lack of empirical research in the coaching field in general (Feldmen & Lankau, 2005) and limited research into the effectiveness of business coaching (Sue-Chan &Latham, 2004). While the number of empirical studies has now increased there is a paucity of studies from the coachee perspective. This study was designed to explore coachee perspectives on coaching effectiveness2. One part of the questionnaire explored barriers to successful outcomes from coaching. Our specific research questions were:

2 An overview of the full study including aims, methodology and findings can be found in our first paper: Blackman A, Carter A, Hay R (2014), Coaching for effectiveness: Initial findings from an international survey

1. What barriers, if any, do coachees perceive they have faced during their coaching?

2. Do barriers vary according to personal characteristics or thecoachees’ work or coaching contexts?

3. Do coachees identifying barriers perceive their coaching to be more or less effective?

The demand for coaching in organisations is strong with talent management an on-going priority for CEOs and HR executives (Corporate Research Forum, 2012; McKinsey, 2012). Coaching is a prominent tool for personal and professional development with coaching perceived by HR specialists as the most effective activity in delivering talent management (CIPD, 2013) and seniormanager development (Reilly & Williams, 2012). Tamkin & Bowyer (2014) link the rise of coaching and on-the-job support as part of a wider move within organisations away from ‘training’ to a ‘learning’ philosophy of personal development. With demand strong within HR and management functions, the continued investment in coaching initiatives by organisations is unsurprising.

The literature tends to focus on ‘successful’ coaching relationships but little is known about unsuccessful coaching relationships. A systematic literature review (NHS Leadership Centre, 2005) identified that the coaching relationship may failfor a number of reasons, with many potentially being within the coach’s control e.g. the coach may share his/her opinion too early or may fail to follow through on monitoring and homework.

In the UK the CIPD (2005) has listed the potential barriers to effective coaching from an HR perspective, although these are predominantly barriers to the take-up of coaching. These includefor example, a lack of understanding of the value of coaching orcoaching not being seen as a priority for the business. Taking acoaching provider perspective Peel (2008) explores the take-up of coaching and mentoring opportunities in the SME sector and argues that barriers to take up of coaching such as gender can be reframed as enablers.

US management scholars Hunt & Weintraub (2007) explored the factors they consider to be most associated with an organisation’s readiness for coaching, which includes aspects oforganisational culture (e.g. are relationships, learning and



innovation valued), business context (e.g. is there a future-orientated strategy) and HR context (e.g. do reward and promotionsystems encourage employees to be helpful to each other). Keddy & Johnson (2011) suggest potential implementation pitfalls for organisations running coaching programmes which include the needto avoid an over-emphasis on just one coaching model and the need for both coach and coachee to be able and willing to end their coaching relationship. Tamkin & Bowyer (2014) also note the importance of successful coaching having the twin themes of addressing individuals’ needs but also ensuring the ‘big picture’ fit with the organisation.

Practitioner articles and evaluation research are often criticised by academics for tending to emphasise the positive and effective while failing to collect or ignoring data that maybe seen as negative (e.g. Megginson 2012). One recent programme evaluation is a notable exception (Aston et al., 2014) which included a survey of non-completers: those who had signed up to the coaching but dropped out of the programme at an early stage.The most common reason given for dropping out was difficulties with their coach. Other reasons given were: they were encouragedby their manager to sign up but did not, in the event, have the time or motivation; for personal reasons; and gaining a new job with a different employer.

The Aston evaluation also conducted in-depth interviews with a small number of participants who completed their coaching programme but reported little or no impact as a result of the coaching. Six reasons were identified why this was the case: theindividual was working in a stable and happy team who were already happy and effective in their job; where individuals feltthey lacked clear goals for the coaching; where there was strongline management and/or supervision; where individuals felt unable to open up to their coach about the issues they really wanted to address; where the coaching relationship had broken down; and where individuals were changing jobs.

The paucity of background literature on barriers faced by coachees during their coaching could be because only a small percentage of coachees encounter problems. Alternatively they may be commonplace but are considered by coaches and/or employers to be part of the coaching process and therefore nothing to be concerned about. We were not satisfied with this

gap in the literature and decided to include a question area about barriers in our international survey of business coaching effectiveness (Blackman, Carter & Hay2014) in order to find out how many coachees perceive they face barriers and, if any do, what are the most commonly encountered and which, if any, might adversely affect coaching outcomes.

MethodologyAn online survey was designed to elicit information from currentand former coachees. The 63 question areas asked about their experiences of coaching, the factors they felt had made the coaching effective, the benefits they derived from coaching and the amount of support they had received. A mix of quantitative and qualitative questions were included to complement each other(Neuman, 1997), requiring a range of yes/no, selection from multiple response options and free text responses.

One of the questions concerned any barriers the coachees may have faced. A pre-defined list of possible barriers to coaching effectiveness was developed from the literature. Respondents were asked to indicate if they had experienced any of these and to ‘select all that apply’. In addition there was a free text box so respondents could use their own words to determine what ‘other’ barriers they felt they had faced during the period of their coaching.

An email containing a link to the online survey was distributed to national and international professional coaching organisations, associations and networks and the survey was available to respondents from March 2013 to May 2014.

Of the 644 responses, 296 surveys were fully completed, 13 were blank and 335 were partially completed. We decided to use only the 296 fully completed surveys for the analysis presented here.



SampleA full account of the survey sample can be found in our previouspaper3 . To assist with further analysis, the following eight variables were identified:

■ Gender, Age, Country of residence (Individual/Personal)

■ Employment status, Manager/non-manager, Organisation size (Work Context)

■ Coach Type (external/internal), Participation type (voluntary/mandatory) (Coaching Context).

Table 1 summarises our respondent sample.

Table 1: Summary of respondent; personal, work context and coaching context

Individual/personal Work context Coaching context

56% were female; 44% male 50% were employees; 50% self-employed

83% had an external coach; 14% had an internal coach

Mean age was 48 years 57% were managers; 43% non-managers

92% came to coachingvoluntarily; for 8% it was mandatory

32% were living in UK & Ireland; 27% in Rest of Europe; 22% in Australia with remaining from North America (5%); Asia (5%); Africa (3%); South America (0.3%)

40% worked in micro-businesses (1 to 5 employees); 10% in small (5 to 19 employees); 12% in medium-sized (20 to 199employees); 5% in large(200 to 499 employees); 33% in very large (>500 employees)

Source: IES and James Cook University, 2014

AnalysisFor further analysis purposes two of the variables were grouped into a smaller number of categories: Organisation size was originally split into micro, small, medium, large and very large3 Blackman A, Carter A, Hay R (2014), Coaching for effectiveness: Initial findings from an

international survey

businesses: they were grouped into small/medium (combining micro, small and medium) and large (combining large and very large). Country of residence was originally split into Australia, UK & Ireland, Rest of Europe, Asia, North America, South America and Africa: they were grouped into Australia, UK &Ireland, Rest of Europe and Rest of the World (see Tables 2 and3).

Table 2: Size of organisation respondents worked in

Business size N Percent

Small/medium size businesses

171 61.3

Large businesses 108 38.7

Total 279 100


Table 3: Country where respondents were living

Country of residence N Percent

Australia 65 23.6UK & Ireland 93 33.7Rest of Europe 80 29.0Rest of world 38 13.8Total 276 100


It is important to note that our sample was generally positive about their coaching experience with 98 per cent stating that they would participate in coaching again and 99 per cent statingthat they would recommend coaching to colleagues. A range of coaching outcomes was identified in our previous paper (Blackman, Carter & Hay 2014). In this second part of the analysis we focused on coachee perceptions of the overall ‘effectiveness of the coaching’. For analysis purposes the effectiveness of the coaching responses were also grouped together. The question used a five-point rating scale from ‘not at all effective’ through to ‘very effective’. We grouped together into ‘Limited effect’ (combining not at all effective



through to neutral) and ‘Effective’ (effective and very effective) as shown in Table 4 below.

Table 4: Respondents perception of how effective their coaching was

How effective do you think the coaching was? N Per

centLimited effect 30 10.6Effective 255 89.5Total 285 100


To make sure there were no significant differences between coaching effectiveness and any of the other personal, work or coaching context variables by conducting a chi-squared test on the raw scores. Of those who entered into coaching voluntarily, 90.8% felt that it was effective compared to only 73.9% who entered into the coaching because it was mandatory. This suggests that those who enter in voluntarily are more likely to report effective outcomes than those who entered into it on a mandatory basis. It is likely that with a higher response rate, this would have been significant but at the moment we can only say there is a suggestion (see Table 5).

Table 5: Effectiveness of coaching/type of participation

What/is your participation in coaching

Limitedeffect Effective Total

Voluntary 24 (9.23%) 236 (90.8%) 260 (100%)Mandatory 6 (26.1%) 17 (73.9%) 23 (100%)

Chi Square= p<0.05,6.3df=1 but one cell has expected count less than 5 suggesting a higher sample size was needed to understand if there is a significant difference. With cell counts <5 an alternative test can also be used (Fishers Exact).


To better understand the barriers themselves present, the pre-defined responses along with the open text ‘other’ responses were coded into higher order and sub themes. They were thematically coded independently by two researchers who then discussed the themes and areas of dispute before deciding on the

final codes/themes. This resulted in generation of four higher order barriers and the ten sub-theme barriers.

Results

Barriers faced by coachees during their coaching

Our first research question concerned (and the question in the survey asked) whether coachees believed they had faced any barriers during coaching. Eighty four per cent of respondents indicated that they had faced barriers. Sixteen per cent indicated there were no barriers and were therefore excluded from the remainder of our analysis.

Based on the academic and practitioner literature a list of pre-defined barriers had been provided as multiple response options.Figure 1 is a bar chart showing the 18 response options, one of which was an ‘other’ response option which received 36 responses.

As can be seen from Figure 1 the top six barriers related to: Goals; ‘other’; Emotions; Commitment; Defensiveness; and Boss. The free text ‘other’ responses can be seen in Figure 2.



Figure 1: Barriers present in coaching: multiple choice responses

My colleagues resented covering my time off for coaching and made things

difficult for me

My coach was defensive

My coach was not committed to the coaching process

There was nothing challenging I wanted to work on

There was no suitable place to meet for the coaching sessions

I didn’t get on with my coach

I lacked commitment to the path of development

I was defensive

Other

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50%

Per cent of cases N


Figure 2: Barriers to coaching effectiveness: free text responses

Self-doubt

Unmotivated coach/coachee

Not all parties involved (ie boss)

Coach not flexible to all areas of business

Coach left organisation

Cost/distance

Time poor

Session content/platform unsuitable

Inadequate coach

0% 4% 8% 12%

16%

20%

Per cent of respondents


To better understand the barriers present, the pre-defined responses along with the open text ‘other’ responses were coded into higher order and sub themes. The two researchers each codedthe text independently initially and then discussed themes/areasof dispute before deciding on the final codes/themes. Using thisprocess the barriers faced by coachees were sorted into the following five categories:

■ Skills and qualifications, manner or style (difficulties with coach)

■ Readiness for coaching, engagement or emotions during the process, external events (personal issues )

■ Practicalities, coaching model used, resources (coaching programme/process)

■ Coaching relationship

■ Immediate boss, wider organisation (organisational culture)



These higher order barriers and sub themes can be represented diagrammatically, as seen in Figure 3.

Figure 3: Higher order and sub-themes: barriers to coaching effectiveness

External Happenings

Engagem ent

Readiness for Coaching

Coaching Style

Im m ediate Boss W ider

Organisation

Coaching Program m e

Organisation Culture

Personal Issues

Coach Skills

Barriers to Coaching

Effectiveness

Difficulties with Coach

Coaching Relationship


The responses from which the higher order and sub-themes were derived are presented in Table 6. The example statements are a combination of the multiple response answer options provided andthe open text responses. The number of respondents who highlighted barriers to their coaching is shown in the table. ‘Limited resources to participate’ was a sub theme developed solely from the open text coding rather than any pre-defined questions. The remaining sub themes were developed using a mixture of the pre-defined responses and the open text responses.

Table 6 shows the most cited higher order barriers were personalbarriers (N=104), barriers associated with coaching programme orprocess (N=73) and Organisational culture barriers (N=36). Within the subthemes, personal issues such as engagement during

the coaching process (N=53) and initial readiness for coaching (N=45) were the most prevalent barriers. In addition to this coaching programme issues such as the coaching methodology beingused during the coaching programme (N=37) were also well cited. Additional issues such as the organisational culture particularly with reference to a lack of support from the immediate boss (N=22) and the practicalities of the coaching programme (N=21) were also apparent.



Table 6: Barriers faced in coaching: higher order themes and sub-themes

Higher order themes N % Sub-themes (N) Example comments

Organisationalculture 36 14.4

%

Wider organisation (14)

My organisation no longer supported me during the coaching processMy colleagues resented covering my time off forcoaching and made thingsdifficult for me

Immediate boss (22)

My boss was not supportiveMy boss was not involved

Difficulties with coach 24 9.6%

Perceptions of coach skills and qualifications (16)

My coach was defensive

My coach struggled with the concepts of coachingCoach not qualifiedCoach not sensitive enoughCoach only focussed on one area of the businessand was not flexible

Coaching manneror style (8)

My coach was not committed to the coaching processCoach not involved/supportive in coaching sessionCoaching was vagueCoach was nervous

Personal issues 104 41.6

%Readiness for coaching (37)

I lacked commitment to the path of developmentThe timing wasn’t right for me (too late in my career, maternity leave)There was nothing challenging I wanted to


work onUnmotivated

Engagement during the coaching process (53)

I found it difficult to grasp the coaching concepts

Emotions got in the wayI was defensiveAlready knew what was being spoken aboutTrained in coaching techniques

External happenings (14) I changed job

I changed focus of coaching to new learning

Coaching relationship 13 5.2% Coaching

relationshipI didn’t get on with thecoachI don't find my coach really involved in the coaching session and he is not really supportingme

Coaching programme/process

73 29.2%

Practicalities of coaching programme (21)

No suitable place to meet for coaching sessionsMy coach was no longer supported by their organisationSkype doesn’t workSigning contract vs. trust is nonsenseDifficult to set appointments quicklyDistance an issueCoach changed organisation

Coaching model/methodology (45)

Difficult with reflective aspects

It descended a little tothe personalIt was meant to be




mentoringToo focussed on specificmethodologyUnclear development goals or lacked agreement with coach on my goalsFocus only on problem solving and not development goalsFocus too much on psychological aspects ofcoachingExperiments conducted bythe coach

Limited resources to participate (6)

Cost

Too busy to meet coach or complete work

Total 250 100%


Which coachees face which barriers?Our second research question asked whether barriers vary according to personal characteristics of coachees or their work or coaching context. We cross-tabulated both the higher order barriers and then the sub-theme barriers with eight variables:

Gender

Age,

Country of residence

Employment status (employed/self-employed),

Manager/non-manager,

Organisation size

Coach Type (external/internal),

Participation type (voluntary/mandatory).

Gender

Initial analysis indicates a significant difference between gender and the identification of higher order barriers, (see Appendix Table 1). Whilst slightly more women (18.9%) than men (15.5%) consider personal issues and coaching programme/process (women 13.5% & Men 10.8%) to be a barrier to effective coaching,women (7.4%) are nearly twice as likely to be effected by organisational culture as men (4.4%). Similarly, women consider difficulties with the coach (5.1%) and coaching relationships (3.4%) as barriers to effectiveness, more so than men (3.0% and 1.4% respectively).

Further analysis between gender and sub themes showed a significant difference with women more likely to highlight engagement during the coaching process as a barrier to coaching (women 11.1%, men 6.4%), see (Appendix Table 2). In addition, women more than men felt their immediate boss (W 4.7%; M 2.7%) and the practicalities of coaching programs (W 4.4%; M 2.7%) hadinfluenced coaching effectiveness.



Country of Residence

When comparing country and higher order barriers to effective coaching (see Appendix Table 3), all countries highlighted personal issues as the largest barrier to effective coaching, although respondents from Australia and Rest of the World were not as concerned as respondents from UK and Ireland and Rest of Europe. Australian, UK and Ireland and the respondents from Restof Europe highlighted the coaching programme/process as the second biggest barrier to coaching effectiveness, although this was of less concern to Rest of World.

Organisational culture on the other hand was of much more concern to Australian and UK and Ireland respondents than to theRest of Europe and Rest of the World respondents.

Further analysis between country of residence and sub themes (see Appendix Table 4) showed a significant difference with 37.8% of those in Australia and 39.0% of those in UK indicating they had faced a barrier with coaching methodology compared to only 14.3% of those from the Rest of Europe.

There was a suggestion that country of residence also impacted on whether people highlighted personal readiness for coaching asa barrier (see Appendix Table 5). 50% of those from the rest of the world highlighted this as a barrier compared to only 23.2% from Rest of Europe, 14.6% from UK and Ireland and 8.9% from Australia. However due to the small sample size this could not be assessed as significant.

Organisation size

There is a significant difference between those who reported barriers associated with external influences on the coachee and business size (see Appendix Table 6). 64.3 per cent of those in large businesses reported barriers associated with external influences on coachee compared to only 35.7 per cent in small and medium businesses.

Type of participation in the coaching

When comparing the type of participation in coaching with higherorder barriers, there is a significant difference between those who enter coaching on a voluntary basis and those for whom

participation was mandatory (see Appendix Table 7). For example, mandatory participants are less concerned about personal issues in coaching (4.7%) than voluntary participants (30.1%). Mandatory participants are also less likely to be concerned about the coaching programme/process (4.4%), organisational culture (2.4%), and difficulties with the coach (1.7%) or the coaching relationship (1.0%). Whereas voluntary participants overall are more concerned about barriers (84.5%).

Other variables

Our initial analysis found no other differences between the cross-tabulated variables regarding: age of coachees; whether they were employees/self-employed, managers/non-managers; or hadan internal/external coach.

The effect of facing barriers on outcomes

Our third research question concerned whether coachees identifying barriers perceive their coaching to be more or less effective. We started by looking at coachee perceptions of coaching effectiveness (as a proxy for achieving desired coaching outcomes).

Although 84% of participants highlighted that there were barriers that affected their coaching, for the vast majority facing barriers did not make coaching less effective (see Table 8). 102 respondents cited high order personal issues as a barrier faced during their coaching. However, it seems that coachees were able to overcome personal issues as a barrier withthe majority (82.3%) still finding their coaching to be effective.

Likewise, 81.9% of the 72 participants who faced coaching programme/process high order barriers overcame these to find their coaching effective. Other high order barriers such as organisation culture , difficulties with the coach and coachingrelationships also highlighted the coachees’ ability to overcomebarriers to coaching effectiveness in the majority of cases, with 77.7%, 75% and 71% respectively overcoming them to find their coaching effective.



Table 8: Higher Order barriers/ perceptions of how effective their coaching was

High Order Barriers Limitedeffective Effective No of

cases

Personal Issues 18 (6.1%) 84 (28.4%) 102 (34.5%)

Coaching Programme/Process 13 (4.4%) 59 (19.9%) 72 (24.3%)

Organisational Culture 8 (2.7%) 28 (9.5%) 36 (12.2%)

Difficulties with coach 6 (2.0%) 18 (6.1%) 24 (8.1%)

Coaching relationship 4 (1.3%) 10 (3.4%) 14 (4.7%)


Drilling down further into the sub-themes (see Table 9), the majority of participants were able to overcome the biggest threesub-theme barriers and rated their coaching as effective: engagement during the coaching process (with 40 out of 52 coachees still finding their coaching to have been effective, ie76.9%), the coaching methodology (33 out of 45 coachees, 73.3%) and readiness for coaching (29 out of 37 coachees, 78.4%).

By contrast limited resources to participate (6 out of 6 coachees, 100%) can be seen as a barrier not limiting the effectiveness of the coaching.

Table 9: Sub-theme barriers/ perceptions of how effective their coaching was

Sub-theme Barriers Limitedeffective Effective No of

casesEngagement during the coaching process

12 (4.1%) 40 (13.5%) 52 (17.6%)

Coaching methodology 12 (4.1%) 33 (11.1%) 45 (15.2%)

Readiness for coaching 8 (2.7%) 29 (9.8%) 37 (12.5%)

Immediate boss 6 (2.0%) 16 (5.4%) 22 (7.4%)

Practicalities of coaching programme

6 (2.0%) 15 (5.1%) 21 (7.1%)

Perceptions of coach skills and qualifications

5 (1.7%) 11 (3.7%) 16 (5.4%)

Wider organisation 4 (1.4%) 10 (3.4%) 14 (4.7%)

External happenings 4 (1.4%) 10 (3.4%) 14 (4.7%)

Coaching relationship 3 (1.0%) 10 (3.4%) 13 (4.4%)

Coaching manner or style 1 (0.3%) 8 (2.7%) 9 (3.0%)Limited resources to participate 0 (0.0%) 6 (2.0%) 6 (2.0%)


Finally we reflected on the overall figures for effective coaching. As previously stated 89.5% of total respondents to oursurvey perceived their coaching to have been effective with 10.5% stating it to have been of limited effect. Coachees facingbarriers during coaching are more likely to state their coachingwas of limited effect compared to those who face no barriers. Although not the most commonly faced barriers, it seems that facing difficulties with your coach or the coaching relationshipor the organisational culture are most associated with limited effectiveness of coaching with under 80% of respondents facing these barriers perceiving their coaching to have been effective.



Discussion and conclusion

Summary of main findings

The aim of this article was to identify barriers to successful outcomes from business coaching. Eighty four per cent of respondents indicated that they had faced barriers and for the vast majority of these facing barriers did not make their coaching less effective.

We have suggested a categorisation framework:

■ Skills and qualifications, manner or style (difficulties with coach)

■ Readiness for coaching, engagement or emotions during the process, external events (personal issues )

■ Practicalities, coaching model used, resources (coaching programme/process)

■ Coaching relationship

■ Immediate boss, wider organisation (organisational culture)

Unclear development goals or lack of agreement with their coach on their goals was the most frequently mentioned barrier in our survey. From this we might conclude that the goal setting process may not be working smoothly in these cases or that the demand for coachees to set goals was not welcome by one of the parties. This would lend support to the view that the simplisticprescription of SMART goals is not always appropriate and can even be damaging in the context of a complex and rapidly changing world appropriate (David et al., 2013). Given the current findings, practitioners may wish to reflect further on whether too rigid a reliance on goal setting may be unhelpful for coachees.

Unclear development goals could be an organisation rather than acoach issue. Interviews with coaches in the Aston evaluation (Aston et al., 2014) revealed experienced coaching practitioners were well aware of the advantages and limitations in their coaching practice of goal pursuit. They described a nuanced understanding of goals, with the possibility for bringing greater impact and sophistication to their coaching engagements.

Our previous analysis (Blackman, Carter & Hay 2014) found that coaching was no more effective if the participant received support from their organization. However, this would seem to runcounter to practitioner advice (Keddy & Johnson 2011; CIPD, 2005) where support from an individual’s boss for the coaching experience is thought to be important. It may be that clarity and honesty from the boss/line manager about the reasons for nomination for coaching (and what they hope the outcomes will be) is what is important here, rather than more generalised ‘support from my boss’ throughout the period of the coaching.

The most cited higher order barriers were personal barriers; barriers associated with coaching programme or process and organisational culture barriers. Within the subthemes, personal issues such as engagement during the coaching process and initial readiness for coaching were the most prevalent barriers.We believe it is important for coaches and coach trainers to appreciate the large number of barriers that coachees’ can face during their coaching period so that they can fully anticipate the coachee perspective.

We found a significant difference between gender and the identification of coach as a barrier. Five point one per cent ofwomen identified this as a barrier compared to only three per cent of men. Organisations (and coaches) may like to reflect on this as it may have implications for their processes to match employees to coaches. It is reasonable to infer the need to ensure a choice of coaches are offered rather than just one: a choice may be especially important for women.

We found country of residence to be significant in two ways. Firstly coachees from both Australia and UK and Ireland were over twice as likely to identify a barrier with the coaching programme/process as those in the rest of Europe and world. Secondly, coachees from Australia and UK and Ireland were more likely to identify a barrier arising because of the coaching methodology being used compared to those from the Rest of Europe. This may be because coaching has been used longer in those countries and coachees are more aware of other possible ways that coaching could be delivered to them i.e. they could bemore challenging consumers of coaching. Or it may be due to national cultural differences. In addition there was a suggestion that country of residence impacted on whether people highlighted personal readiness for coaching as a barrier. Half



of those from the rest of the world highlighted this as a barrier compared to less than a quarter from rest of Europe, 15 per cent from UK and Ireland and nine per cent from Australia. It may be that people in these countries are being put into coaching too early before they are ready which might suggest to organisations the need to improve briefings about what to expectfrom coaching, coachee recruitment/selection processes and/or pre-coaching preparation.

There was a significant difference between those who identified problems with coaching methodology and their coaching outcomes. Those who reported facing a barrier with coaching methodology ormodel were more likely to consider their coaching to have been of limited effectiveness. Therefore organisations should be aware of different coaching models/methodologies and that, for some coachees (especially in countries already knowledgeable about coaching), this will be an important criterion in the coach/coachee matching criteria alongside other criteria. It also seems important that organisations don’t just use one coachor multiple coaches who all use the same methodology/model. Thislends weight to the advice from coaching practitioners Keddy andJohnson (2011) who urge organisations to avoid an over-emphasis on just one coaching model.

There is a significant difference between those who reported barriers associated with external happenings on the coachee and business size. Those in large or very large businesses are almost three times more likely to report barriers associated with external influences on coachee compared to those in micro, small and medium businesses. It may be that employees in larger organisation have less control over their work routines or job changes or find it more difficult to fit their coaching around their workloads then those in micro-businesses or SMEs do and soit becomes a barrier.

Areas where more research might be worthwhile

Our sample consisted of similar numbers of respondents in terms of employment related variables (employed/self-employed, manager/non-manager) and we found no significant differences in terms of higher order or subthemes between these groups. Howeverour sample did not have similar numbers in terms of personal characteristics (e.g. average age was 48 years) and coaching

context (e.g. most had an external coach and were participating voluntarily). We suggest more research and discussion is needed as to the extent to which barriers might vary based on personal and coaching context and whether there is more that could be done by organisations or coaches to anticipate or minimise some barriers prior to coaching. It would also be useful to understand how barriers are overcome by coachees.

We feel that the barriers faced by employees with internal coaches is worthy of further research. Internal coaches are usually expected to carry out their coaching role in addition toor as part of their ‘everyday’ job (Hamlin et al., 2009) and being an ‘internal’ coach can result in ethical dilemmas for the coaches (St John-Brookes, 2010). In our current study we found no difference in the barriers faced by coachees (either in higher order or sub-themes) or perceptions of coaching effectiveness according to whether coaches were internal or externally sourced. This may be because the great majority of the coaches in our current study were external. A bigger sample of respondents with internal coaches may reveal differences between the groups. It would be interesting to see if the uniqueoperating challenges for the coaches from their insider context result in any different barriers to effective coaching from the perspective of their coachees.

Limitations and implications for research and practice

Coaching companies, associations and organisations were contacted by the researchers and then asked to send out to theiremail lists of people currently or recently undergoing a programme of business coaching. Therefore there is no way to establish a response rate as snowball sampling was used and the researchers did not have access to email lists due to privacy restrictions. In addition there is no way for the researchers toknow who the organisations decided to forward our survey link to. Although wee requested they send it to all their coachees, some may have sent it only to those they had good relationships with who might be expected to provide favourable responses.

Analysis has been predominantly in the quantitative tradition. However, we found it helpful to adopt a thematic approach to assist in categorising the barriers, which is more commonly usedin a qualitative research paradigm. Some academics argue that



researchers should stay wholly within one research stance and may not support our pluralistic approach.

In most cases the chi Square was P>0.05,with cells having expected counts less than 5, suggesting a higher sample was needed to understand if there was a significant difference between variables.

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About the authors

Dr Alison Carter

Alison is an Associate Fellow at Institute for Employment Studies (IES) in UK. Her application of coaching research seeks to maximise the added benefits for employers of their coaching activities. She also writes, speaks and consults on a range of HR, OD and leadership development issues. Alison was a Director of EMCC (2003/2005), Co-Chair of the 2nd Harvard International Coaching Research Forum (2009) and is a Chartered Fellow of CIPD.

Dr Anna Blackman

Anna is a Senior Lecturer in the School of Business, James Cook University in Townsville, Australia. Her research centres on theuse of business coaching to help improve business practices. Currently she works across several industries, including: tourism, rural and regional businesses, FIFO, IT, climate changeand farming. Anna is a Queensland State Councillor for the Australian Human Resources Institute (AHRI), a member of EMCC, and the Australian Institute of Management (AIM).

Ben Hicks

Ben Hicks is an Associate Researcher at Institute for EmploymentStudies, a Researcher at the Bournemouth University Dementia Institute, UK, and a Doctoral Student.

Appendix of Tables

Appendix table 1: Higher Order Barriers/Gender

What is your gender?

Higher Order Barriers MaleNo(%)

FemaleNo(%)

CasesNo(%)

Personal Issues 46 (15.5%)

56 (18.9%) 102 (34.5%)


32 (10.8%)

40 (13.5%) 72 (24.3%)

Organisational culture 13 (4.4%) 22 (7.4%) 35 (11.8%)Difficulties with coach 9 (3.0%) 15 (5.1%) 24 (8.1%)Coaching relationship 4 (1.4%) 10 (3.4%) 14 (4.7%)


Appendix table 2: Sub-theme Barriers/Gender

What is your gender?

Sub-theme Barriers MaleNo(%)

FemaleNo(%)

CasesNo(%)

Engagement during the coaching process

19(6.4%) 33 (11.1%) 52 (17.6%)

Coaching methodology 17 (5.7%) 27 (9.1%) 44 (14.9%)Readiness for coaching 13 (4.4%) 23 (7.8%) 36 (12.2%)Immediate boss 8 (2.7%) 14 (4.7%) 22 (7.4%)Practicalities of coaching programme

8 (2.7%) 13 (4.4%) 21 (7.1%)

Perceptions of coach skills and qualifications

6 (2.0%) 10 (3.4%) 16 (5.4%)

External happenings 4 (1.4%) 10 (3.4%) 14 (4.7%)Wider organisation 4 (1.4%) 10 (3.4%) 14 (4.7%)Coaching relationship 4 (1.4%) 9 (3.0) 13 (4.4%)



Appendix table 3: Higher Order Barriers/Country of residence

What is your country ofresidence?

Higher Order Barriers Australia No(%)

UK &IrelandNo(%)

Rest ofEuropeNo(%)

Rest ofWorld No

(%)

Personal Issues 25 (35.7%)

29 (42.0%) 33 (47.1%) 14 (40.0%)


18 (25.7%)

19 (27.5%) 24(34.3%) 10 (28.6%)

Organisational culture 12 (17.1%)

12 (17.4%) 6 (8.6%) 4 (11.4%)

Difficulties with coach 9 (12.9%) 6 (8.7%) 5 (7.1%) 4 (11.4%)Coaching relationship 6 (8.6%) 3 (4.3%) 2(7.4%) 3 (8.6%)Total 70 (100%) 69 (100%) 70 (100%) 35 (100%)


Appendix Table 4: Problems with coaching methodology barrier/Country of residence

Coaching methodology Australia UK and

IrelandRest ofEurope

No 28 (62.2%) 25 (61.0%) 48 (85.7%)

Yes 12 (37.8%) 16 15 (39.0%)

8 12 (14.3%)

Total 45 (100%) 41 (100%) 56 (100%)

Sig p>0.05 chi= 9.60 df=2


Appendix Table 5: Readiness for Coaching subtheme barrier/Country of residence

Readiness for Coaching Australia UK and

IrelandRest ofEurope

Rest oftheWorld

No 41 (91.1%) 35 (85.4%) 43 (76.8%)

7 (50.0%)

Yes 4 (8.9%) 6 (14.6%) 13 7 (50.0%)



(23.2%)Total 45 (100%) 41 (100%) 56 (100%) 14 (100%)

P<0.01, chi square= 12.76, df=3 however 1 cell has an expected count less than 5 suggesting a higher sample size was needed to understand if there is asignificant difference. With cell counts <5 an alternative test can also be used (Fishers Exact).


Appendix Table 6: External happenings (coachee) barrier/Organisation size

External happenings

Small/Medium

organisations

Largeorganisatio

nsTotal

No 162 (57.4%) 103 (36.5%) 162 (57.4%)Yes 5 (35.7%) 9 (64.3%) 5 (35.7%)Total 167 (100%) 112 (100%) 167 (100%)

P>0.05, chi square= .954, df=1, but one cell has expected count less than 5 suggesting a higher sample size was needed to understand if there is a significant difference. With cell counts <5 an alternative test can also be used (Fishers Exact).


Appendix table 7: Higher Order Barriers/Type of participation in coaching

Type of participation

Higher Order Barriers Mandatory No(%)

VoluntaryNo(%)

No ofcases(%)

Personal Issues 14 (4.7%) 89 (30.1%) 103 (34.8%)Coaching programme/process

13 (4.4%) 60 (20.3%) 73 (24.7%)

Organisational culture 7 (2.4%) 29 (9.8%) 36 (12.2%)Difficulties with coach 5 (1.7%) 19 (6.4%) 24 (8.1%)Coaching relationship 3 (1.0%) 11 (3.7%) 14 (4.7%)Total 14 (4.7%) 89 (30.1%) 103 (34.8%)



Barriers to successful outcomes from coaching

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