Coach the Coach

New leads get promoted for being good at the work, then handed a job that is mostly conversations. This program spends six weeks on coaching and nothing else. The concepts live in short self-paced modules so the live sessions can be almost entirely practice.

Audience · New frontline leads

Format · VILT + self-paced + practice

Length · 6 weeks, ~90 min/week

Facilitator Guide · Week 3 · Session excerpt

Practice Lab: The First Hard Conversation

Time

Segment

Facilitator moves

Guide philosophy: every segment names the facilitator's move, not just the topic. "Debrief the role-play" is a topic; "ask the observer to name one behavior before anyone evaluates" is a move. Guides written in moves survive handoff to facilitators who didn't design the session.

FACILITATOR RUN SHEET — WEEK 3 · "FEEDBACK THAT LANDS" · 60 MIN VILT OPEN THE WEEK-3 SLIDES →

CLOCK
BLOCK
FACILITATION NOTE — WHY IT'S BUILT THIS WAY

:00–:05

Open with a miss. One lead shares a feedback conversation that went sideways since week 2.

Starts in application, not review. If nobody volunteers, use your own miss first — the facilitator going first is what makes it safe.

:05–:12

Model, annotated. Play the 90-second recorded example; pause twice at the marked moments.

The only "content" block in the hour, and it's a worked example, not slides. Pauses are scripted so every cohort dissects the same two decision points.

:12–:48

Triad practice ×3 rotations. Coach / coachee / observer with the observable checklist. Breakout rooms of 3, 10 minutes each, roles rotate.

36 of 60 minutes is practice — that ratio is the design. Observer scores only checklist behaviors, which trains the observer as hard as the coach. Facilitator floats; intervene only when a triad stalls, never to demonstrate.

:48–:60

Commitment, out loud. Each lead names the person and the conversation they'll have before Friday. Captured in the shared doc.

A named person and a deadline is an implementation intention; "I'll give more feedback" is not. The shared doc is what week 4 opens with — accountability is built into the sequence, not policed by the facilitator.

Designer's note

Why I made these choices

Flipped on purpose

I moved every concept into 15-minute self-paced modules so live time is never spent watching slides. If a facilitator presents for more than five minutes, the design has failed at its one job, which is protecting practice.

Real stakes, real reps

I made the role-plays use each lead's actual upcoming conversation instead of scripts about fictional employees. The Week 4 assignment is having that conversation for real. Week 5 starts with what happened.

Managers are the maintenance plan

I gave each lead's manager a one-page observation card and two scheduled check-ins. Programs that end at the last session decay within a quarter, so this one hands reinforcement to the person already in the room.

The theory underneath

Deliberate practice · Ericsson

Skill grows through focused reps with immediate feedback, not exposure to content. The design defends practice time ruthlessly, which is why concepts were exiled to self-paced modules.

Self-efficacy · Bandura

Mastery experiences are the strongest source of confidence. Each lead rehearses their own real conversation before having it, so the first attempt at the skill is never the one that counts.

Transfer climate · Baldwin & Ford

Training decays when the environment does not support it. Managers get the observation card and scheduled check-ins because transfer is a property of the system around the learner, not the course.