The COACH Model™ for Christian Leaders

If you are a Christian leadership coach, chances are you spend time working not only with individual leaders but also with the organizations they represent. Whether you’re working with individuals or organizations, church staff or ministry leaders, you need powerful tools and techniques to help maximize their effectiveness. The Coach Model™, developed by Dr. Keith E. Webb, PCC, is a powerful tool that does just that.

The COACH Model

Dr. Webb offers an overview of the model on his website:

Connect: Engagement

Build rapport and trust. Review previous action steps.

• What insights have you had since our last conversation?

 Outcome: Conversation Goa

Set the coachee’s agenda for the conversation.

• What result would you like to take away from our conversation?

Awareness: Reflective Dialogue

Encourage discovery, insights, and shifts in perspective.

•  Let’s look at this from a different perspective…

Course: Action Steps

Capture insights and put them into 2-3 actionable steps.

• What actions would you like to do to move forward?

Highlights: Review Learning

Ask the coachee to review the conversation.

• What do you want to remember from today’s conversation?

What is particularly appealing about this model when working with church groups or leaders is the place it gives the Holy Spirit in the coaching process. While just about any Christian coach would tell you that they rely on the Holy Spirit throughout the coaching conversation, most of them, when pressed just as to how they do that, struggle to put it in words.
In his book, The COACH Model™ for Christian Leaders: Powerful Leadership Skills for Solving Problems, Reaching Goals, & Developing Others, Dr. Webb explains:

Christian coaches are not a substitute for the Holy Spirit. In our efforts to help, this is easy to forget. Our knowledge, experience, intuition, and spiritual discernment can tempt us to move to conclusions and lead us to believe we know what the other person needs. More important that the coach’s perspective is the Holy Spirit’s perspective, and how He is leading the other person.

As a professional coach and trainer for my church campus’ small group leader training and development, I find the COACH Model particularly easy to understand and use when training church leaders to solve problems, reach goals, and develop others.
Both the model and the book are helpful resources for Christian coaches working with individual leaders, teams, and organizations.
What resources have you found helpful?