Iveta Simera, Centre for Research Capability and Development, Coventry University
Researchers don’t want to be told what to do. They like freedom to explore their thoughts, investigate matters deeply and in context, think, formulate goals and questions, set up plans, collect and analyse data, use the new knowledge to refine the goals, set new questions and new plans … all this is what attracts them to do research.
Perhaps surprisingly for some, the activities described above also very nicely describe the key steps of a good coaching process. So, what is coaching and how it can give you the edge you just might need in your research career?
Coaching does not offer ready-made solutions. Its key advantage is to create a safe thinking space to explore your thoughts with somebody impartial and gain clarity on where you are, where you want to be and how to get there. Coaching conversations can be incredibly useful in almost any aspect of personal and professional life from ‘small’ focused problems (e.g. delivering an important presentation) to tackling strategic longer-term issues (e.g. confidence building, career transition, leading teams, managing stressful situations or large international collaborations). Finding time to stop, think and have an open structured (and confidential) conversation with somebody who can understand but who is not part of your professional life can be incredibly enlightening and beneficial. I can certainly attest to this from my own experience.
I have been working at different universities for the last 20 years, first as a researcher but gradually transitioning into research and education programme development and management. Mentoring has been an important part of my job. To improve my skills, I signed up for a coaching course organised by my university. Realising the potential of coaching and its practical impact on people’s lives, including my own, completely changed my world outlook. I completed a further professional qualification in coaching and started volunteering as an internal university coach. While in training, I had a lot of coaching myself (and I still do). Coaching helped me realise what I am good at and what I need to gradually change as it does not serve me and my career progression very well. I have always worked hard and achieved a lot but somehow I started to feel a bit lost when I reached a mid-career point. Coaching helped me to clarify what is really important for me in my professional life. I reset my career goals and set a pathway for achieving them. Now every couple of months, a coaching session gives me accountability and a much needed reminder not to stray away from my goals.
I am often asked what is the difference between coaching and mentoring? The most important difference is that a mentor is someone who has already experienced aspects of your situation and can therefore provide you with advice from their own experience.
In contrast, a coach does not need direct experience in your area. A good coach is an attentive listener who offers reflections, asks questions (including those we might be avoiding), and helps you to home in on the critical aspects of your issue, facilitating successful change and achievement of goals.
Coaching is particularly valuable when we are seeking clarity of what we specifically want to achieve. Mentoring works best when we already have a clear idea what we want from our mentor. The line between coaching and mentoring is often blurred when provided by researchers for researchers – a bit of both usually creates a very effective and stimulating discussion and leads to a good progress.
Anecdotally, researchers are more attracted to coaches who have research background. This connection usually facilitates a quick development of a trusted and productive relationship. Informal conversations with coaches working with researchers indicated that the most frequently discussed topics by researchers included career progression, transition to a different job within the university or outside academia, working relationships, prioritisation and time management, work-life balance, communication with collaborators, development of complex proposals and effective management of international grant consortia and large collaborative projects.
The Centre for Research Capability and Development (RECAP), in collaboration with Organisation Development, is introducing a focused coaching support aimed at researchers at any stage of their career.
Aside from providing coaching support for any work and career related challenges, we will be gradually introducing a more targeted coaching support focused on maximising benefits of the Coventry Postdoctoral Fellowship scheme. We also aim to develop a coaching support that will assist researchers to embed newly gained management and leadership skills in practice.
More information on the ReCap Coaching Provision can be found here.
In the meantime, please email Iveta at iveta.simera@coventry.ac.uk if you are a researcher and
- Would like to book a short session to learn more about how the coaching works and discuss how we can best support you (read more about Iveta’s background and her approach to coaching)
Or
- Hold a coaching qualification and would like to be involved in supporting your research colleagues, we would also very much like to hear from you.