Who loves to play games? Discover 5 games that quickly teach the basics of Agile Coaching. 
In ""Flash Card Coaching,"" experience powerful questions and the value of coaching by using a deck of 24 powerful questions to silently coach a fellow attendee from ""what's on your mind"" to ""what will you do next and when will you do it?"" 
In the 3 categorization games, work in small groups to sort cards into categories and then turn them over to get feedback. The first game has you sort questions into powerful or not, the second into different kinds of advice giving or advocating, and the third into coaching, mentoring, teaching, or facilitating.
Finally, there are two ""Choose Your Own Coaching Adventure"" games. You are presented with a scenario and multiple choices. Each choice may lead further down the path to a successful coaching outcome or end up with an unhappy coachee. Each unhappy ending comes with an explanation and you can always try again.
 All of the games are freely downloadable. Gillian Lee Damon Poole

1. Anyone Can Coach

2. Copyright 2016-2018 Damon PooleCopyright 2016-2019 Damon Poole
Chief Agilist
Enterprise Transformation
Built Agile Delivery team
damonpoole.com
Founder, CEO, CTO
Past President
Acquired by
Independent Agile Coach
Agile Coach Workshops

3. Copyright 2016-2018 Damon PooleCopyright 2016-2019 Damon Poole
What Does an Agile Coach Do?
Mentoring
Teaching
Facilitating
Providing new knowledge and skills
Providing expert level information,
feedback, advice, options, and examples
Helping a person or group discover,
explore, and choose options

4. Copyright 2016-2018 Damon PooleCopyright 2016-2019 Damon Poole
What Does an Agile Coach Do?
Professional
Coaching
Mentoring
Teaching
Facilitating
Providing new knowledge and skills
Providing expert level information,
feedback, advice, options, and examples
Helping a person or group discover,
explore, and choose options
Inspiring others to come up
with their own solutions.

5. Copyright 2016-2018 Damon PooleCopyright 2016-2019 Damon Poole
1. Meeting Ethical Guidelines and Professional Standards
2. Establishing the Coaching Agreement
3. Establishing Trust and Intimacy with the Client
4. Coaching Presence
5. Active Listening
6. Powerful Questioning
7. Direct Communication
8. Creating Awareness
9. Designing Actions
10.Planning and Goal Setting
11.Managing Progress and Accountability
International Coach Federation Professional Coaching Competencies
https://coachfederation.org/core-competencies
The largest governing body
for professional coaching

6. Copyright 2016-2018 Damon PooleCopyright 2016-2019 Damon Poole
The Essence of Professional Coaching
Planning
Start of
Coaching Identify
Session
Purpose
Explore
Prioritization
Establish
Rapport Goal
Setting

7. Copyright 2016-2018 Damon PooleCopyright 2016-2019 Damon Poole
Questions to Use When Coaching 1-1
• Let’s review the questions / prompts in the coaching “cheat sheet”
• What do you notice about the questions / prompts?
• What are some characteristics / attributes?

8. Copyright 2016-2018 Damon PooleCopyright 2016-2019 Damon Poole
Avoid Leading Questions
“People are
regularly showing up
late to the standup”
“Have you tried
moving the
standup time?
You should
move the
standup time.

9. Copyright 2016-2018 Damon PooleCopyright 2016-2019 Damon Poole
Open Ended Questions
Have you tried
moving the
standup time?
No
What might you
do to improve the
standup?
OPENCLOSED
Yes

10. Copyright 2016-2018 Damon PooleCopyright 2016-2019 Damon Poole
Cheat Sheet Coaching
• Form a pair: coach, coachee. Add an observer if odd # of people
• Coachee picks something to receive coaching on
• Coach shows a card from the deck or picks phrases from the cheat
sheet to say to the coachee
• One way only, when done, we will debrief
5 min
Planning
Start of
Coaching Identify
Session
Purpose
Explore
Prioritization
Establish
Rapport Goal
Setting

11. Copyright 2016-2018 Damon PooleCopyright 2016-2019 Damon Poole
Cheat Sheet Coaching
• Form a pair: coach, coachee. Add an observer if odd # of people
• Coachee picks something to receive coaching on
• Coach shows a card from the deck or picks phrases from the cheat
sheet to say to the coachee
• One way only, when done, we will debrief
5 min
Planning
Start of
Coaching Identify
Session
Purpose
Explore
Prioritization
Establish
Rapport Goal
Setting

12. Copyright 2016-2018 Damon PooleCopyright 2016-2019 Damon Poole
Coachee
Focus on Coaching vs Problem Solving
Coach
Related
Information

13. Copyright 2016-2018 Damon PooleCopyright 2016-2019 Damon Poole
Coachee
Thank
You!
Coaching Is Valuable In Its Own Right
Coach
COACHING PROCESSPROBLEM SOLVING

14. Copyright 2016-2018 Damon PooleCopyright 2016-2019 Damon Poole
3 Kinds of Advice
• The best advice is to provide missing information
• 2nd best: provide a relevant resource or decision making tool
• 3rd best: provide relevant examples from your experience

15. Copyright 2016-2018 Damon PooleCopyright 2016-2019 Damon Poole
3 Kinds of Advice
Coachee: “Our retrospectives are getting boring and useless. ‘What went well, what
didn’t, and ideas’ over and over again is mind numbing. What should I do?”
Coach: “The Scrum Guide only requires a retro, not a specific format.”
Coachee: “Oh! I didn’t know that. That’s awesome! In the future I’ll take advantage of that
flexibility, but I don’t know any other formats. What should I do?”
Coach: “I find that when folks are first trying a different format they have good luck running
‘Best Team’ or ‘Timeline’. I’ll send you the links.”
Coachee: “Oh! Terrific! But I need to run this tomorrow and I don’t have time to look into
that, what should I do?
Coach: “Well, there’s a great online resource called Retro Mat that will give you a random
format by choosing from a wide variety of options for the 5 stages of a retro.”
Coachee: “Perfect. Thanks so much for your help.

16. Copyright 2016-2018 Damon PooleCopyright 2016-2019 Damon Poole
Giving Advice
• Always leave the decision making with the coachee
• Avoid advocating for or against a course of action
• injecting your personal biases and preferences
• the words “should”, “I would” “shouldn’t”, or “I wouldn’t”
• hoping for a particular option to be chosen or not chosen ( they will know )
• judging options and examples
• judging the coachee’s decision
• saying “trust me”
• Including non-verbal cues

17. Play!

18. Q&A
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