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Up IBy Melissa Campeau
n January of 1991, Canadian swimmer Mark Tewksbury
emerged from the Claremont Superdome pool in Perth,
Australia with a problem. A second-place finish in the
100-metre backstroke – 6/100ths of a second behind
American Jeff Rouse – moved his dreams of gold at the 1992
Olympics a little further out of reach.
In search of a solution, he made the unlikely move of hiring
synchronized swim coach Debbie Muir. Together, they
dissected his performance and concluded his weak spot was
the underwater dolphin kick, a move swimmers use to gather
speed at the start of a race and after turns. So they worked on
it. The next year in Barcelona, Tewksbury won his race with a
come-from-behind victory, securing the gold and breaking an
Olympic record in the process.
Before partnering with Muir, Tewksbury was among the top
competitors in the world. When they worked together, he was
quite literally unbeatable.
The same might just apply to employees. Everyone has his
or her “dolphin kick” – the weak spot that’s an opportunity in
disguise. What if someone helped your staff members pinpoint
their unique challenges and work out their best solutions?
What could that mean to the organization?
With a long list of positive results associated with coaching,
the most compelling just might be its ability to boost engagement,
which in turn can impact the bottom line.
While executive coaching has been popular for decades now
– a recent Hay Group survey reports between 25 and 40 per
cent of Fortune 500 companies use executive coaches – the
International Coach Federation reports that an increasing number
of businesses are bringing coaching to employees of all levels
within their organizations. With a solid grasp on what to do,
what to expect and how to execute a good coaching plan, HR
can help an organization make the most of this growing trend.
HRPATODAY.CA ❚ JANUARY 2015 ❚ 19