Basic Coaching Principles: 10 Evidence-Based Coaching Practices

Describe almost anything you are working through and IX Coach finds the practices whose real-world fit is closest. For Basic Coaching Principles, these are the strongest matches in the current practice library.

Practices that may help

1. Rewrite internal-focus coaching cues as external-focus equivalents
   Audit your coaching language and convert body-focused instructions to effect-focused ones.
   External Focus of Attention, Made Practical
2. Give performers choice within practice to support autonomy
   Offer self-directed options in practice — which drill, how many reps, which cue — to enhance intrinsic motivation and learning.
   External Focus of Attention, Made Practical
3. Use GROW in brief leadership conversations, not just formal coaching sessions
   Apply GROW structure to 5-minute hallway conversations and 1-on-1 check-ins — not only to hour-long coaching sessions.
   The GROW Model: Coaching Conversations That Actually Move People
4. The Coaching Habit: Seven Questions to Be More Coach-Like
   Michael Bungay Stanier’s seven questions — from "What’s on your mind?" through "What was most useful for you?" — are a practical system for coaching conversations that takes less than a minute to learn and a career to master. The framework is practitioner-derived from behavioral coaching practice; its mechanisms are grounded in autonomy support, self-determination, and the generation effect. The questions work because they shift the cognitive labor back to the person who owns the problem.
5. Obstacle anticipation before close
   Before ending, ask "what could get in the way?" and pre-plan the response.
   The GROW Coaching Model, Made Practical
6. Maintain a high question-to-statement ratio throughout GROW
   Ask questions far more often than you offer statements — the coachee’s thinking is the product.
   The GROW Model: Coaching Conversations That Actually Move People
7. Close the GROW loop with session review
   At the start of the next session, review what was committed and what actually happened before setting a new goal.
   The GROW Coaching Model, Made Practical
8. Powerful open questions at every stage
   Ask questions that invite thinking, not ones that suggest answers — and ask more than you tell.
   The GROW Coaching Model, Made Practical
9. Generate Options before evaluating any
   Brainstorm all possible paths before judging — then the coachee, not the coach, narrows them.
   The GROW Coaching Model, Made Practical
10. Coached practice with targeted feedback
    Attempt the task yourself while a coach observes and provides immediate, specific feedback on process.
    Cognitive Apprenticeship: Learning by Making Thinking Visible

Does this sound like the set of challenges you might be facing?

• When I coach people, almost everything out of my mouth is about their body→
• The people I’m training just go through the reps I dictate, checked-out and joyless, and I dictate every detail because I assume that’s my job→
• I only ever coach in the rare formal sit-down and then default to firing off answers in every quick hallway exchange→
• The people I coach leave fired up with a plan, but the first ordinary snag throws them and the whole thing quietly dies→
• When I replay my coaching conversations I’m talking way more than the other person→

Describe your situation in your own words to search the complete practice library.