How to coach your team instead of carrying them

1 day ago7 min read3 comments

If your team grinds to a halt the moment you step away, you haven't built a team—you've created a dependency, and that's a fundamental leadership failure I see constantly when coaching entrepreneurs. Too many business owners, especially those steeped in the 'hustle culture' glorified in books like 'The Hard Thing About Hard Things,' mistakenly believe that supporting their team means carrying them.They leap into every operational fray, solve every customer service dilemma, and personally answer every question that arises, mistaking this frantic activity for effective leadership. In reality, this creates a devastating bottleneck that stifles growth and ensures the business can never truly scale beyond the founder's direct involvement.The true goal of leadership isn't to be the perpetual smartest person in the room; it's to cultivate an environment filled with individuals who can think critically, solve problems proactively, and act decisively in your absence. This pivotal shift from being a hands-on problem-solver to a strategic coach is arguably the most critical transition a business owner can make, and it's the only sustainable path to scaling an enterprise without burning out.The first step is to consciously stop answering every question. When an employee approaches you with 'What should I do about X?' your instinct might be to provide the solution, but that only trains them to return to you for every subsequent issue.Instead, adopt a Socratic method of coaching by asking empowering counter-questions: 'What options have you already considered?' 'How would you proceed if I were on vacation for two weeks?' 'What is the very next logical step you could take to move forward?' This isn't about being evasive; it's a deliberate strategy to develop their decision-making muscles, building both confidence and long-term capability. Next, trade perpetual firefighting for building durable frameworks.Good managers excel at putting out fires, but great leaders architect fire prevention systems. Start by documenting your own internal decision-making processes.What specific questions do you ask before committing to a course of action? What patterns do you recognize in recurring operational issues? Transform these mental models into tangible frameworks your team can use—be it a decision tree for customer refunds, a checklist for launching a new marketing campaign, or a step-by-step protocol for handling a technical outage. Knowledge trapped in your head is merely a habit; codified on paper or in a shared digital space, it becomes a scalable tool for the entire organization.Furthermore, it's crucial to coach for outcomes, not for your personal style. Many founders get trapped in the micromanagement loop, correcting *how* a task is performed rather than evaluating the end result.If a team member achieves 90% of the desired outcome using their own unique methodology, celebrate that victory and offer guidance for the final 10%, but resist the urge to force them to replicate your exact process. Excessive intervention, as numerous organizational studies confirm, stifles creativity, erodes morale, and halts professional growth.Your objective isn't to create clones of yourself; it's to build a diverse portfolio of capable, independent thinkers. This requires establishing a robust feedback loop before you step back.Coaching doesn't mean abdicating responsibility; it means creating a support structure that enables autonomy. Implement weekly check-ins that focus on progress and learning, not on achieving perfection.Define clear Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) tied directly to outcomes and results, not just hours logged. Maintain open channels for questions, but set the expectation that team members should bring potential solutions alongside the problems they identify.When you strategically step back within this kind of structured support system, your team will inevitably step up with a renewed sense of ownership. Ultimately, this demands letting go of the 'hero' identity.For many driven founders, it feels deeply rewarding to be the fixer, the rescuer, the one with all the answers. But if your business's survival is predicated on you always being the hero, you've built a glorified job for yourself, not a self-sustaining company.You'll remain trapped on a hamster wheel of your own making, and your team will never reach its full potential. Remember, great coaches don't chase the glory of scoring the winning goal; they derive their satisfaction from building the champions who do.Your primary function as a leader is not to do more, but to be a multiplier, making everyone in your orbit more effective, resourceful, and capable. Coaching is the ultimate leverage point where leadership transforms from a reactive, draining activity into an exponential, sustainable force.It represents the critical difference between growth that exhausts you and growth that energizes and expands the entire organization. So, the next time you feel that familiar urge to immediately fix something for your team, pause and reframe the moment: ask yourself, 'Is this merely a task for me to complete, or is it a strategic opportunity for me to coach?' One approach simply builds a longer to-do list; the other builds a truly resilient, valuable business.

#leadership

#team management

#coaching

#business growth

#productivity

#featured

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