Highly effective group and team coaches have a robust toolkit that usually includes a variety of questions to support their clients in deepening awareness and taking action towards their highest priority goals.
In Team Building we know that Highly Effective Teams have at least 6 Key Factors
- Shared Purpose or Mission: Highly effective teams understand their WHY—Why they exist, who they serve and where they are going.
- Shared Behavioral Norms: How you do things? What is acceptable and unacceptable on the team?
- Shared Commitment: Highly effective teams are committed to each other, to the work they undertake, their mission and their stakeholders. What are team members committed to?
- Shared Performance Goals: Goals create the frame of the coaching process. With high performing teams they have shared performance goals and are clear on what these are and what it will take to get there. Additional questions in this area point us to how are people measured? How do goals align—across the team, with individuals, with the organization? Overlap?
- Shared Team Practices: Teams that work together effectively share common practices such as a Monday morning huddle, a Thursday night out or some other regular event. Shared team practices are very important in creating camaraderie, connection while providing a vehicle for communication.
- Clear Roles: An understanding of what’s needed for productivity is key for teams, including understanding how our roles overlap, align and connect.
Against this backdrop, having a variety of coaching questions helps teams not only become more aware of their own processes, but supports them in taking action towards what's really important to them.
Let's explore Coaching Questions to Create Highly Effective Teams in these 6 areas:
Area 1) Shared Purpose or Mission
As coaches we support groups and teams in developing understanding, clarity and insight around why they exist—and what their purpose is.
Coaching Questions we can ask to explore and build awareness around shared purpose or mission include:
- Why do we exist?
- Who do we serve?
- What is important to us?
- What's possible?
This vision work is often tied into work around team and organization values as well.
Area 2) Behavioral Norms
Many teams are quick to name the values they uphold but find it harder to articulate what those values look like in action (their shared observable behaviors).
Actions speak louder than words, and teams often have a written—and unwritten—set of norms. I like to ask teams:
- If I were to come in with my phone and record you in action around this value, what would we see you doing on the playback that demonstrates this?
A central cornerstone of both team and group coaching processes is to develop Group or Team Agreements about how the grouping will operate. These agreements, sometimes called Ground Rules, Terms of Engagement or Ground Rules create safety and clarity around behavior.
Coaching Questions we can ask teams and groups to help them understand their behavioral norms include:
- What are the acceptable and unacceptable behaviors for our team?
- What is taboo for us as a team?
- As we consider our values, what do these look like behaviorally?
Area 3) Shared Commitment
Groups and Teams which excel are engaged. They're committed to their work, each other, and they have each others' backs. They are passionate and connected to what they are creating.
Coaching Questions we can use to explore shared commitment are:
- What does commitment mean to us?
- What are we committed to, no matter what?
- How do we have each others' backs?
- Where could we improve in this area?
Area 4) Shared Performance Goals
The team or group's goals—individually and collectively—are the foundation of the coaching process.
Coaching Questions we can use to explore shared goals include:
- What is really important to us: Individually? Collectively?
- What do we want to get done, no matter what?
- What are your top 3 goals this Month? Quarter? Year?
- What is really important about completing these?
Area 5) Shared Team Practices
Shared team practices such as meetings, a huddle, a monthly lunch together creates a place for sharing, communication, connection and building shared experiences.
Coaching Questions we can ask team and group members to understand and deepen shared team practices include:
- What are your most important connection points during the week?
- How does information get passed on most effectively?
- What gets in the way of you connecting as a team?
- What value do you get from these shared experiences?
Area 6) Clear Roles
Teams which excel are clear in their roles. And they know how their roles overlap, align and connect.
Coaching Questions we can ask team to deepen understanding around roles include:
- What roles are needed in the team to be most effective?
- What roles (as individuals and as a team) do we usually fulfill?
- How does that serve us? Hinder us?
- Where do our roles overlap?
- How do our roles align?
- What's the connection between what I do and _____?
Wrap-up
Teams which excel value the 'pause point' we can create as coaches. And questions are an integral part of creating that pause and provide an opportunity to prompt new action on the part of the client towards their goals.
Finally, remember that questions can deepen awareness around core elements of whatever issues they are facing.
Now over to you! Here's an activity to consider in service to your work with group and team clients:
- Create your own list of questions around these six areas.
- Then next time you work with a team, have them identify where they are in these 6 areas.
If you liked this article about group and team coaching and questions, you may also like:
- 6 Key Team & Group Coaching Approaches to Create Connection and Engagement also by Jennifer Britton
- Use The Cartesian Questions to Unblock Your Client and Make Better Decisions PLUS Tool to Help!
- Coaching Questions 101: 7 Questions to Identify Values with Your Client!
Contributing Author:
Jennifer Britton, MES, CHRP, CPT, PCC-ACTC, has influenced a generation of coaches in the realms of team and group coaching. You may have read her writing (she’s the author of 7 books), including Effective Group Coaching (Wiley, 2010), the first book in the world to be published on the topic of group coaching; From One to Many: Best Practices for Team and Group Coaching; or her latest, Reconnecting Workspaces: Pathways to Thrive in the Virtual, Remote and Hybrid World (2021).
In 2025 Jennifer is leading a series of workshops around Coaching and Change, supporting coaches via Experiential Tools Under the Conversation Sparker Experiential Roadshow™. You can bring her in for a half-day or full day workshop.
Since 2006, Jennifer's Group Coaching Essentials (10 CCEs) and Advanced Group and Team Coaching Practicum (10 CCEs) programs have become known as the must-do training in the area of group coaching. The two courses have now grown into ten distinct courses that group and team coaches can take – whether coaches want to work towards the ACTC (Advanced Credential for Team Coaching) or simply want to develop their practice.The two courses have now grown into ten distinct courses that group and team coaches can take – whether coaches want to work towards the ACTC (Advanced Credential for Team Coaching) or simply want to develop their practice.
Focused on providing coaches with best practices in designing, marketing and implementing group coaching, these programs have helped thousands of coaches launch their own group and team coaching programs in a wide variety of settings (public, corporate, non-profit). These advanced courses dive deeper int the development of the coach, neuroscience of group and team coaching, and coaching a range of diverse clients which naturally exists in group and team coaching
Potentials Realized's ICF-CCE programs are geared for aspiring group and team coaches, especially those wanting to work toward the New Advanced Credential in Team Coaching (ACTC) with the ICF.
Also check out our neuroscience course for group and team coaches (NLE-A), Team Coaching Essentials and ACTIVATE Your Team and Group Coaching Superpowers. Prefer podcasts? Listen into the Coaching Many Podcast.
Image of Happy High Performing Team by fizkes via Shutterstock
This was really helpful for me to plan a for a difunctional team coaching workshop, thank you!