Lead at first. Don't Coach.
💌 Letter #7 – ⏳ 4 min 34 sec
⚡️What’s new in this letter? Based on your feedback 🙏 , I’m trying something new: a shorter format. A pure letter. Under 5 minutes — promise! Let me know in the comments if it resonates, or if you have other thoughts 🧠
Lead (/liːd/)
from old English lǣdan, meaning “to guide, to conduct, to make go before oneself.” A leader, by extension, is the one who walks ahead — who leads the way.
Dear you,
It’s the second time you’ve asked me that:
– “Can I really be both a leader and a coach?”
Last night, your tone had changed. A bit more frustration this time:
– “Honestly, I don’t get it anymore. Everyone tells me to coach my team, to ask questions, to listen… but sometimes I just want to tell them what to do. What’s the right posture, for God’s sake?”
Ten days ago, you came back from the company-wide coaching program your HR team had chosen. You came back excited, convinced you’d found the key to a more human kind of management. But the more you tried to apply those principles, the more your interactions blurred. Meetings dragged on, decisions got delayed, and you started feeling like you’d lost control. Your team no longer knew whether you were there to lead or to ask questions.
So this time, I won’t answer like a coach would.
I’ll step out of my usual reserve and speak plainly, because this topic irritates me almost as much as it does you.
Since I came back on LinkedIn, I’ve read an avalanche of nonsense about coaching.
– « Sam, trust me, I’ve seen it all, you have to coach your teams, or you’ll never scale. »
– « No, Sam, listen to me, I’m a multi-millionaire entrepreneur, you have to be super directive, or you’ll get eaten alive. »
My God.
It can sound like leadership and coaching are a binary choice: to coach or to command, to be soft or to be strong. But they’re not opposites. Leadership is contextual. Coaching is too. Both are complementary. They’re different postures that serve different moments.
As Jean-Pierre Bacri used to say: “I find it disgusting to make people believe the world is binary.” Nothing in leadership ever is.
The real question isn’t whether to be one or the other. It’s whether you can be a leader who uses coaching techniques with discernment: in the right place, at the right time, with the right people.
It’s always a matter of context.
Remember what lead really means. The word comes from Old English lǣdan: “to guide,” “to show the way.” To lead is to walk ahead, trace the path, set the direction. That’s what’s expected of you, first and foremost.
When things get tough, your job is to lead.
Imagine a ship captain who, in the middle of a storm, gathers his crew for a sharing circle about how everyone feels before deciding who wants to do what. No.
In the storm, the captain listens, of course, but to re-frame, re-direct, decide. When the stakes are high and the challenges clear, take your leadership responsibility. Lead. It’s neither authoritarian nor outdated. It’s simply what your role, and your people, require.
But when you’re surrounded by strong, competent, autonomous collaborators, it’s different. That’s when — yes, ten times yes — you walk beside them and could and should leverage a coaching posture embed in your leadership. Give them the space they deserve, let them take ownership, make decisions, take initiative. That’s the moment to use coaching tools: to ask, to listen, to help them find their own answers.
But be careful: I said use coaching tools — not become their coach.
Don’t blur the roles. You can’t be their coach, and I strongly advise you not to try.
Your hierarchical position prevents the neutrality, trust, and confidentiality true coaching demands. It can also open doors to personal matters you’re neither meant nor equipped to handle without stepping out of your role.
Leaders who confuse the two often create chaos. They think they’re developing their teams, but end up muddying everyone’s bearings. That erodes trust — theirs and others’ — in their ability to lead and decide.
Dear you, stay in your posture as a leader, at first.
Sharpen it, deepen it, enrich it with coaching techniques. So that, when the moment allows, you can leverage those coaching tools to elevate your team, build ownership, and fuel autonomy and creativity.
Say it differently, be inspired by coaching — but don’t get lost in it. You’re their leader, not their coach.
And if one day you sense someone needs deeper support, point them toward a professional coach. It’s a craft: one that takes training, practice, and a neutral, confidential framework. Coaching is an art.
And to your initial question, yes — you can be, and should be, a leader who uses coaching tools. But no, you can’t be both a leader and a coach.
Being a great leader, in my view, isn’t about choosing, in a binary way, between leading and coaching, questioning or directing. It’s about knowing, in context, when to use coaching and when not to — when one posture should precede the other.
Take care,
Adri
Merci Adri ! A quand ton partage sur ces outils de coaching que les leaders peuvent utiliser et quand stp ? On a hâte de la suite …