THE BIG IDEA
Commitment Questions help you and your coachee create realistic and actionable commitments and reinforce personal accountability. Make sure you ask: What they’ll do, When, and How it helps them obtain their goal. Also ask what obstacles could block them and what support they need. Finally, ask on a 1-to-10 scale how certain they are that they will keep this commitment. If they say lower than 8, help them find a new commitment that they can be more certain they will keep. Make sure they understand, are excited by, and feel supported in their commitment.
When someone doesn’t keep their commitment, it’s most likely an issue of alignment – the person, the organizational culture/environment, and their capability all should align to ensure the individual can keep their commitment as promised. Focus on creating that alignment to help coachees keep commitments.
EXAMPLES
Here are six questions you can use to build good commitments:
1) What are you going to do?
2) When are you going to do it?
3) How will this commitment help you obtain your goal?
4) What might stop you from acting on this commitment?
5) How certain are you that you will follow through on this commitment on a scale of 1-10, 10 being absolutely certain?
6) What support might you need?
Read through these questions several times, then use them as you work with coachees this week. Get to the point where you can ask all 6 from memory!
