Leading a Coaching Culture with Corry Robertson

Corry Robertson is a leading global expert on organizational culture, coaching culture and colleague engagement. She's also the founder and CEO of The Coaching Academy for Leaders. In this episode learn about:

• Coaching as a way of being
• Why creating a coaching culture is key for leaders
• How to adapt your coaching and communication style in a virtual world
• The reason emotional connections in coaching are so important.

Plus loads more hacks!

Join our Tribe at https://leadership-hacker.com

Music: " Upbeat Party " by Scott Holmes courtesy of the Free Music Archive FMA

Transcript: Thanks to Jermaine Pinto at JRP Transcribing for being our Partner. Contact Jermaine via LinkedIn or via his site JRP Transcribing Services

Find out more about Corry Robertson below:

Corry’s Website - https://corryrobertson.com

Corry on LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/corryrobertson/

Corry on Twitter - https://twitter.com/CorryRobertson

Corry on Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/coachcorryrobertsonpcc/

Full Transcript below

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Steve Rush: Some call me Steve, dad, husband or friend. Others might call me boss, coach or mentor. Today you can call me The Leadership Hacker.

Thanks for listening in. I really appreciate it. My job as the leadership hacker is to hack into the minds, experiences, habits and learning of great leaders, C-Suite executives, authors and development experts so that I can assist you developing your understanding and awareness of leadership. I am Steve Rush and I am your host today. I am the author of Leadership Cake. I am a transformation consultant and leadership coach. I cannot wait to start sharing all things leadership with you.

Joining us on the show today is Corry Robertson. She's recognized as an expert on organizational culture and she's the founder and CEO of The Coaching Academy for Leaders. But before we get a chance to meet with Corry, it's The Leadership Hacker News.

The Leadership Hacker News

Steve Rush: In the new today we've got a fun and bizarre story just to put into context how crazy our biases can be. The guy who travels the New York, subway dressed as a giant rat as his bizarre costume makes it dead easy to practice social distancing, Jonothon Lyon purchase on the train six wearing his strange regalia as part of his work as a performance artist. And he says his costume is ideal for staying COVID secure. He's told us that he doesn't have to worry about what people are saying or how close they need to get because the six feet distance is just naturally happening. A video of Jonathon riding, the rails dresses as Buddy the Rat went viral online with the official account of New York metropolitan transport authority joking, thank you for wearing a mask. Jonothon points out that he was wearing a surgical face mask underneath his rat face. In fact, sometimes he wears an extra face mask on top of buddy face. When not infesting the underground, Jonothon works in physical theatre and puppetry as well as performing as part of a barbershop quartet, The Apple Boys. He's even done a stint with internationally famous performance art company, Blue Man Group, but Jonothon best known for scampering around on TikToK as Manhattan's largest rodent. He occasionally even carries a giant pizza slice to add a touch of realism to the scene. Jonothon said he created his Buddy the Rat character just over 10 years ago, and his first video showing buddy expedition to times square scored just over 70,000 views on YouTube.

So good luck to Jonothon and Buddy the Rat, but the leadership lens here is quite simple. However, absurd and obvious it may seem to people that a giant rat can put space between us proves that our unconscious thinking and our unconscious mindset still plays out in some simple behaviours. So, the next time you see a giant rat and you think I need to run away from it, it's probably just Jonothon. That's been The Leadership Hacker News. If you have any fun, interesting, or just plain crazy stories that you'd like our listeners to hear, please get in touch.

Start of Podcast

Steve Rush: Corry Robinson is our special guest on today's show. She's a leading global expert on organizational culture, engagement and retention, particularly in the tech industry. She's also the founder and CEO of The Coaching Academy for Leaders. Corry, welcome to The Leadership Hacker Podcast.

Corry Robertson: Thank you for having me, Steve.

Steve Rush: Joining us all the way from Quebec in Canada today.

Corry Robertson: Absolutely.

Steve Rush: How is Canada dealing with the world and what's happening right now?

Corry Robertson: Well, you know, I think Canadians are being good Canadians, you know, trying hard to, you know, limit the spread of COVID-19, learn to keep a great attitude, you know, and just trying to keep the world turning, you know, doing our part to get through this together.

Steve Rush: Good stuff. So, tell us a little bit about your journey Corry, from where you started out to then running and leading and coaching and inspiring others?

Corry Robertson: Great question. I started with a degree in communication studies actually, and I entered the workforce and I was just so excited. It was my dream come true to, you know, get out and start working and making my mark on the world. I started realizing very quickly in that it wasn't all that it was cracked up to be. You know, I was really looking forward to, you know, working with great leaders and having great colleagues. In retrospect, I realized what was really lacking for me was strong leadership, visionary leadership. And so, I moved from advertising into project managing events, which I really, really enjoyed and took a break from that when my husband had an opportunity to move abroad and we had a small child at the time. And then when we got abroad and the baby was on the way and I wanted to go back to my events business, but I didn't have a network. And so, I decided I was going to build one. So, I started this business called the Elvetham Heath business network. And Elvetham Heath was the name of the village we lived in and the business grew and grew and grew. And what ended up happening was is, I took all of my work experience that I had had from, you know, from advertising. I did some time in magazine publishing and of course there was the events. I realized that these skills were really important for my business network. So before, you know, I'm publishing a magazine for, you know, full articles written by my clients. You know, giving really great advertising opportunities. I'm organizing trade shows, I'm hosting networking events, giving public speaking opportunities to my clients. And three of my clients were business coaches and two of them became really good friends. And one of them lent me his material from this training school that he went to become a coach. And he lent me the material on Friday afternoon, two huge binders because in those days we still received our learning material on paper and on eve files.

Steve Rush: There was no Zoom then.

Corry Robertson: There was no Zoom, no digital files. Our business network actually had one of the first websites that anyone had seen. Nobody had really gotten hooked on websites yet; it was still pretty new. And I realized from clients who were coaches, what I've learned from them is that most people, although they're asking for advice, so they reach out and they ask for help. They don't really need advice. And this is really where the coaching magic comes in as you know, people already have so much information, so much education, so much experience, so much creativity and intelligence that they don't need mine. They don't need yours. They don't need anybody else. They need somebody to help coax it out of them. And that's what coaching is. So, when I discovered coaching as a profession, in Canada coaches were sports coaches, not life coaches or leadership coaches or corporate coaches. So, it was brand new to me. And it was just, it was a catalyst for me. I have this, this is really, really exciting stuff. And it's such a great opportunity to be a part of.

Steve Rush: Awesome, I had a very similar experience. Actually, its kind of gets hold of you, doesn't it? When you can unlock the potential in others through just conversation in great communication, it's almost a luring, isn't it? And you just want more of it and more of it.

Corry Robertson: Oh, absolutely. As you know, I train coaches, I mentor aspiring coaches and I always tell them, I said, there's going to come a time when you witnessed somebody's “A-HA!” moment and you will never be the same again.

Steve Rush: Yeah, I feel very privileged in having done that several occasions, if not more than several occasions. And it's a very intimate experience, isn't it? And you know, particularly cherish.

Corry Robertson: Oh, it's amazing. It's amazing. And then you think this is my blessing. This is my career. You know, people come to me and they allow me to hold space and bear witness to their transformation. And it's so special be