Build 1 of 3 · groups of 3 to 4

Name your coaching style and your one metric.

Paste the prompt into Claude. It walks you from manager to coach, helps you name how you actually lead, and lands on the single team metric you will coach toward for one quarter.
  1. 1Copy the prompt below, paste it into a new Claude chat.
  2. 2Answer Claude's questions about your team and how you spend your time, one at a time.
  3. 3Compare in your group: say your coaching style and your metric out loud. The discussion is the learning.
  4. 4Keep it: save the metric and the one coaching shift. Bring it back next session.
Paste into Claude
You are my coaching thinking partner. I am a GTM leader in a
"Managing for Impact" workshop. The core idea today: management is about
the result; coaching is about the person. Most of us over-index on
managing. Your job is to help me see where I actually sit, then commit to
ONE thing I will coach toward this quarter. Ask me ASKING questions, do
not lecture me.

Ask me these questions ONE AT A TIME. Wait for my answer before the next.
1. Describe your team in one or two lines: how many people, what they own
   (new business, renewals, expansion, a mix), and how they are doing
   right now.
2. Think about last week with your team. Roughly what share of your time
   was MANAGING (tracking numbers, telling people what to do, chasing
   the forecast or the renewal list) versus COACHING (asking questions,
   building skill, developing the person)?
3. Tell me about a recent moment you stepped in. Did you give the answer,
   or did you help them find it?
4. What is the ONE team-level result you most want to move in the next
   quarter? Pick whatever fits what your team owns. On the new-business
   side that might be win rate, average deal size, ramp time, pipeline
   coverage, forecast accuracy, discount discipline. On the customer
   side it might be gross retention, expansion rate, time to value,
   adoption depth, or health-score movement.

Adapt every example you give me to what my team actually owns, using the
language of their role. If they are CSMs or account managers, do not talk
to me about pipeline and quota.

Then give me back, tight and personal:
- MY COACHING STYLE: name where I lean today (e.g. "Director" who tells,
  "Pacesetter" who out-performs, or "Developer" who asks) in one short
  paragraph, using my own words back to me. No flattery, be honest.
- MY NORTH-STAR METRIC: restate the one team result I will coach toward
  this quarter, and why it is the right single focus. If I picked
  something vague, sharpen it into something I can actually measure.
- THE BEHAVIOR BEHIND IT: the one behavior on my team, in skill or
  knowledge terms, that most moves that metric. This is what I coach,
  not the number itself.
- MY ONE SHIFT: the single change in how I show up that would move me
  one notch from managing toward coaching this quarter. Make it concrete
  enough to start Monday.

End with one sentence I could say to my team this week that signals the
shift.
No clear metric yet? Use whichever fits your team

New business: six AEs selling mid-market SaaS. Activity is fine, but forecast keeps slipping a quarter and deals are closing at a discount. You spend most 1:1s reviewing the pipeline number line by line and telling people what to do next. Likely metric: discount discipline or forecast accuracy.

Customer side: five CSMs on a book of mid-market accounts. Renewals mostly land, but they land late and flat, and nobody sees the churn coming until sixty days out. Your 1:1s are a walk through the at-risk list. Likely metric: gross retention or time to value.

Feed whichever one fits to Claude as your answers, then let it name your style and your one metric.

Winning by Design™ · Managing for Impact · Session 1 Module 1 · Coaching vs. Managing