Explore the differences between leadership and coaching styles. Learn when to direct and when to coach for maximum team development and results.
Written by Laura Bouttell • Tue 30th December 2025
Leadership versus coaching represents not competing approaches but different modes within effective leadership: traditional leadership focuses on directing work toward outcomes, whilst coaching focuses on developing people to achieve those outcomes independently. The most effective leaders know when to shift between these modes based on context, capability, and objectives.
Consider this telling finding: coaching is the least used of Daniel Goleman's six leadership styles—yet research shows it creates more positive emotional climates than all but one other approach. A study published in the Leadership & Organisation Development Journal found that coaching leadership creates psychological safety and openness to change, resulting in employees speaking freely about workplace challenges and driving creativity and innovation.
The difference between coaching and management is that management focuses more on the work, whilst coaching focuses more on the employee. Understanding when each approach serves best—and developing capability in both—distinguishes leaders who merely direct from those who develop.
Traditional leadership and coaching represent different approaches to influencing others, each with distinct assumptions, methods, and outcomes.
The management leadership style is formed around the idea that the leader knows best. Leaders oversee their team directly and push them toward specific outcomes. Key characteristics include:
Coaching leadership is characterised by collaboration, support, and guidance. Coaching leaders focus on bringing out the best in their teams by guiding them through goals and obstacles. Key characteristics include:
| Dimension | Traditional Leadership | Coaching Leadership |
|---|---|---|
| Primary Focus | Work completion | Employee development |
| Leader's Role | Directs and decides | Guides and questions |
| Time Horizon | Immediate results | Long-term growth |
| Communication | Telling and instructing | Asking and listening |
| Success Metric | Task completion | Capability building |
The coaching leadership style is when a leader focuses on developing their team as individuals through one-on-one communication. This style helps employees grow and creates stronger bonds between team members and leaders.
Coaching leaders help employees identify their unique strengths and weaknesses and tie them to their personal and career aspirations. The approach involves:
A coaching leadership style focuses on developing a mentor-like relationship between leader and employee. Those bolstered relationships often lead to more effective communication, improving work outputs for all. Unlike transactional management, coaching creates genuine connection that persists beyond any single project or task.
Several prominent leaders exemplify the coaching approach:
Satya Nadella (Microsoft) Nadella uses a coaching leadership style to focus on the employees responsible for creating and maintaining Microsoft products. His emphasis on growth mindset and development transformed Microsoft's culture.
Sheryl Sandberg (Meta) Sandberg demonstrates coaching leadership by setting high standards whilst providing feedback to help team members meet them. She uses strong connections with her team to identify and remove obstacles.
David Morley (Allen & Overy) Morley made coaching leadership foundational at the law firm, focusing on meaningful workplace conversations. This approach contributed to a 175% increase in annual profits.
Research consistently demonstrates significant benefits when leaders adopt coaching approaches, though these benefits require investment and commitment to realise.
A study published in Leadership & Organisation Development Journal found that coaching leadership creates psychological security and openness to change, resulting in employees speaking freely about workplace challenges. This leads to more creativity and innovation—benefits that directive approaches often stifle.
Benefits include establishing stronger communication between leaders and employees. Trust in leadership increases employee commitment, satisfaction, and retention—yet only 21% of employees report they strongly trust their company's leadership. Coaching builds the trust that directive leadership rarely develops.
Coaching leadership fosters a sense of purpose and autonomy among team members, making them feel valued and heard. This leads to:
Many employees choose workplaces based on corporate culture, and culture supports staff retention. Leadership coaching plays a significant role in shaping company culture—creating environments where development is valued and people feel invested in.
| Benefit | How Coaching Delivers It |
|---|---|
| Innovation | Psychological safety enables risk-taking |
| Retention | Development investment increases loyalty |
| Engagement | Autonomy and growth fuel commitment |
| Communication | Dialogue builds understanding |
| Trust | Consistent support demonstrates care |
Despite its benefits, coaching leadership presents real challenges that explain why it remains the least used leadership style.
There's a reason coaching is the least used leadership style: it takes time. Rather than issuing orders, coaching requires slowing down, observing and listening to team members, delivering feedback, and working with them on improving. Not every manager has that much time, especially in fast-paced industries or crisis situations.
Some employees don't benefit from coaching. Coaching requires a collaborative relationship, and if an employee doesn't want to engage, frustration and disappointment result. Some people prefer clear direction; others need more guidance than coaching provides.
Specific situations call for specific types of coaching leaders. Just because someone coaches effectively doesn't mean they're right for a particular organisation. Finding appropriate matches feels incredibly difficult.
Some organisations still operate heavily under top-down structures. This can make coaching leadership difficult to implement where it contradicts established norms and expectations.
A potential drawback involves team members becoming overly reliant on their leader for guidance and decision-making—the opposite of coaching's development intent.
Effective leaders adjust their approach based on context rather than applying one style universally.
Coaching leadership is especially effective when:
Directive approaches serve better when:
The best managers know when to coach, when to deploy other leadership styles, and when to step back. Rigid adherence to any single approach—whether coaching or directing—limits effectiveness. Situational awareness determines which mode serves best.
| Situation | Preferred Approach |
|---|---|
| New team member learning basics | Directing |
| Experienced employee facing novel challenge | Coaching |
| Emergency requiring immediate action | Directing |
| Long-term skill development | Coaching |
| Routine task completion | Directing |
| Career growth conversation | Coaching |
Leaders who've primarily directed can develop coaching capabilities through deliberate practice and skill building.
Coaching requires different assumptions than directing:
| Directing Assumption | Coaching Alternative |
|---|---|
| I have the answer | They can find the answer |
| Faster is better | Development takes time |
| Tell them what to do | Ask what they think |
| Fix their problems | Help them solve problems |
| Measure compliance | Measure growth |
Practice questioning Replace telling statements with questions. Instead of "Do it this way," ask "What approaches have you considered?" This simple shift builds coaching habit.
Schedule development conversations Create dedicated time for coaching separate from task-focused meetings. Development requires protected space.
Seek feedback on coaching Ask team members how your coaching feels. Their perspective reveals blind spots in your approach.
Observe skilled coaches Watch leaders who coach effectively. Notice their questions, listening, and patience.
From an employee's perspective, being coached feels fundamentally different from being managed—and this difference shapes engagement and development.
Traditional management creates experiences characterised by:
Coaching creates experiences characterised by:
The coaching experience produces employees who:
Coaching leadership—leading with a coaching style—differs from executive coaching, though both share developmental intent.
Many leaders benefit from both:
Traditional leadership focuses on directing work toward outcomes—the leader decides and instructs, emphasising efficiency and immediate results. Coaching focuses on developing people—the leader guides through questions and feedback, emphasising long-term capability building. Effective leaders use both approaches, adjusting based on context. Coaching invests more time but develops employees who can eventually lead themselves.
Coaching leadership is when leaders focus on developing team members as individuals through one-on-one communication, feedback, and support. Coaching leaders help employees identify strengths and weaknesses, connect development to career aspirations, and work through challenges with guidance rather than direction. This style builds stronger relationships and creates employees who think independently and remain engaged.
Coaching works best when building trust with new relationships, pursuing long-term goals that allow development to pay off, working with high-potential employees who respond to investment, and facing complex challenges requiring judgment. Directing works better during crises, under time pressure, with new employees needing basic instruction, and in safety-critical situations requiring precise execution.
Coaching takes more time than directing. Rather than issuing quick instructions, coaching requires observing, listening, questioning, providing feedback, and working through challenges with employees. In fast-paced environments or crisis situations, many leaders lack this time. Additionally, coaching requires skills many leaders haven't developed and patience that efficiency-focused cultures don't reward.
Yes—coaching leadership integrates coaching into the leadership role. Rather than seeing leadership and coaching as separate functions, effective leaders shift between directive and coaching modes based on context. The best leaders coach when developing capability and direct when situations require immediate action. Both approaches serve leadership goals; they simply operate differently.
Research demonstrates that coaching leadership creates psychological safety enabling innovation, builds trust that increases retention, fosters engagement through development investment, strengthens communication through dialogue, and shapes positive corporate culture. These benefits require time investment but produce employees who think independently, take ownership, and remain committed through challenges.
Develop coaching skills by practising active listening, asking questions rather than providing answers, observing patterns and development opportunities, delivering constructive feedback, and exercising patience while others work through challenges. Replace telling with asking, schedule dedicated development conversations, seek feedback on your coaching, and observe skilled coaches to understand effective approaches.
Leadership versus coaching isn't an either-or choice—it's a both-and capability that distinguishes exceptional leaders from merely competent ones. The executive who only directs produces compliant teams that await instruction. The leader who only coaches may lack the decisiveness that crises demand. True leadership integrates both.
The coaching leadership style, whilst time-intensive, produces returns that directive approaches cannot match: employees who think independently, engage fully, and develop continuously. Yet coaching alone doesn't serve every situation. Emergencies require direction. New employees need instruction. Time-critical tasks demand efficiency that coaching cannot provide.
The most effective leaders develop fluency in both modes and judgment about when each serves best. They recognise that coaching represents an investment—slower in the short term but compounding over time as developed employees require less direction and contribute more value.
As you consider your own leadership approach, ask not whether you should lead or coach, but when each mode serves your team, your organisation, and the people you're responsible for developing. The answer will vary by context—but having both capabilities available makes all the difference.