5: Effective Communication Skills Available to Purchase

Excellent communication skills are key to coaching and mentoring and generally when working with young people. As coaching and mentoring interventions are primarily one-to-one, there can be certain pressures when talking with a young person without the fallback of group work and engagement with other people. Coaches and mentors need to be good listeners, understand how to ask the right questions, know when to self-disclose or not, be able to discern body language cues and be comfortable with periods of silence. We will examine these different communication strategies and skills, including both digital and face-to-face settings. There is likely to be limited time for the coach or mentor to build the relationship so that the young person feels able to ‘buy into’ the process, otherwise they may quickly choose to make excuses or simply attend sessions. The literature speaks of ‘a-ha’ or ‘lightbulb’ moments where the coachee or mentee suddenly has a new insight or flash of inspiration. These moments can be hard to predict and can also be few and far between. It is important then that the coach or mentor remains motivated to keep the discussions and explorations going, so that the young person eventually comes to a place of clarity or sense of purpose about any decisions or goals they might want to set for themselves. This chapter will look at different types of communication skills and will include tips and examples of approaches that are specifically effective for young people who may not themselves have fully developed their own interpersonal skills. We will also explore how you approach coaching and mentoring with different age groups, as these vary when aimed at younger teenagers or young adults.