In the last few years, HR and People leaders have faced relentless recruitment pressures, burnout cycles, and rapid organizational change. But in 2025, the focus is shifting. This is the year to focus on staying power by developing people and building systems that last.
The 2025 SHRM State of the Workplace report highlights what matters most. Today, the real opportunity lies in how HR and People leaders show up day to day. Whether it's a quick check-in, a team conversation, or a moment of tension, the ability to offer grounded guidance and clear feedback is essential. Practical coaching skills used in the moment can turn everyday interactions into lasting impact.
So let’s take a look at 5 core coaching skills that help shape stronger teams, cultures, and leadership.
What Is Coaching?
Coaching is the skill of helping someone think more clearly, take purposeful action, and build lasting growth. Rather than offering solutions or advice, coaching invites reflection and ownership. The goal is to support forward movement through clarity, intention, and insight.
It’s helpful to draw the line between coaching and other roles HR leaders often play. Managing focuses on performance. Mentoring shares personal experience. Training builds specific skills. Coaching does something different; it helps someone pause, get perspective, and move forward with clarity.
Take a moment to consider how much of your 1:1 time is spent giving advice versus partnering in thought. What might shift if coaching became part of your everyday conversations?
5 Core Coaching Skills for HR in 2025
1. Coaching for Manager Development
The SHRM State of the Workplace report states that 35% of employees reported experiencing poor or ineffective management in 2024. That number speaks for itself. So how do we better support our employees?
Effective manager development should focus on building the habits that shape trust, clarity, and leadership presence. Skills training supports this, but it’s the daily behaviors that make it stick. Coaching helps managers strengthen those behaviors in a number of ways.
Try this in your next 1:1 meeting:
- Start with curiosity: Ask, “What does support look like for your team right now?”
- Listen for patterns: Let them talk without jumping in. Notice how they describe challenges, wins, or team dynamics.
- Reflect it back: Say, “It sounds like clarity and consistency matter most this quarter.”
- Co-create one next step: “What’s one thing you want to try this week?”
It’s easy to move into advice mode or offer quick solutions. But the steps your managers come up with on their own are the ones they’re most likely to own. Plus, they’ll feel more confident in themselves.
2. Coaching for Employee Experience
SHRM’s latest research highlights 4 core drivers of employee experience: cohesion, purpose, fairness, and recognition. These drivers matter across roles and are often shaped by what managers do and say without even realizing.
Understanding these microbehaviors and their impact is where coaching can make a big difference. For example, a manager’s tone during a tense update or who they follow up with after a meeting. These microbehaviors shape how safe, seen, and supported others feel.
Steps to coach for microbehavior awareness:
- Zoom in on the moment. Ask, “What was your tone or body language like in that interaction?” Not to criticize but to surface patterns that may be invisible to them.
- Name the ripple. Help them connect behavior by asking “How might that have landed for your team member?”
- Spot the default. Invite them to reflect. For example, “When you’re under pressure, what habits tend to show up?” This builds awareness of automatic cues.
- Re-center on intent. “What message do you want your team to take away in moments like that?” Coaching reconnects behavior to purpose.
- Identify one shift. Ask “What’s one thing you want to try next time to reinforce safety or clarity?”
These conversations may feel small, but they often unlock big insights. Coaching microbehaviors helps managers lead in a way that strengthens trust without needing a full rework of process.
3. Coaching for Learning and Development
Learning and development is now a top-three priority for both HR teams and employees. People want to grow, and they’re looking towards their leadership for support.
Coaching helps managers turn day-to-day work into real development. Every project can stretch a skill. Every feedback loop can build confidence. The key is helping managers slow down enough to notice those moments and shape them with intention.
One simple framework that works well in check-ins and project planning is the GROW model. It guides a short, focused conversation that links work to growth.
Use the GROW model to coach managers on employee development:
- Goal: Ask, “What does your employee want to develop or achieve?” This gets the focus clear from the start.
- Reality: “What’s their current skill level or barrier?” This builds shared awareness of where they’re starting from.
- Options: “What stretch projects, peer feedback, or mentoring opportunities could help?” Now the conversation becomes practical.
- Way Forward: “What’s one step they can take this week?” This turns insight into action.
With a few simple questions, coaching shifts the tone of development conversations. It helps managers stop guessing what people need and start building learning into the flow of work.
4. Coaching for Accountability and Alignment
Accountability drives clarity and trust. It gives teams the confidence to move forward, knowing who owns what and how progress is measured. When HR leaders coach for accountability, they’re helping managers set the tone for performance without falling into control mode.
Start with expectations. Help managers name the goal, define what success looks like, and check for alignment. The clearer the goal, the easier it is to follow through.
Make progress visible. Support managers in choosing simple ways to track and share updates. That could include dashboards, quick check-ins, and shared docs. Co-design the process so it feels collaborative.
When things go off track, focus on course correction. Look at what got in the way. Talk through what needs to shift. Keep it future-focused and free of blame.
Consistency matters. Encourage managers to follow through on their own commitments. Their example sets the tone for the team.
5. Coaching for Influence and Buy-In
SHRM shows the biggest blockers to progress are showing up at the organizational and executive levels. Think of misaligned priorities, slow decision-making, or lack of sponsorship.
That’s where coaching for leadership buy-in becomes essential. Managers often know what needs to happen but struggle to get the executives on board. Coaching can help them build a clearer case and find the right people to align with.
Start with relationships. Help managers identify who needs to be involved and what matters to them. Focus on connection before persuasion.
Then sharpen the message. What’s at stake if nothing changes? Why should leaders care? Coaching here helps managers tell a clearer story, one that speaks to the priorities of the people they need on board.
When influence becomes part of the coaching conversation, managers are more likely to speak up, connect across silos, and get the momentum they need.
Putting Coaching into Practice
You don’t need to be a certified coach to make an impact. These coaching practices are core HR skills that start with paying attention, asking better questions, and creating space for others to think things through. One clear moment of insight or intention can shift how a leader shows up for their team.
You don’t have to do everything at once. Choose one skill to explore this week. The goal is steady progress, not perfection.
Here are 3 simple ways to start:
- Identify one manager you regularly support. What’s one coaching prompt you can try in your next conversation?
- Take five minutes today to reflect. Which of these 5 skills feels most natural to you? Which one feels worth developing next?
- Share this list with your HR or L&D team. How might these coaching skills show up in your next program or 1:1?
The ripple effects from small shifts are real. When you coach with intention, you’re not just supporting one leader, you’re shaping the culture they carry forward.
Lead Through Coaching
Coaching has become a core part of how HR shapes culture, strengthens leadership, and supports real growth inside an organization. These 5 coaching skills shift how conversations happen so that managers leave with more clarity, teams feel more trust, and work becomes more human.
Each of these skills creates momentum. Together, they build capability that lasts.
Start small. Stay consistent. And remember, every intentional conversation helps your managers become the leaders their teams need.
