A person can be taught the techniques of effective communication by an instructor and it then becomes the responsibility of the student to learn and apply that knowledge as they see fit. That takes accountability. From a coach's perspective people already know how to communicate. The difference here is that the coach will challenge the coachees to sharpen their communication skills to improve their awareness, approach and delivery. Is that the performance you desire? Therefore in communication, training is about teaching the techniques but coaching is about enhancing and sharpening that skill. Both of these are needed. At times, it seems that people do not appreciate that training is knowledge and process based. It is often too generalized to yield a very high return on investment. The retention of any training is questionable. I draw this from a statistic I was made aware of when I became an instructor and coach back in Austria. 20% retention is achieved in the classroom under instruction. If that training is then 32 accompanied with coaching, the long term retention rockets to over 80%. WHAT IS AN EFFECTIVE AND EFFICIENT SOLUTION It is easy to contract out a few days of training which would be an efficient approach, but is it effective? In a competitive economy does your team need to stack on more knowledge when they might be retaining an average of 20% of the content? Would it be more efficient to supply the ongoing motivation, support and direction that coaching can provide? COMMUNICATION CONSIDERATIONS Coaching on the other hand is about the ongoing interaction How can this all apply to our effective communication with customers to promote customer loyalty and retention, raise the company profile publicly, and generate more revenue? What action are you prepared to take to level up on communication to accomplish this?