A form of working with another person which is popular in large companies.  Most often a superior accompanies his employee (e.g. a sales representative)  for observation during his meetings with customers.  After the visit he gives his employee Feedback referring to the company’s sales standards (almost every company has certain standards which its employees should follow).  On this basis the superior creates certain developmental tasks for his employee, which he should then work on till their next visit in order to increase his effectiveness.

This form of Coaching is most often opposed to holistic coaching, where the process is a lot more complicated and changes take place at the system’s level.  The main differences are that in holistic coaching the Coach works within a wider context of change, searches for the reasons for certain Behaviour appearing, on Strategies, Values and beliefs.  In operational coaching we work mainly on the modification of Behaviour.

An additional difference is a much greater role of Feedback in operational coaching as opposed to holistic.  We can say that operational coaching relies on objective and neutral feedback.