Want a High-Performing Workforce? Coach Like an Athlete

In this month’s newsletter, I share how personalized, behavior-driven coaching, just like in elite sports, can unlock real performance improvement in the workplace. Before we dive in… 

Here’s my top-performing post on LinkedIn this month:

And ICYMI, check out our Enterprise AI Buyer’s Guide, which features downloadable templates and provides a practical framework to help leaders assess solution providers and make informed decisions that maximize return on investment. 

The Day I Saw My Performance in Real Time 

I’ve been swimming for years. For a while, I thought I was doing everything right: swimming steady, consistent laps, and pushing myself just enough to feel like I was improving. But the truth was, my performance was inconsistent, and I didn’t even realize it. 

Until I had a conversation about swimming with Brian Snyder of CellularSales, one of our strategic customers and an amateur swimmer himself, who told me about FORM smart goggles. These augmented reality goggles project real-time performance metrics—including swim distance, pace, and heart rate—directly onto the lens, allowing swimmers to adjust their performance as they train. 

Intrigued, I bought a pair. The impact was immediate. With performance tracking, real-time feedback, and achievement recognition, I improved my pace and saw tangible progress. Also the High-Intensity Interval Training (HIIT) method greatly helped me improve my stamina. 

That’s when it clicked: this was gamification in action. It made me realize that most employee engagement programs operate like my old swimming routine—slow, repetitive, and lacking the real-time insights needed for meaningful improvement. After all, high-performance athletes don’t train that way, and neither should your employees. 

What Elite Athletes Know About Performance (That Most Companies Don’t) 

More recently, FORM launched a new set of premium coaching features, which changed the game once again. The system analyzed my swim and revealed that to improve my performance, I had to change a set of behaviors, such as my breathing technique. It measured behaviors such as: 

• Head Pitch: the angle at which you look up or down while swimming with your face in the water. You should aim for 30-37 degrees. 

• Peak Head Roll: the maximum angle of the side-to-side roll of your head when breathing. The lower, the better. 

• Time-to-Neutral: the percentage of your breath time spent returning to neutral after you inhale. 

Think about it: If you focus only on the outcomes—such as speed and distance—without addressing the behaviors that drive them, you won’t get far. You can say “swim faster,” but the real question is, “how?” 

The same applies to your team’s performance: if you focus only on their KPIs without addressing the underlying behaviors driving those results, performance is unlikely to improve much. 

Performance Isn’t Just About Metrics. It’s About Behaviors 

Too often, organizations track high-level performance metrics while overlooking the underlying behaviors driving them. But metrics alone don’t create change! Targeted behavioral adjustments, however, do. 

Let’s consider two contact center-specific examples. 

Example: Low Sales Conversion Rate 

If a contact center agent is struggling to meet her sales conversion KPI, she can't be expected to improve purely by seeing her missed target. Asking someone to sell more is not enough. They must understand the behavior driving their performance gap. In this case, the agent may not be consistently asking probing questions to uncover customer needs. Without targeted feedback and coaching, she’s likely feeling unsuccessful, disengaged, and unmotivated. 

The solution? Shadow call coaching, simulations, and gamified challenges will help her learn and practice effective sales techniques, such as asking the right questions at the right time. 

Example: Low Customer Satisfaction (CSAT) Score 

If an agent’s CSAT score drops, the root cause could be a lack of active listening or empathy during customer interactions. In this case, targeted actions might include AI-driven coaching on listening skills, role-playing exercises to practice empathy, or a gamified challenge focused on using positive language. 

By linking performance insights to behavior-driven coaching, organizations can create meaningful improvements beyond numbers. 

From Data to Action: How Behavioral Coaching Changes the Game  

Just like FORM goggles analyze my breathing and provide guided training to correct it, frontline managers need data-driven coaching insights to help employees improve their skills. 

With AI-powered performance management and coaching, companies can: 

✅ Pinpoint behavioral gaps that impact performance. 

✅ Deliver personalized coaching targeted to specific needs instead of generic training. 

✅ Measure the impact of behavior changes over time. 

Instead of broad training sessions that don’t stick, coaching can be precise, data-driven, and action-oriented. 

And, of course, gamification is key to addressing those coveted behavioral changes! 

Stop Swimming in Circles. Start Training to Win. 

The day I started identifying my weaknesses and correcting my technique, my swimming performance transformed. 

The same holds true in the workplace—tracking metrics alone won’t drive improvement. The real question is: What behaviors need to change to achieve better results? By focusing on behavior-driven coaching, organizations can turn insights into action, helping employees improve faster, smarter, and with lasting impact.

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