Learning the Craft: The Value of Coaching in Public Policy
Regular coaching by senior policy writers plays a critical role in building capability and confidence among less experienced staff. Through structured coaching conversations, emerging policy advisors gain insight into how experienced practitioners analyse complex issues, balance evidence and risk, and craft clear, well-reasoned advice for Ministers and stakeholders. This accelerates learning beyond formal training and helps newer staff develop sound judgement, stronger writing skills, and a deeper understanding of the organisation’s quality standards and expectations.
The impact on the quality of policy advice is significant. Coaching supports consistent application of best-practice policy frameworks, clearer problem definition, and more persuasive and concise writing. Less experienced writers are better able to anticipate questions, test assumptions, and refine their advice before it reaches decision-makers. Over time, this results in fewer rework cycles, stronger peer review, and advice that is timely, robust, and aligned with the Ministry’s strategic objectives.
What’s the difference between coaching and mentoring?
There are no hard and fast distinctions between coaching and mentoring in organisations but in general, coaching is focussed on helping people to be more effective in their current role and develop the skills and capabilities they need to thrive and excel. It has both a personal and practical elements to it and works best if it is driven by the learning needs of the person being coached. Mentoring has a broader, longer term development focus. It is helping people do what they need now to best achieve their longer term goals and aspirations. A mentor usually has some distance from the day to day performance of the person being mentored and the confidentiality within the process provides the privacy for significant conversations to take place.
Benefits beyond the practicalities
Regular coaching also contributes positively to retention, engagement, and job satisfaction. When senior staff invest time in coaching, it signals commitment to professional growth and creates a supportive learning culture. Less experienced policy writers report greater confidence, a stronger sense of belonging, and clearer pathways for development. For senior policy writers, coaching reinforces leadership capability and professional pride. Collectively, this strengthens workforce engagement and helps the organisation retain skilled policy practitioners in a competitive labour market.
It’s got to be good value for time
Coaching and mentoring skills are therefore essential competencies for senior practitioners who have a role to play in developing the capability of less experienced analysts entering the profession. The ability of senior analysts to support and develop others is as important as their own technical expertise, ensuring the long-term sustainability and effectiveness of the policy workforce.
The New Zealand Coaching & Mentoring Centre has been running workshops for a number of public sector organisations this year to ensure senior policy analysts and advisors have the skills to coach and mentor others. Our practical Coaching & Mentoring Skills workshop covers some very simple tools and skills that ensure coaching provides great value for time. The workshop is designed to help people shift from a ‘checking and correcting’ to a coaching mindset by ‘using more ask than tell’. Fixing, solving and advising provides short term benefits. Helping people develop their craft is a longer term aim. Investing time in developing others is a challenge in a high demand environment where results and deadlines rule but it needs to be given the priority it deserves if senior leaders value engagement, quality and workforce development.
Recent assignment: Building Coaching Capability in a Government Policy Environment
The Ministry for the Environment approached us recently with a clear objective: to strengthen the capability of policy advisors, senior policy advisors and leaders to use coaching more intentionally when supporting less experienced staff. Following an initial briefing with the senior leadership team, it became evident that the quality of policy advice depended not only on technical expertise but also on how effectively experienced staff transferred their knowledge to others. In a specialist field where much of the learning comes from experience, coaching was recognised as an essential way of accelerating development. This was particularly important in an organisation with many remote and hybrid workers, where informal learning opportunities and spontaneous peer support are less available. We designed and delivered a series of customised, online Coaching and Mentoring Skills workshops for around 70 advisors over a 4 month period, together with three Leaders as Coaches programmes for leaders. Recognising the pressures of a demanding policy environment, the workshops were deliberately designed as intensive, half-day sessions that delivered immediate value. Participants left with practical coaching tools they could apply immediately, while also benefiting from discussions with colleagues facing similar challenges. These conversations enabled participants to exchange practical approaches, explore what was working in their own teams, and translate the intention to coach into everyday practice. The result was a stronger coaching culture that supported the development of less experienced policy writers and contributed to improving the quality and consistency of policy advice across the organisation.
The workshops were well received and evaluation comments from participants included
“Pithy and applicable content for people short on time. Very valuable.”
“The key benefit of this course is to be able to quickly learn an approach that is also fast to implement and works for less experienced coaches.”
