What is a Kata Skill Week? | Continuous Coaching Commitment

Organizational development is a laudable but frequently elusive goal; the best companies do not leave this success factor up to chance. Continuous Coaching Commitment’s Kata skill week is a tailor-made experience that is delivered on-site at our client companies. It can be held over the course of anywhere from three to five days and offers employees the chance to think more deeply about the organization’s goals, methods, and trajectory, as well as how they are personally contributing to these efforts.

Starting Strong

The first and most fundamental part of a kata skill week is setting out the purpose of the program. This segment challenges participants to think beyond the structures, rules, and strategies they have been taught and to come up with conclusions about why these guidelines exist. After this, the company will create their processes and learn how to deploy them depending on their visions. Establishing these core concepts early on (before any real work is done) makes it easier for the processes to be put in practice and for the outcomes of such to be assessed.

Applying Kata Concepts

After these basics have been explored, the Kata skill week will move on to more complex concepts. This is the point where the Improvement Kata comes into play and is used to create a customized Kata Storyboard. These are the actions which will be taken to ensure the improvement of the company. Like a conventional storyboard, they are arranged in a sequence of events that cannot be rearranged or altered in any way; one must go through all four steps in the prescribed order to create the desired effect. These steps are, in order:

  • Understanding the direction the organization is moving in – where you want to go
  • Understanding the current conditions – where things are, for better or worse
  • Setting the next target condition – what you need to do in order to get closer to the goals you’ve set
  • Moving toward the target condition – how you will achieve the result you’ve described above

With these steps, a company can formulate an action plan to ensure that it becomes the powerhouse entity it wants to be.

Passing the Knowledge Along

The next step is the Coaching Kata or the process of learning how to teach what was learned during the Kata skill week to others. To do this, participants learn to break down the Improvement Kata into five key questions that differ slightly in format from what they previously learned in the prior days. These five Kata questions are:

  • What is the target condition?
  • What is the actual condition?
  • What obstacles do you think you will face preventing you from reaching the target? Which particular obstacle are you working on now?
  • What is your next step? What do you expect?
  • How quickly can we go and see what we have learned from taking that step?

By reviewing and carefully examining these questions and the multiple ways to answer them under the guidance of a Master Kata coach, participants eventually reach a level of mastery that permits them to instruct others. If you want to ensure that your employees are actively and thoughtfully contributing to the development of your organization, the Kata skill week is a highly effective, time-tested way to accomplish it.

 

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