Stop Managing Start Coaching, How to Grow Leaders & Empower Your Team

The call to stop managing start coaching is the single most important shift for any supervisor. Do you ever end your shift feeling like you did everyone else’s job? You double checked every reservation, rewrote the schedule, inspected rooms yourself, and even stepped in to handle a guest complaint that a team member should have managed. You are exhausted, and you wonder why your team just does not seem to get it.

For years, this was me. I believed my job as a supervisor was to be the ultimate quality controller. I was the safety net. Nothing got past me. My team knew it, and frankly, they started to rely on it. They would pause and wait for my approval before making even a simple decision.

I was not leading a team. I was managing a checklist and creating a group of dependents. I was stuck in a loop of control, and it was burning me out while suffocating my team’s potential. I was managing, but I was failing to lead.

Stop Managing Start Coaching, How to Grow Leaders & Empower Your Team

The Vicious Cycle of Micromanagement

The trap of the “controller” mindset is that it feels productive. By constantly intervening, you prevent small mistakes. This gives you a brief sense of accomplishment. The problem is, you are not solving problems. You are just postponing them.

When you fix every error, your team learns one simple thing: they do not need to. They stop taking ownership. Why risk making a mistake when the boss is just going to redo it anyway? Their critical thinking skills atrophy. They stop growing, and you become a permanent bottleneck.

This cycle is frustrating for everyone. You feel like you have to do everything yourself, and your team feels mistrusted and incompetent. This is the fast track to high turnover and low morale. Control does not create excellence. It only creates compliance.

What Coaching Actually Looks Like

Shifting from manager to coach felt unnatural at first. It required me to stop giving answers and start asking questions. When a front desk agent came to me with a guest issue, my old instinct was to say “Step aside, I’ll handle it.” My new response became, “I see. What do you think the best solution is?”

The first few times, they would freeze. They were not used to being asked. But I waited. I guided them. “What does the guest truly want? What power do you have to make this right?” We would talk through the options, and I would let them make the final call.

Coaching is not about abandoning your team. It is about investing in their competence. It is about trading five minutes of telling them what to do for fifteen minutes of teaching them how to think. This is a long term investment, not a short term fix.

The Surprising Result of Letting Go

The first time one of my “coached” agents handled a complex service recovery without me, it was a revelation. Not only did she solve the guest’s problem beautifully, but she came back to the desk beaming with pride. She owned that solution. She had grown in that moment.

Suddenly, I had more time. I was no longer putting out tiny fires all day. I could finally focus on the bigger picture. I could plan for the next month, analyze guest feedback for patterns, and develop new training initiatives. My team became more engaged, more confident, and more capable.

This is the paradox of hospitality leadership. The more control you give away, the stronger your operation becomes. Your team’s success is no longer dependent on your constant presence. You are not just running a shift; you are building future leaders.

Your New Job: Building People

Stop seeing your team as a set of hands to complete tasks. See them as individuals on a development path. Your job is not just to enforce standards. Your job is to be their guide. Ask them about their goals. Find out what part of the operation interests them. Give them a small project.

A manager controls the process. A coach builds the people. A manager is a critic, finding what is wrong. A coach is a guide, showing what is possible. This is the single most important shift a supervisor can make.

It is time to make a choice. You can keep controlling everything and remain the burned out, overwhelmed hero of your department. Or you can start coaching, and become the proud leader of a team that wins without you.

Which path will you choose today? What is one small way you can shift from answer provider to question asker with your team this week?

3 Key Takeaways

Managing is about controlling processes; coaching is about developing people’s judgment.
When you fix every mistake, you rob your team of the chance to learn and grow.
Asking “What do you think we should do?” is the most powerful tool a leader has.