Procore named one of top five coaching cultures in the world

Authors: John McClure, Lisa O’Brien and Jeanne Smith

On July 16, the International Coach Federation (ICF) named Procore as one of only five finalists for their prestigious 2019 Prism Award. The award celebrates top-tier coaching programs that exemplify ICF’s exacting professional standards and display measurable impact on an organization’s key strategic goals.

So what does that mean? Why does it matter? And why is Procore committed to this investment over the long-term?

Coaching is a relatively new industry that has been maturing over the last 25 years. During that time, the ICF has been recognized the world over as the gold standard for ethics, competencies, and accreditation in the field. The Prism award is both prestigious and highly sought after because of the rigorous standards the ICF sets for coaching worldwide.

We like to say, “coaching is the new learning” and at Procore, giving every employee the opportunity to learn and develop as an individual and a leader is not only critical to our culture, but it’s also a real business advantage. But what is a coaching culture?

Coaching is the new learning.

John McClure, a co-founder of Procore’s internal Sr. Executive Coaching Team, says he first learned about the ‘coach approach’ under the expert tutelage of Pam McLean, CEO of the Hudson Institute of Coaching.

The coach approach teaches you to focus on a team’s growth instead of metric achievement, on their strengths instead of their weaknesses, and to be curious and listen to their perspectives and opinions — all to better grow your leaders.

To that end, we’ve focused on offering curiosity and listening skills trainings, in addition to 1:1 coaching engagements across the organization, at every level in every business vertical. Additionally, we currently have 18 leaders going through an ICF coaching certification program to help scale our coaching culture by bringing these tools and approaches to their teams. The results are increased engagement, empowered teams, meaningful conversations, collaborative solutions, and dynamic results.

Essentially a start-up when compared against our competitors for this year’s award — all major players in the coaching world — for Procore’s coaching program to be nominated for the Prism award is confirmation of the effort that has gone into building the program and speaks to the future impact this program can have inside and outside of Procore. In just under two years, Procore’s coaching culture has been acknowledged as one of the top five coaching programs in the world, and we are just getting started.

“18 months after its inception, and our coaching culture is coming together in a way that exceeds any vision I could have imagined,” says John. “Pinch, pinch, pinch -- is this real?”

Lisa O’Brien, the newest member of Procore’s internal Sr. Executive Coaching Team, joined the company for exactly that reason. For most of her career, Lisa has examined organizations to discover the gaps that exist between a company’s aspirational values and the reality of the employee experience.

Procore was a true surprise as I witnessed the aspired values being expressed and experienced so broadly inside the organization. I chose Procore because I believe we are on the cutting edge of creating the future of work culture and organizational development, and I am excited to be along for the ride!

There isn’t a singular path to a successful coaching culture as every company is different and requires its own special sauce. Our success lies in partnering with leaders that are hungry for growth and change at a company that truly believes having a world-class culture steeped in people development is a business differentiator.

Procore’s mission is to improve the lives of everyone in construction, a higher calling that makes people in the construction industry our first priority. Are you seeing a theme here? People first! It matters.

As the Coaching Culture Architect at Procore, Jeanne Smith relishes in this unique opportunity. “This is the best ride of my career, and I get to share it with the most extraordinary people! I’ll join John in the ‘pinch, pinch, pinch – is this real?’ club!”

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