Do you remember that we announced the launch of Asia Tomorrow Together, the Underdogs’ global coach training program last May? A company of its words, from July 1–4 we delivered our very first coach training online, with seven participants from three countries in Asia.
This full four-days training was delivered as Phase 1 of the overall coach training program, developed based on the Underdogs’ Social Innovation Startup Approach. In short, all seven participants successfully completed phase 1 and continued the training by joining us again for phase 2, which they participated as ‘coaches’ in the recent Underdogs Camping program.
Underdogs Global Coach Training Program
Underdogs Global Coach Training Program consists of three phases, which take about a year to fully participate and complete with certificates. As you can see in the diagram above, the completion of each phase will qualify the different levels of responsibilities and roles as a coach/facilitator. Upon the completion of phase 3, the most advanced level, the global coaches are qualified to design and deliver lectures and training programs, lead any R&D activities for upgrade and contextualization of training programs, and play the role of the Underdogs coach in their own context.
For our 2020 program, phase 1 and 2 have been designed as online courses, whereas Phase 3 is planned as f2f training delivered in Korea by the end of this year — yes, we have not yet given up on our hopes of the pandemic!
Meet the Seven Underdogs Global Coaches
Fortunately, some of them already had an understanding of our work and the 4-steps approach. For instance, Uyanga from Mongolia had participated in a workshop delivered by Underdogs, as a part of the Gender Innovation Award in Taiwan hosted by Impact Hub Taipei; Anh from Vietnam was the coordinator of our workshop with SK Sunny; Norby from the Philippines had joined Underdogs’ Asia Tomorrow Network in 2019 and has become our good partner ever since. However, even without any prior experience with us, the other participants were also ready to join the training with full preparation. Also considering that they all have full-time jobs and other responsibilities, our team at Underdogs was grateful that they had committed four full days.
Underdogs Coach for Startups — What You Need to Know
Our intention for Day 1 was to focus and emphasize the distinguishing features of our training program and its competencies, as well as to understand the potential for adaptation and application in a diverse context.
We started by sharing the Underdogs vision and mission, and how the new coaches will contribute and benefit from joining the Underdogs community of entrepreneurs and coaches. We also introduced the key performance of our work, with emphasis on how important and critical the roles of coaches are in every training.
As Underdogs coaches directly contribute to the ‘quality’, there are also ‘Dos and Don’ts’ that we share with all our coaches. Also, the coaches communicate the most with entrepreneurs and teams in training, it is important to keep in mind the key elements of ‘coaching’, especially in the entrepreneurial context. As the coaches facilitate the training sessions, it is important to make sure that their communication catalyzes dialogue and interaction with the entrepreneurs.
The Next session was on the Underdogs Social Innovation Startup Approach — probably the most solid content-based session for the participating coaches. The 4 Steps Approach is the result of Underdogs’ past five years of experience in working with about 8,000 individuals, starting from defining the problem to developing a business solution. In this session, the participants were introduced to the overall structure and the modules for each step for a deeper understanding of the approach.
A number of business cases from startup teams were presented as well, to provide sources for a clearer understanding on how the approach is applied to and support the developing process of an idea into a business. We wanted to make sure that the participants understand the approach completely, as it will be their main role to support the entrepreneurs with the approach during their idea and business development.
The last session of Day 1 was a sharing of Underdogs’ projects and customized training programs, using the 4 Steps Approach. Over the years of training diverse target groups with specific needs and/or objectives, our team discovered that our approach was not just for developing business, but more fundamentally, ‘developing problem-solving skills,’ leading the sustainability of the business and the solution.
Two examples were also presented — Underwomen for women entrepreneurs and Awwwake for nonprofit startups and organizations. Designed as a two-day workshop, Underwomen targets women with career experience and professional skills wanting to start their own business. In this case, the ‘problem’ was for them to identify and develop ‘market competent’ strength, as well as restoring their confidence as entrepreneurs.
For nonprofit startups and projects, ‘developing businesses’ was perhaps not the priority — ‘developing effective strategy for identifying and securing necessary resources for the project’ would be a better interpretation. Although a focused customization was required, with a balanced combination of problem defining and business development workshops Underdogs’ step-by-step approach proved to be effective in both cases.
Continued in Asia Tomorrow Together — Underdogs Global Coach Training #2
