How To: Build Coaching Templates Every Team Can Use (A Guide for Admins)

Your managers already coach in Ambition. They schedule Sessions, work through agendas with their reps, and walk in with a Pre-Read. As an admin, the question is how much of that should look the same from one team to the next.

Coaching templates are where you, the Ambition Admin, answer it. A template sets the agenda, the instructions managers see, who can use it, and the metrics and ratings you'll track later in Coaching Analytics. Build it once, and every Session created from it starts in the same place.

8 Steps to Build a Coaching Template

1. Open the Templates tab

Go to Coaching → Manage, select the Templates tab, and click + Template. The form has five sections: Details, Managers, Agenda, Attribution Metrics, and Rating Categories.

2. Name it for the conversation it supports

The Name is what managers pick from a dropdown when they create a Session, so name it after the conversation, like "Call Review" or "New Hire 30-Day Check-In." Add a Description, and if the template has one clear purpose, write it in Objective.

3. Decide how much managers can change

This is the biggest choice you'll make, and you can't change it once the template is open.

• Locked: Managers can add their own items, but they can't edit or remove yours. When you update the template, the change reaches active Sessions built from it.
• Unlocked: The agenda is a starting point. Managers can edit, remove, or add items, and your later updates only apply to new Sessions.

Use Locked for anything you want consistent across the org, like a certification or a call review. Use Unlocked when managers need room to make it their own.

4. Write instructions for the coach

Coaching Instructions are for managers only. Employees never see them, and managers can collapse the section when they share their screen. Use it for the context a new manager would need: what to listen for, what good looks like, and where to find resources.

5. Choose which managers can use it

In the Managers section, open the template to all managers or pick specific ones. A template for one team or one program shouldn't clutter everyone else's dropdown.

6. Build the agenda

Choose whether the agenda is for an individual or a group, then add items. Individual agendas can use Questions, Metric Snapshots, Feedback, Polls, Gong and Zoom calls, and more. Group agendas support Content Block and Embed Media only. Mark each item required or optional. You need at least one required item to save.

For a closer look at each item type, see How To: Build Coaching Agendas That Make Every 1:1 Count.

7. Add attribution metrics and ratings

Both sections are optional, but they're what make the template measurable. Attribution Metrics let you track up to 10 metrics against programs built from the template. Ambition compares each week to a four-week baseline, so pick metrics you measure weekly, not monthly or quarterly. Rating Categories let you track Session quality, and you can add or remove them later.

These feed Coaching Analytics, so this is where you set up the question "is this coaching working?" before anyone asks it.

8. Save and open

Click Save, then Save and Open if it's ready, or Save as Draft if it isn't. Managers can't use a draft until it's open.

What you need: The Coaching: Create Template or Coaching: All Access permission. Metric Snapshot items need the Coaching: Metric Snapshot Item feature, Gong and Zoom items need those integrations turned on and authorized, and Rating Categories need the Coaching: Check-in Ratings feature under Administration → Features.

Keeping templates current

A template isn't done once it's open. Coaching priorities shift, and the agenda should shift with them.

Edit: Go to Coaching → Manage → Templates, click the ellipses on the template, and choose Edit. On an open template, click Update Template to save. If it's Locked, Ambition tells you how many active Sessions will get the new agenda before you Confirm. You can change almost everything except the Locked or Unlocked setting.

Duplicate: Need a version for a different team or a new program? Click the ellipses and choose Duplicate. The copy shows up as a draft named "[Template Name] - Copy," ready for you to adjust and open.

Start from an example: If you'd rather not start from a blank page, Ambition has a set of example coaching templates built by sales leaders for SDR, BDR, and AE teams.

Tips for building templates managers will use

• One template, one conversation. A Call Review and a weekly 1:1 have different jobs. Give each its own template, not one long agenda that tries to do both.
• Keep the required list short. Required items should be the things you'd want in every Session. Make everything else optional.
• Lock what needs to be the same. If leadership will compare results across teams, lock the agenda so everyone answers the same questions.
• Set up measurement on day one. Attribution metrics added at the start give you a clean baseline. Added later, you've lost the before.

Start with one template this week

Pick the conversation your managers have most often, whether that's a weekly 1:1 or a call review, and build a template for it. Decide what has to stay the same, lock it if needed, and add one or two attribution metrics so you can see whether it's working.

When managers start from the same place, coaching gets easier to run and easier to measure.