Executive coaching is focused on top managers to help them clarify their goals, overcome obstacles and achieve higher performance. Along with the coach, a manager can take a broader look at the issues he deals with, and apply his new findings immediately to practice. This way of learning contributes to the development of leadership skills as well as the company's performance.
Most often, executive coaches can help when managers are going through a career change or when they need to improve in interpersonal communication, change management, strategic thinking, and conflict resolution. The secret for success is to identify a specific problem and focus on it.
If you would like to know why you personally or your employees need an executive coach, look at the following answers to this question recently published on Bizjournals.com.
1. You need an objective view
Company directors and other senior managers often lack honest opinions around them about where they can improve. Remember the Emperor's new clothes ... A coach will inform you about your bare bottom.
2. You need feedback
Top managers' colleagues and subordinates often do not talk about how good their leader is. However, where asked by a coach, they will be more open about the strengths and weaknesses.
3. You need a guide through self-reflection
An expert who knows what to ask, can guide your thinking about things that otherwise you would not think about.
4. You need an outside view
A coach who has worked with top managers in other companies can tell you what works for them and what does not.
In an earlier article, Forbes.com suggested what questions you should ask before finally deciding to hire an executive coach.
1. What value does the particular manager have for the company?
Executive coaching is time-consuming and costly. It should therefore be aimed at managers who play the most important roles in the current and future success of the company.
2. What problems are the manager facing?
An executive coach can help best in achieving changes in a manager's relationships and behavior. These may include both problems of effective self-management and leading of others. However, a coach is not a consultant who tells a manager what to do.
3. Is the particular manager interested in coaching?
A manager, to be coached effectively, must first of all want to change and develop. If he lacks the motivation to change, it is useless for his superiors or HR representatives to force him to go through coaching.
4. What other options we can try?
Coaching is not the only tool for the development of top managers. You can use training, mentoring, job rotations, assigning specific tasks, etc. Immediate supervisors often neglect to help in the development. This supervisor' responsibility can't be replaced by assigning even the best coach.
5. What do other key managers think?
Coaching works best when the manager being coached is supported by the people around him. If the other managers are skeptical or even opposed, it significantly reduces the chance of success.
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