5 Things Everyone Gets Wrong About Executive Coaching
At a certain level in leadership, everyone is smart, experienced and highly capable; those traits are no longer differentiators. Unfortunately, at this level, there are less supports for leaders who are struggling with an issue. Doubt shatters progress. More hours are not the answer.
At some point in a leader’s career, there may be an opportunity to hire an executive coach. Your organization may hire the coach but lately more individuals are hiring a coach themselves.
An executive coach is a qualified professional that works with individuals (usually executives, but also high performers) to help them gain self-awareness, clarify goals, advance to new roles, change industries, create better relationships, let go of something that holds them back, manage a difficult behavior, unlock their potential, achieve other developmental objectives, and act as a sounding board. They ask questions to help a leader clarify and resolve their own problems, some of which the leader may not even see.
What is Executive Coaching?
Coaching executives usually involves phases, starting with an initial meeting or call to evaluate the coachability of the coachee and if the coach is a good fit, an intake assessment, goal setting, and development planning for leadership skills such as interpersonal team building, and then progressing through the impact plan. This may involve instruction or executive coaching online training, one-on-one coaching, and continual access to the coach for support. The process is over when the development goals are achieved, when the agreed upon time frame has come, or when the coach and/or coachee decide that it should stop. The typical duration for a coaching engagement is between 3 to 9 months for individuals and seven and 12 months for organizations.
5 Things Everyone Gets Wrong About Executive Coaching
- It’s the responsibility of my organization to provide a coach for me. In an ideal world that would be nice. Let’s face it – your career development is your responsibility. Don’t wait for your company to make it theirs. Companies provide coaches for high performers. Generally, they don’t for anyone else. If you sense that you are not identified as an emerging leader, want honest feedback, have been passed over for promotion, don’t have the executive presence of your peers, feel stuck, act impulsively, or can’t get a great career role, a conversation with a coach is prudent. Another year, self-help or business book, failed interview, conference or complaining session with your spouse will not change the situation.
- If I need a coach there is something wrong with me. On the contrary. The highest performing individuals invite guidance from a management coach because it provides a third-party perspective on your actions. Coaching also teaches you to be a third-party observer of your own behavior so that you may not only identify what you have been missing but so you may begin to self-regulate in the moment. You show up differently and it matters.
- It’s the coach’s responsibility if I fail. Wrong. If you follow that line of thinking everyone that joins a gym should drop two sizes just by signing the contract. Your results will only be as good as your commitment to your own development. That means when the coach challenges you to do something between sessions or gives you an exercise to do and you don’t do it you are wasting your time and that of the coach. Be open and honest. Have humility. Your coach is your ally. When people make the commitment to hire a coach they usually realize they have wasted enough time hiding from the truth of their limiting beliefs, behaviors and results. They are eager to address what they can’t see, align their values in a plan, and develop routines that become habits of success with the reinforcement of the coach.
- I can’t afford an executive coach. You can’t afford not to have one! Money replenishes itself. Time does not. When you say, “I’ll do it next year” or “I have to wait until I get through (x),” that is just an excuse. It’s not that you don’t have the money. Of course you do. Often people don’t want to make the commitment or are afraid of the process and wait until they are miserable. By then so much time has been lost; so much money unearned; and so much happiness flitted away. Most people spend more on vacation than they will on a coach when the transformation of their lives and the strategies they learn will sustain them for their entire lives and the vacation photos rarely make it off the phone. Allow a job coach to help you develop the areas that hold you back so that you may get the promotion, use your transferable skills to position you for advancement, and have presence that commands attention. Just leave pride at the door.
- I’ll wait until I’m out of work to get a coach. I can’t tell you how many leaders reach out to me who are miserably unhappy in their jobs, are already on a performance improvement plan, or sense they are going to be terminated. It takes far longer to modify their mindset, behavior and results than if they had reached out before the doubt and low self-esteem took hold. Organizations send employees they’ve stereotyped as low performers subliminal messages of disapproval that cripple the ability to take risks and thrive. When someone carries this uncertainty in themselves their perceived under-performance usually becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. When the end finally comes, so goes their motivation. They are completely demoralized.
Mary Lee Gannon, ACC, CAE is an International Coach Federation certified executive coach and 18-year corporate CEO who helps leaders have more effective careers, happier lives and better relationships. Get her FREE Career and Life Planning Tool to be the leader everyone wants to work for. Success is freedom. Not more hours.
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