Find the Right Coach: 9 Guidelines for ExecutivesLearn Management Articles on management-info.biz. Find the Right Coach: 9 Guidelines for Executives article will help answer your questions on Management Articles.We at management-info.biz specialize in Management Articles. Management Articles at management-info.biz provides the most up to date news and articles. If you have questions please do not hesitate to contact us.
Nine Guidelines for Executives It seems that coaches are everywhere these days. Senior Executives are hiring executive consultants in increasing numbers, and for a wider variety of reasons. In the past, coaching was viewed primarily as a remedial tool for executives whose careers were skidding. Today more and more leaders use coaches on a consultative basis, for everything from accelerating leadership transitions to facilitating board, shareholder and employee relations. Today’s leaders proactively seek coaching to build on strengths, accelerate initiatives and identify potential derailing obstacles before they cause serious damage While locating a coach may be as simple as asking a colleague or entering a few words in a search engine, finding the right one for your specific needs can be a bit more difficult. So how do you locate a coach with the right skills and expertise that match your needs? And once you get started how can you work with your coach to benefit the most from the experience? Over many years of working with senior executives, we have formulated 9 practical suggestions. To gain the most from your coaching experience, follow these guidelines: 1. Define your goals – What are your most immediate goals? What long-term results are you seeking? By considering your objectives in advance, you’ll more rapidly identify the best person to work with. Some common reasons why Executives seek coaching: ·accelerate career advancement ·increase leadership effectiveness ·increase senior management team effectiveness ·improve presentation and communication skills ·improve negotiation skills ·reduce stress ·enhance career transitions ·help gather and assimilate information for more objective decisions ·improve interpersonal and team relationships ·assist with crisis or change leadership ·help lead culture change ·enhance executive hiring decisions ·improve delegation and reduce time constraints ·plan retirement or the next career 2. Establish Rapport You want a coach who listens. The best coaches are objective and unbiased. They save insights and recommendations until they have listened, assessed and fully understood your situation. There’s no formula for assessing rapport in advance. And no credentials or testimonials will allow you to figure this out. You’ll get a “gut feeling” in your initial conversation or two whether this is the right collaborative relationship. If the feeling isn’t there, don’t make the assumption that things will get better over time… keep looking. 3. Be Yourself The right coach will help bring out your best, not try to change you into someone else. One sure way to recognize a poorly trained coach is if he or she recommends a categorical change based on a textbook standard. Experienced coaches can pinpoint specific areas where a small change can lead to a significant result. There’s no point in trying to become someone you’re not. You’ll squander precious energy and become less effective. The right coach won’t try to change you just for the sake of change. Find a coach who’ll help you be your best self. 4. Look for a positive focus A coach is there to help you improve your game, not to ferret out and fix every flaw. The best results are achieved by focusing on strengths, not weaknesses. Of course the right coach will help you identify and correct major stumbling blocks to progress. However, the primary focus should be maximizing your strengths, so that your weaknesses become irrelevant. 5. Confidentiality Is Key A sense of trust and safety is critical to a productive coaching experience. Coaching isn’t therapy, but you should feel comfortable revealing any relevant information to your coach. It’s not uncommon for personal issues to arise that are not entirely business-related, but affect outcomes for better or worse. Make sure your coach has a confidentiality policy with which you’re comfortable. 6. Look for Psychological Savvy While advanced degrees aren’t any guarantee of effectiveness, a psychologically informed coach can help you use interpersonal dynamics to finesse conflicts and reduce any negative impact on company performance. A good coach will be multifaceted – able to combine one-on-one coaching with effective team intervention as needed. Knowledge of both interpersonal and group dynamics is important to successful outcomes. 7. Establish a Schedule That Meets Your Needs At this point in your career you’ve probably attended more than your share of meetings. What you don’t need are more meetings to talk about theory. For the best use of your time and to capitalize on real-life situations, most senior executives benefit from coaching in real-time. Having a consultant available to work with you, onsite, is the best approach to getting the results you want. Find someone whose schedule fits into your needs. The best coach does little good if he or she is only available for phone calls. 8. Value Honesty The best coach isn’t afraid to tell you the things you need to hear Remember, the higher up you are in the company, the harder it is to get honest information. People around you have a vested interest in keeping you happy. Many of them may also fear a “kill the messenger” response. It’s easy for coaches with minimal training to fall into a trap of giving feel-good answers. After all they risk being fired if they give advice the client doesn’t like. Dr. Steven Berglas, former Harvard psychiatrist and instructor at UCLA’s Anderson school, explained in an interview with Chief Executive Magazine, “A lot of times consultants and coaches are deemed great because they’re adding syrup to a sundae. They just go along; they’re ‘gaysayers’ and proponents.” The CEO may feel good, but little progress is made. In fact, according to Berglas, an “alarming number” of coaches who lack psychological training hurt their clients more than they help them. Instead of looking for consensus, weigh your coach’s input before you make your own decision. After all, that’s what you’re paying for. 9. Give your coach access. Make it easy for your consultant to do his or her job. Allow ample rein to inquire, research, survey, whatever it takes to thoroughly understand the issues and, most importantly, get you the information you need. Locating the right coach for your needs can be tricky but these guidelines can increase your chances for success. They will help you launch an ongoing, beneficial partnership with your coach and keep it that way. With the right collaboration, you’ll find that you can significantly compress the time you need to achieve your most important goals. © 2005 Dr. Robert Karlsberg & Dr. Jane Adler
|
More Articles:1. Come Home Rich - How to Get the Most out of Your Next Conference Success in your career depends upon how well you manage your professional development. A prime source of this development comes from being a member of a professional association that relates to your career. As a member, you can attend conferences where you advance your skills and meet people who can help you.Some people, however, treat conferences as a paid vacation. They party, they skip sessions, and they return home with little more than a stack of receipts. That costs them (or their business… 2. Managers Who Spend PR $$ Wisely By Robert A. Kelly If you are a department, division or subsidiary manager, your budget is a precious possession whether you work for a business, a non-profit or an association. So why stand by while your public relations team spends too much time and treasure on tactics like press releases, column mentions and brochures? Especially when you could be using an aggressive PR blueprint to persuade your most important outside audiences to your way of thinking, then move them to take actions that lead to your success… 3. Success at Work : People Skills : Dealing with New Ideas By Stephen Bucaro Re-organizing, re-engineering, re-training, down-sizing, outsourcing, changing-changing-changing. Organizations today think they need to be constantly changing or they will perish. Corporate leaders worship at the alter of new ideas where the motto is, "Any new idea is a good idea".Every organization operates based on work-flow and processes. The reason the current processes are in effect is because over the years, many different ways of doing things have been tried, and the organization adapt… 4. How to Plan for More Time and Have Time for More Planning It is important to realize that the title of this article could have been written the other way around, and while at the surface it may seem as stating the same thing, this is the illusion that most people are deceived by and hence therefore are doing less with more, instead of more with less.Now let me clarify, this to another level. Most people complain about 'Well if I had more time, then I could really plan my days!' Yet this approach will never allow you to have that time, therefore no plan… |
||||
