About Executive Coaching
The demands on executives and mangers are greater today than ever before. Rapidly evolving technology, the need to accomplish bigger goals with fewer resources and staff, and ever-present uncertainties in the economy can make working at the highest levels a high stress proposition. The good news is that you don't have to operate in a vacuum. Executive coaching offers you a confidential sounding board and a safe venue to sort out and solve your most challenging business and career issues.
Do any of the following scenarios apply to you?
- You're on your way to the top. To get there you need to leverage your strengths, talents, and connections more effectively.
- You feel like you keep bumping up against the same challenges and learning the same "lessons" over and over.
- You've received feedback that you have gaps in your leadership capabilities or "people skills."
- You are responsible for a team that needs to be motivated, encouraged, and more focused on their goals.
- You lead an organization that is in transition or on the brink of a culture shift.
- You are at a crossroads in your career and need clarity about what to do next.
- You are almost always pressed for time; there are never enough hours in the day.
If you see yourself in any of these descriptions, you may be a good candidate for executive coaching. By design, the coaching process helps mangers and executives achieve their potential as leaders, become more valuable to their organizations, and enjoy greater work/life balance. Through the coaching process, individuals learn how to identify and leverage their strengths, remove obstacles to success, identify new skills, improve interpersonal abilities, and set and achieve important goals.
Executive coaching is all about momentum and growth. It is for high performance individuals who are ready to do the work required to be their best and deliver their best to clients and customers, staff and teams, their organization and community, and to themselves and their families.
My Approach to Executive Coaching
To be effective, executive coaching must be customized to the role the leader holds within the organization, their level of authority and responsibility, the strengths they know they possess (so as to leverage those strengths) as well as to areas that need improvement. Executive coaching is results-focused and is often related to helping an individual become more effective in dealing with others – staff, teams they lead, other leaders within the organization, clients, and their community. Work-life balance often comes into play during the coaching process, as does time management, setting priorities and goals, and – of course – the concept of authenticity as it relates to being a leader in business. In coaching executives I draw on not only my many years of experience as a woman in business, but also on my intuition about organizational culture and how it impacts the individuals working within it.
The Benefits of Executive Coaching
- Identifying and narrowing gaps in skills, performance, and approach.
- Improved focus and clarity.
- Access to a confidential sounding board and unbiased feedback.
- Improved ability to deal with challenging people and situations.
- Accountability to create action plans and achieve goals.
- Developing flexibility while working within a corporate structure.
- Ability to maintain equilibrium during times of stress and change.
- Increased clarity about the direction of your career.
- Improved work/life balance.
- Create follow-up processes to turn emerging leaders into leaders that people choose to follow.
- Coach managers that are in the process of a mergers or acquisitions to ensure movement, focus and mobilization
- Create a mind set of agility within the structure during times of resistance
How Does Coaching Work?
First, you engage in an initial complimentary session to determine if executive coaching is indeed what you need – if it is a "good fit." At that point, if you are fairly certain you would benefit from coaching, a series of telephone sessions are scheduled at your convenience over a period generally lasting 6-12 months. Sessions tend to run about 45 minutes in length and are conducted weekly or bi-weekly, depending on the needs of the client. Between sessions you will mostly like have action steps to take and you may be in touch with your coach via e-mail.
If you feel that you (or someone in your organization) would benefit from executive coaching, contact me to arrange a complimentary, introductory coaching session today.