How can feedback help tailor a leadership development coaching program to a specific industry?

360 degree feedback is critically important to developing leaders in the law. Lawyers typically receive little meaningful feedback on their leadership capabilities. My experience is that hearing insights from colleagues, juniors who report to them, and senior lawyers helps them identify effective leadership behaviors and spot issues that may derail their leadership efforts. As a coach, it is difficult to help leaders understanding their overall impact without hearing from those around them. For many people I've coached, receiving 360 feedback is the first time they have gained these insights into their relationships and overall effectiveness.

In my opinion, feedback serves as a valuable guide for customizing a leadership development coaching program to a specific industry, ensuring that it is tailored, relevant, and impactful for the leaders within that particular business environment. We have to be mindful of our audience every time we attempt to coach anyone.

Generally speaking, feedback is a good extra tool. However, it’s important to remember that the feedback experience isn’t culturally relevant to all parts of the world. So, as a coach you need to read your client in cultural context before proceeding with any path forward. And be careful of falling into the “coach plan” mindset — if you’re coaching well the mindset plan needs to come from the client and the coach need to inquire, support, guide. You’re a coaching caddie not a coaching counsellor!

I find that many miss a critical piece of feedback before they start coaching a person and that is behavioral data. Behavioral data of the leader you are coaching, behavioral data of that leaders - leader and of the team under the leader. Without that insight into the behavioral hard wiring of the leader, you will miss often miss the mark on how to best support their success moving forward. I often say, we can't see the picture when we are in the frame so using science backed data + leaders assessment + real time peer and team data starts to give us a clearer picture of where to start.

Como coach ejecutiva, aprecio la invaluable fuente de información que proporciona la retroalimentación antes de iniciar un proceso de coaching. Este enfoque basado en datos profundos me permite analizar a fondo las fortalezas y áreas de mejora de cada líder, permitiendo una personalización precisa del programa según las necesidades únicas de la industria a la que pertenece. Además, establece una base sólida para medir el progreso y asegurar resultados significativos tanto al coachee como a la organización. La retroalimentación previa al coaching se convierte así en un aliado estratégico esencial para potenciar el liderazgo de manera efectiva y adaptada al entorno específico de cada coachee.

Coaching plans need to be flexible. Why? Because people are dynamic. If you meet a coach who never changes, they may not be the best for you. You want someone who can adapt to the changing world.

By collecting feedback from the leader and other stakeholders regularly, you can track how they are moving towards their goals and objectives. You can also measure the outcomes of your coaching interventions and see if they are achieving positive changes or results. This can help you to evaluate your effectiveness as a coach and make adjustments if needed. Feedback helps you to determine the areas which need improvement. By asking for feedback from the leader and other stakeholders, you can identify any gaps or discrepancies between what the leader thinks they are doing well and what they actually need to work on. You can also find out what skills, behaviors, or strategies are missing or ineffective in their current situation.

When we aren't asking questions as a coach, we should be giving feedback —?feedback on how things might be sounding, how the coachee is responding to what you are asking them. This is all about raising their (self-)awareness and should be welcomed by a coachee. If it isn't, there's work to be done!

Receiving feedback is a skill that not everyone has fully developed. So it is especially important to handle evaluations, especially 360 evaluations, with emotional intelligence, sensitivity and care. When receiving unexpected constructive feedback, leaders may experience a range of emotions and responses, such as: surprise or shock, which may in turn trigger curiosity or confusion, and ultimately acceptance or denial. While these responses are normal, they can interfere with feedback being taken in, understood, integrated, and acted on. For this reason, leadership development professionals may carefully manage the timing and delivery of 360 results to facilitate genuine receptivity, understanding, learning and adoption.

Employ an evolving feedback mechanism. The nature of feedback should adapt as the leader's skills develop. This dynamic approach ensures that the coaching remains pertinent to the leader’s advancing capabilities and the ever-changing demands of their sector.

Focus on how the leader has applied their newfound skills in real-world industry scenarios. Assess their ability to integrate coaching insights into day-to-day operations, particularly how they navigate industry-specific challenges and leverage opportunities.

Any change requires constant effort to embrace and carry out the new changes. Coaching is similar, where the coachee needs to carry on his / her efforts in ensuring that these new changes are incorporated in their working and that they don’t go back to old ways.

After coaching, feedback becomes the compass guiding refinement. Collect insights on program effectiveness, relevance to industry demands, and individual growth. Analyzing post-coaching feedback is akin to mining gold—extracting valuable nuggets to enhance future programs. Whether it's tweaking modules, incorporating industry-specific case studies, or adapting coaching techniques, post-coaching feedback molds the program into a bespoke tool for leadership development within that specific industry. It's a continuous loop of improvement, ensuring each coaching experience becomes more impactful and aligned with industry needs.

Feedback helps in shaping the perspective and understanding how the future programs should be curated. Feedback hence is a potent tool. The individual taking the feedback should be aware of how the program is run and who are the key stakeholders.

Feedback is essential to grow as a leader to ensure your intent and impact are aligned. Misalignment is a crack in the foundation of your leadership. That crack intensives the higher you move up and the broader your influence base. Here are two points for consideration: 1). It is very difficult to rise without someone to help you manage the terrain. 2). You must have self-awareness to successfully grow as a leader. In my experience these two concepts are not always easily adopted in the power dynamics of leadership. This is why leadership development is an evolution process for each individual, regardless of the available resources. Behavior change requires 2 things, willingness and capability. The test of time determines both.

Receiving feedback from colleagues and mentors is essential for gaining a comprehensive understanding of your leadership strengths and areas for improvement. The manner in which one solicits this feedback can greatly influence its quality. In my experience, approaching others with humility and a sincere desire to learn can significantly enhance the value of the feedback received. I often observe that authenticity in leadership is a key factor in obtaining useful information, data, and feedback. The nature of relationships with peers can also impact the level of candor in discussions and the degree of trust between parties. If these elements are lacking, there's a substantial risk of falling into the pitfalls of politics in the workplace.

When you're looking for feedback to develop a leadership coaching program keep in mind that feedback should yes, come from peers, but also people above and below you. Peers, hands down give the most critical feedback. You will need a well-rounded picture of feedback from various sources.

Encourage a collaborative feedback loop within the industry. Peers and mentors can offer unique insights into industry-specific trends, challenges, and solutions, providing a broader perspective that enriches the leader’s understanding and approach.

Feedback from peers and mentors serves some critical purposes: 1. It allows a client to see their strengths and not just rely on assessments or a managerial take. Strengths present differently with peer, mentors, and mentees because clients interact differently with each group. This gives the client more positives to leverage as they pursue areas of growth. 2. Feedback from a variety of people may also unveil biases in leadership. If the relationship between the coachee and manager is strained or difficult (potentially why you were hired), it helps the coach identify the issues as relational/communicative than merely individual growth.

Gauge the leader’s external impact. Feedback from customers and partners should be utilised to assess how well the leader is meeting external expectations and adapting to market demands, particularly focusing on customer satisfaction and partnership dynamics.

The lifeblood of any organization are the consumers of their products and the partners that make the product possible. Performance based results are based on a 360 view. Those parameters are the company, its customers and partners, it is an inclusive model. Companies must have a process of cyclical feedback to ensure they are looking at performance from every angle. This will help to mitigate blind spots, and false narratives of performance. The bottom line is that companies that are committed to open and honest communication between their partners and customers foster a healthy relational dynamic that will help to elevate them as market leaders and create a loyal consumer base.

Feedback is a shield not a sword. 1.Continuous Improvement:Feedback propels leaders on an ongoing journey, fostering adaptability and sustained effectiveness in leadership roles. 2. Self-awareness Catalyst:Feedback acts as a mirror, cultivating a crucial foundation of self-awareness for effective leadership by providing insights into strengths and areas for improvement. 3.Customized Leadership Development:Feedback guides coaches in tailoring programs to leaders' unique needs, ensuring finely tuned, industry-relevant development initiatives. 4. Feedback Culture for Engagement:Leaders fostering a culture of continuous improvement enhance employee engagement through open communication and valuing constructive input.

Establish a culture of perpetual learning and adaptation. Continuous feedback should be a cornerstone, fostering a mindset that encourages ongoing personal and professional growth, crucial for thriving in a constantly evolving industry landscape.

Feedback is the lifeblood of continuous improvement in leadership development coaching programs. It serves as a dynamic tool, allowing us to gauge the effectiveness of strategies employed. By actively seeking feedback from participants, we uncover nuances specific to their industry challenges. This input becomes the catalyst for refining content, adjusting methodologies, and tailoring the program to better align with the unique demands of their professional landscape. In essence, feedback isn't just a response; it's the heartbeat of evolution in leadership coaching, ensuring our programs are always at the forefront of industry relevance.

Feedback is the one tool we have to accurately assess where we are in our leadership effectiveness. Continuous feedback, which can be considered a culture of feedback is typically the marking of a healthy culture. The key to effective leadership is self awareness, which holds true to any trait you want to cultivate. Without self-awareness, it is impossible to have accountability, and without accountability it is difficult to improve performance.

The Observation, Impact, Listening, and Solutions plus strategy (OILS) framework is used to nurture a feedback culture. The real magic happens when managers engage employees on the root causes of past challenges and create a path forward focused on the underlying skills required for success.

One of the ways to have a great coaching experience for the coaches is to get feedback from them and their direct reports, to understand, realign and redesign, such that they get an impactful session that wld serve them and the team.

Our goal as coaches should be to promote a culture of feedback centered around growth and continuous improvement. We should live by this standard if we want to nurture this in our coachees. Always work on improving relationships and rapport and give your coachees the same tools. Then emphasise that feedback is about being EVEN BETTER, not about the gaps and failures. And make sure your coachee starts to adopt the same language. The difference in an organization from this simple shift is remarkable.

I have found asking for and being open to feedback at all stages is key. Before: to understand “their” expectations. During: to see if you need to tweak immediately or for next time. After: Understanding what went well, where you can do better, and what needs to be added or addressed. The key is asking and making the time for the participants to provide the feedback.

Make sure that the leadership development coach you are hiring has relevant experience in your industry and role. Just last night I was talking with someone who was a leader forced into leader training by the leaders above him that was so off the mark. The training was good, but it was clear that the coaches didn't really understand the roles and responsibilities of the leaders they were hired to coach, so it missed the mark. You have to make sure that they don't just have "good content" but the coaches need strong context "real life experience" in the industry and role of the people they are hired to coach.