The 9 Questions To Ask When Hiring An Executive Leadership Coach

Does anyone like being taken advantage of?

Hiring an executive coach or executive leadership can be a daunting prospect. It is a position of trust that requires experience and skill, yet with such low barriers to entry - and possibly some great marketing spin - it can be hard to identify the good from the bad (to the downright foolhardy!)

These 9 simple questions will help you identify the good from the bad, the amateur from the professional, the executive leadership coach worth paying for compared to the one that is an expensive waste of time. If you are talking or engaging a coach that can’t answer these 9 questions effectively – walk away! There are plenty of highly effective executive leadership coaches who can – and you deserve to work with someone that can back up what they say with action.

Question 1: Do you have a coach yourself? (Highly Effective Coaches Have a Coach Themselves)

Do you have a coach yourself? If the answer is no – walk away. That person:

• believes they have learnt everything there is to know in coaching (they don’t),
• doesn’t believe in their product,
• is more interested in selling the services than living the services,
• has forgotten what it is like to be coached,
• has stopped striving and learning in their profession.

Is that who you want to work with? Work with the coach who has a coach themselves. They:

• believe in the product they are selling,
• are still seeking to learn and grow, irrespective of experience,
• know what it is like to be coached,
• clearly knows the feeling of being held to account and vulnerable with another person from both sides.

In an industry full of slick marketers, bold promises and low barriers to entry, look for the person who has a coach themselves and believes in the process.

Question 2: Are you an Accredited Coach?

A Credible Executive Leadership Coach Is Accredited. The?International Coaching Federation (ICF)?is the international governing body for coaching – and they have 3 levels of accreditation – Accredited Certified Coach (ACC), Professional Certified Coach (PCC) and Master Certified Coach (MCC). While you don’t have to be working with an MCC level coach, you should at least work with someone who has the ACC. As a minimum, the person has then had their coach recordings assessed by another certified coach, and they will have completed over 150 hours of coach training and done more than a 100 hours of coaching (for ACC – higher again for the higher levels).

Not only do you get someone who has completed some significant hours as a coach when you choose someone accredited, you also ensure that they have signed up to the coaching industries code of ethics and conduct.

Why Work With An Accredited Coach?

Working with an accredited Executive Leadership Coach has a number of benefits.

They:

• are invested in professional development themselves, and will most likely respect your investment in doing the same,
• are still seeking to learn and grow, irrespective of experience,
• are likely not a ‘part time’ coach – this is their job and they want to attain high professional standards,
• have been assessed and reviewed by someone else (the ICF) to verify their basic coaching standards,
• have signed up to a professional code of ethics and conduct, and
• have had at least 2 recorded coaching sessions pass a peer and have completed at least 10 mentor hours with an accredited coach themselves.

Question 3: What is your experience as a Leader? A Credible Executive Leadership Coach Is An Experienced Leader

For all of the learning and reading a person has done, nothing can substitute having experience in a leadership role – making decisions, counselling / coaching and performance managing team members, holding other accountable for results, setting a clear vision – all of the things that you have to do as a leader.

It is also worth asking the types of teams and industries that the coach has experienced leadership in – does the experience they have compliment what you are looking to develop in your leadership skills? As a member of a team, a leader or a supervisor, you will have learnt that not every team is the same. Some teams (and businesses) are a dream to work with, and others take all of your skill and effort just to keep them on the straight and narrow.

Effective Leadership Coaches Have Made Mistakes

A credible executive leadership coach will have multiple leadership experiences leading teams, and be able to discuss freely and openly the mistakes that they made, how they recovered from them and what they learnt in the process. Any leadership coach that is unwilling to discuss their failures isn’t worth working with – because we have ALL made mistakes and done things we wish we could do over – and have subsequently learnt from.

I know that some of the best practical tools and tips that I have shared with my clients (and they have responded positively to) are those that were borne out of mistakes, and a desire to never repeat them. Both the?Team Expectations Checklist?and the?AIR/BLEEDS model?for personal responsibility came from seeking to correct mistakes with my team – and make a huge difference now.

What Questions Should I Ask?

Ask:

• ‘What experience have you had leading a team?’
• ‘What industries have you worked in and for how long?’
• ‘What was your toughest experience as a leader managing people?’
• ‘What was the biggest or most embarrassing mistake you made as a leader?’
• ‘How have your leadership experiences shaped your leadership style?’

A credible and experienced leadership coach should be able to provide you with solid, concrete examples of how they have led teams, the number of people they have led, and the impact that their leadership had upon the teams they were working with.

Question 4: What is your own Coaching style?

Developing Leaders coaches all bring their own style to the coaching process – which could include transformational coaching, ontological coaching or other backgrounds. Key for all coaches is the ability to apply executive leadership coaching – often a blend of coaching and training focussed on leadership skills, gaps and development, as well as executive coaching – focussed on adapting to the client need at the time working with them to provide further understanding of a problem or developing a solution.

While the nuances between coaches styles is more a discussion for the coaches, the key take-away is that an executive coach should have their own style of coaching that has been developed through experience, multiple clients and multiple circumstances.

What Questions Should I Ask?

Ask:

• ‘What models do you use to aid your coaching?’
• ‘Can you outline the type of lessons / learning we can cover?’
• ‘Have you written your own models / lessons from experience?’

Listen to how they discuss their work and consider the following questions for yourself:

• ‘Does this sound like it will aid in my development as a leader?’
• ‘Will this person’s style compliment my own’

A credible and experienced leadership coach should be able to provide you with solid, concrete examples of their coaching style, how it changes depending on the client they are working with, and what they have noticed is more or less successful with their clients.

Question 5: Who else would you recommend?

If you are a great executive leadership coach, you know other great leadership coaches. More than that, you know them well enough to recommend them when you know that you aren’t the best fit for a client.

An effective leadership coach knows that they don’t appeal to everyone’s style and that fit is important. An effective coach in the industry will personally know several other effective leadership coaches of different styles that they can refer you to. Anyone that can’t is looking more for the sale and less for your welfare and development.

There are two very simple yet powerful questions that Developing Leaders Executive Coaches ask potential coaching clients to consider before the engage our services. They are:

• Do you want to undertake executive coaching (or leadership coaching) with us?
• Would you like to complete that coaching process with me?

Importantly, they are two distinct questions. Not every coach, nor every coaching provider, is the right fit for everyone looking for coaching. If a potential client doesn’t want to complete executive coaching with an IMLD, we can refer them on to some amazing executive coaches both in Melbourne and in other capital cities in Australia and South East Asia (in fact, in many parts of the world!)

In addition, while someone may love our?Velocity Leadership CheckPoint?and the leadership coaching that has been outlined, the individual coach may not be the best fit – perhaps the client is looking for someone with different experience, a different outlook, a different way of holding to account or even a different gender. The key is – it is the client choice and the fit of coach and client is important.

What Questions Should I Ask?

Ask:

• ‘If you aren’t my best fit as a coach, who else would you recommend and why?’

A credible and experienced leadership coach should be able to provide you with several options of excellent leadership coaches who they would recommend. As all of the IMLD Executive Coaches also have a coach themselves – and have changed coaches multiple times depending on circumstance and need – we have many recommendations of coaches we can attest to through personal experience.

Question 6: What recommendations and success stories do you have?

This question seeks to get past the fancy website and the sales pitch. An effective executive leadership coach will have dozens of recommendations from previous clients that are happy with the work that was completed, and even happier to tell others about it. Look to the person’s website for testimonials and see what they have said about the process, where they started and what they learned. Look up some of the testimonial names on LinkedIn – are they real people in leadership roles? Do they work for the person ? (I know, yet several coaches I sought for myself had a small number of reviews, and those were from peers, not clients). Look up the reviews of the business as well as the leadership coach on Facebook, Google reviews and alike – can you find recommendations?

Skilled Coaches Have Recommendations

If the person doesn’t have?20 or 30 clear and identifiable recommendations or reviews, they haven’t yet proven themselves as an?effective leadership coach. It is also important to separate the leadership coach from the leadership business – while the business may have many reviews for their stable of coaches, the one in front of you may not. Also ask if you could speak to a previous client about what they got from the coaching process. An effective leadership coach will not only be able to provide you with names, they will have at least 5 clients they could willingly provide you the phone / contact details of to discuss their coaching.

Executive Leadership Coach Review

• Check their website or LinkedIn profile for 20 to 30 recommendations and reviews
• Check reviews and people giving them are real and not from their own business
• Separate the reviews of the business from the specific coach

Ask:

‘Can I speak to one or two of your previous clients to discuss what they learnt?’

Question 7 : What resources and tools do you have at your disposal?

This is a broad question, and it is seeking to understand the depth of knowledge of the leadership coach you will be working with. An effective?Executive Leadership Coach?talks about their field of expertise – either publicly in keynote speaking or webinars, online through videos or tutorials, or?written in blogs / posts and articles. Take some time to read, listen or watch what they talk about and see if it resonates with you. Does this person talk about leadership / leadership skills in a way that appeals to you? If you can’t find your chosen leadership coach speaking about the topic of leadership in at least one of these mediums, walk away. Effective leadership coaches have a body of work that should be easy to find and demonstrate their understanding of the topic.

In addition, ask to review or discuss their coaching outcomes documents and their confidentiality policy – it should be clear and easily understood. You want to know before you undertake a coaching process who the information you discuss is going to be shared with, how long notes are kept and what the records process entails.

Executive Leadership Coach Review:

• Their website for articles, tutorials and videos
• Look for Youtube or Vimeo videos speaking on the topic
• ‘Google’ their name and search for things like ‘leadership articles’

Ask:

• Where can I find articles or videos of you discussing and explaining leadership and / or coaching?’
• ‘Can I have a copy of your Coaching Outcomes documents?’
• ‘What is your policy on confidentiality’

Question 8: What Leadership Assessment tool do you use?

An?effective Executive Leadership Coach?will use some form of?leadership assessment tool?to assess the level of skill / behaviour you have at present, and highlight how they will help you develop from that baseline. There are a myriad of effective tools in the marketplace, just make sure that the tool provides useful information for you in its own right – it should be in plain language and discuss leadership behaviours. It should also measure behaviours that can develop and grow, that you easily relate specific behaviours to. The tool used should be more than a personality test, which are often generically written (4 types, 4 colours etc) and not designed to change over time.

Ensure the tool being used can be used again in several months time so that you can have a tangible measure of growth – after all, ‘what isn’t measured, isn’t done’. Most effective leadership coaches can provide you with a PDF of a standard report from their chosen leadership assessment tool, and many will provide an assessment / short debrief as part of their introductory process.

The Velocity Leadership CheckPoint

At Developing Leaders we use the Velocity Leadership CheckPoint to assess a leaders skills before every coaching and training program. It is a powerful tool in determining which behaviours a leader need the most improvement in, as well as help identify strengths and weaknesses as a leader. Skilled coaches can then essential insight on how you can develop those areas, as well as the links between leadership behaviours and results in your performance, your team culture and you business results.

Without a clear start point, many leadership coaches are ‘flying blind’ to determine what needs addressing in a leaders behaviour to become a better leader. The leader being coached may have an idea, however their view may be skewed by recent events, opinions of others or an avoidance of facing the real issues. An effective executive leadership coach uses a leadership assessment tool like the CheckPoint as an ‘extra tool in the toolbox’ for assisting leaders improve their performance. Without one, they are far less efficient and effective as a coach.

Executive Leadership Coach Review:

Ask:

• ‘What leadership assessment tool do you use?’
• ‘Can I have a copy of a standard / example leadership report’
• ‘Do you offer an assessment prior to committing to a coaching contract / process’

Question 9: How will you challenge me?

While rapport and connection is very important through a coaching process, an effective leadership coach is not your best friend. While they will encourage you and cheer you on through your successes, they also need to be able to hold you to account for behaviours that aren’t helping you succeed and challenge your thinking and your actions. An effective leadership coach understands the difference between what you?want?to hear, and what you?need?to hear. They won’t be cold and emotionless – an effective leadership coach will discuss your development needs clearly and specifically, identify a path to develop and grow and guide / help / push you towards action to address shortfalls.

Further, ask about their own coaching process. An effective leadership coach knows that they don’t have all of the answers and are developing and growing themselves. An effective leadership has experienced the process of coaching for themselves, they understand the impact, the sticking points in their own development and can discuss it clearly with you. If your chosen coach doesn’t believe in the coaching process, why should you?

Executive Leadership Coach Review:

Ask:

• ‘How will you challenge me to develop my skills?’
• ‘What is the process if we disagree on a way forward?’
• ‘Do you have a coach at present?’
• ‘What did you learn through your coaching process?’

Through asking some or all of these questions, you should be able to ascertain not only if the person in front of you is an effective leadership coach, but if they are the right leadership coach to assist you in growing and developing as a leader.

What Next?

You don’t have to work through the decision alone! You also don’t have to jump in feet first and hire a leadership coach before you know if it will be useful (or cost effective). There are two simple and easy options to get started without a financial commitment:

1. Book in a short discovery call with Developing Leaders.?Our experienced team can discuss your needs and see if a leadership coach is the best fit for your time, team and budget.
2. Complete a complimentary leadership assessment.?The?Velocity Leadership CheckPoint is Developing Leaders way of determining a leader’s strengths and areas of development. It can help you work out what specific areas you might need some help with, and whether a leadership coach is the right option to address it. It is free, easy and people say the debrief alone was worth completing to get started on addressing some leadership deficiencies.

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