Need of a Coach / Trainer to Leaders

The leaders of the corporate world today, the CEOs of an organisation, are exposed like no one else at the company. They are answerable to their shareholders, customers, the media, their investors, employees and the board. It is said that it is lonely at the top. CEO often face challenges that they have not encountered earlier like high-profile decisions, greater accountability, deep scrutiny from board members and much less personal time. They have to deal with immense pressure situations while keeping their wits about them.

From Tony Robbins to Richard Branson, Dale carnegie to Warren Buffet, Merlin to King Arthur, Birbal to Akbar, Tenaliraman to Krishnadevarayar and Aristotle to Alexander the great, history has several examples of the significance of coaches/advisers to powerful kings and leaders.

CEOs / Leaders often need to step into their role with very little room for mistakes and even less time to get up to speed with all eyes on them for direction. Some CEOs rise through the ranks in an organisation and are groomed for the role, while others find themselves suddenly at the top, making it even more challenging.

The nature of their role prevents CEOs from being completely candid with most people they work with. Where do they go to talk things through in a trusting environment? Where can they turn to for sage advice? Who do they use as their sounding boards? How can they connect to mentors who really have “been there, done that”?

Whether you choose a coach, mentor or a confidant, the core of every successful relationship is TRUST. The importance of trust came up very often in the discussion.

What can be looked for in a trainer / coach?

?   This person should be able to see the bigger picture and offer a strategic perspective.

?   Someone who will keep your interests ahead of their own agenda.

?   Someone with relevant experience and specialist knowledge.

An ideal coach has integrity and is someone with whom you build personal trust to be able to be unguarded and talk about anything without being judged. There are no set rules as to who the best advisers may be. The individual needs of CEOs differ depending on their personalities and the challenges they face. Leaders need to acknowledge that they will benefit from confidential, unbiased sound support and consequently, so will their company.

Valuing your people and their development directly increases their satisfaction which highly impacts your customer’s value through increased performance and consequently boosts your whole business.

According to Dr. Lois Frankel, a bestselling author and executive coach, the difference between a leader who gains commitment from employees and one who only gains compliance is coaching. The most effective leaders see themselves as being coaches and leaders rather than managers or supervisors. What has also changed in the Gen Y workforce is that the new generation of workers want to be challenged and recognized for their efforts. For them to be committed to your organization, they need to be led, not micromanaged. Deloitte looked at how Gen Y employees are very different from the previous iconic generations and found that Gen Y’ers are a “hidden powerhouse of employee potential”. This means that they are more eager to contribute and take on additional responsibility that will help them advance. Although competitive pay does influence their decisions to work for a company, they highly value meaningful development opportunities.

So, how does coaching come into play? Feedback and goal setting are the two main components of coaching; they provide a concrete road map on what employees are trying to achieve and how they can succeed. Despite wanting a challenge, employees want to be given the appropriate training and resources to be able to achieve what they set out for. Goal setting allows the employees to know what direction they are working towards – it doesn’t matter which path they decide to take — the purpose is for them to look at the bigger picture and be creative on the ways to reach the goal. At the same time, real-time and continuous feedback gives the employee an opportunity to improve and ask for support if needed. Think of yourself as a sports coach – you share your objective with your team, observe the players during games, and then provide feedback on how they can improve. For the next game, all of your players start the game knowing what to do differently. As a coach, there is no way you will wait for the end of the season to sit your players down and give feedback. The same applies to your organization. If you wait for the annual performance appraisal period, you and your employees are missing out on opportunities to improve.

The benefits of coaching seem to be very employee-oriented; however, looking at the bigger picture, your organization as a whole gains from having effective coaching sessions. Workplace Psychology, a website which covers areas of the workplace and workers from a scholarly perspective, offers some advantages of integrating coaching in your organization. I have elaborated their top three reasons:

1. Overcome costly and time-consuming performance problems: many companies still rely on their annual performance to evaluate their employees’ performance. By integrating coaching in your organization, you can identify performance problems easier and quicker, and take the appropriate measures to overcome these hurdles such as re-aligning the employees’ objectives, or offering training/mentoring to help your employees succeed.
2. Strengthen employees’ skills: Coaching allows employees to gain valuable skills and knowledge from their coach – whether it is you or a senior employee – which will eventually increase the productivity of your organization. Coaching also provides you with how the employees are performing; by following up with their progress, you may discover that they possess skills that you were not aware of. Therefore coaching helps you identify the competencies of your team and you may then take the initiative to strengthen these skills by encouraging them to take advanced classes or/and attend seminars.
3. Improve retention: when employees are coached, they feel supported and encouraged by their manager and their organization. Coaching is a two-way communication process. You provide feedback to your employees and they are able to use this opportunity to also give feedback. Employees are more likely to stay in your organization if they feel that their voice is being heard by you and senior management. By integrating coaching, you are encouraging your managers and yourself to be more present among your employees. Coaching also allows you to identify employees who fit with your succession planning.

We will often move in and out of different roles when we coach, depending on the specific needs of the client. What I want to explore today is the role of the coach in embodying the very change that the coachee is seeking, so that it may be experienced directly by them during the session.

Before we delve into this, it is useful to look at some of the more common roles that we might adopt during coaching.

COACH AS THE GIVER OF SUPPORT

Coaching can sometimes be a daunting experience of introspection for the coachee, where they obtain new and often unexpected insights into their lives. It requires courage on the part of the coachee to grapple with difficult questions, and as coaches, it is our role to support them during this journey of discovery.

Sometimes, support can involve believing in the inherent potential of the client when they cannot see this for themselves. The coachee experiencing the coach’s belief in them during the session can be very empowering and a powerful catalyst for change.

COACH AS THE PROVIDER OF CHALLENGE

Closely related to support is challenge. The role of the coach in challenging the coachee to dig deep is fundamental to effective coaching. Challenge requires courage on the part of the coach; particularly when dealing with issues that involve deeply rooted belief systems and patterns of behavior. Gauging the appropriate level of challenge is an art and will depend on a number of things, including the amount of trust in the coaching relationship and the “readiness” of the client.

Sometimes, the degree of challenge might be a little too much and we might encounter resistance from the coachee, and that’s okay. Resistance is in itself important information as it allows the coach to then explore the source of the resistance, which might in turn lead to deeper insights for the client.

COACH AS THE REFLECTIVE MIRROR

The coach’s experience of the client during sessions offers powerful insights into how the client’s behaviors and attitude might be impacting others that they interact with (colleagues, family members, etc.). We can sometimes take on the role of a mirror, reflecting back to the client what they are projecting, in a way that perhaps others in their life have been unable or unwilling to do. Receiving immediate feedback during a session can be very useful in allowing the coachee to build greater self-awareness into how they are.

This then brings us to a coaching role that is perhaps a little more elusive, but is hugely powerful in enabling change.

COACH AS THE EMBODIMENT OF CHANGE

Coaching is fundamentally about change. No one comes to a coach to stay the same. Change will often be the result of the coachee experiencing a shift in perspective or attitude. To better enable this, the coach can embody the very change that the coachee is seeking and thereby allow the coachee to intuit what such a changed state feels like during the session—this is what I mean by the embodiment of change.

This is not an “act” of any sort by the coach, but rather a channeling of a particular archetype, which the coachee will subconsciously, if not consciously, tune into. For example, when supporting someone with their confidence, a very common coaching area, the coach can embody what it means to be confident and thereby serve as a channel through which the client can tap into that confidence.

It is the same with self-awareness. The more aware and in the moment the coach is during the session, the more the client will pick up on this and begin to channel the coach’s way of being. It is very important that the archetype is wholeheartedly and genuinely channeled. If not, the effect can be detrimental, as it risks becoming a caricature.

FINAL THOUGHTS

From Tony Robbins to Richard Branson, Dale carnegie to Warren Buffet, Merlin to King Arthur, Birbal to Akbar, Tenaliraman to Krishnadevarayar and Aristotle to Alexander the great, history has several examples of the significance of coaches/advisers to powerful kings and leaders. If even legends needed a coach / adviser, then how about us.....

Vishnu Vardhan, MBA, is a certified Master Trainer and Facilitator by Dale Carnegie and Carlton Advanced Management Institute. Addition to being an L&D specialist he speaks and trains on leadership, career, professional development and cross-cultural business communication.

References

1. Rowan, J. (2014). The Transpersonal Approach to Coaching. In E. Cox, T. Bachkirova, & D. Clutterbuck (2nd Eds.), The Complete Handbook of Coaching (pp. 145-156). London: Sage.

2. Whitmore, J. (2009). Coaching for Performance (4th ed.). London: Nicholas Brealey.

3. Whitmore, J., & Einzig, H. (2010). Transpersonal coaching. In J. Passmore (Ed.), Excellence in Coaching, The Industry Guide (pp. 134-146). London: Kogan Page.

4. Law, H., Les Lancaster, B., & Di Giovanni, N. (2010). A wider role for coaching psychology – applying transpersonal coaching psychology. The Coaching Psychologist, (6)1, 24-32.