Should you hire an Executive Coach?

In the past 2 weeks I’ve had exploratory conversations with 2 Founder CEOs of start-ups, a senior leader in a start-up, an entrepreneur, 3 mid-level high potentials who aspire for senior leadership roles and the COO of a family-owned business. All of them were thinking of hiring an Executive Coach.

In every single case, I felt that a leadership program followed by an executive coaching engagement would be a better option for them rather than a standalone coaching engagement and I shared that with them.

Here are my thoughts on this topic:

Why Executive Coaching?

As I see it, the purpose of Executive Coaching is to help the Coachee identify what it is about the way they are thinking (and behaving) that is not effective and then help them think rigorously and act fearlessly so that they create the results and relationships they want.

The world’s best players hire coaches because the one thing they can’t do is “observe” themselves. Even if they watch a video of themselves playing and identify growth areas, those perspectives are likely to be limited by their past experiences and beliefs.

What does an Executive Coaching engagement involve?

An Executive Coaching engagement involves 5 steps across 2 parts:

Part A – Reflection, raising awareness and learning new mindsets

1. The Coach observes/listens to the Coachee.
2. Holding the mirror – the Coach gives feedback to the Coachee to raise their self-awareness; helps them notice patterns of thinking and behaviours that are getting in their way that they might have not been aware of.
3. Identifying distorting beliefs – once the Coachee notices patterns of ineffective thinking/behaving, the Coach’s job is to ask powerful questions to help the Coachee delve deeper and identify which beliefs are leading to those behaviours and in some cases, which life experiences might have led to the formation of those beliefs.
4. Building powerful mindsets – once a Coachee has identified the beliefs that were getting in the way, the next step is to learn ways of thinking that can help them solve problems (long after the coaching engagement is over).

Part B – Taking action and building sustainability

1. Practicing new mindsets and behaviours – intellectually understanding new mindsets and empowering beliefs is a good starting point. But, to internalize new mindsets you’ve got to practice new behaviours and that can be scary/uncomfortable. When Coachees initially practice new behaviours, they might struggle and/or fail. It’s important to stay on track without letting failures and justifications get in the way of internalizing new behaviours.

Standalone coaching engagements are not the most effective or efficient

I feel that standalone coaching engagements are not the most effective or efficient, from a leadership development point of view, for the following reasons:

a. Difficult to create momentum:

The most energy-intensive part of a rocket launch is the initial phase of the launch as the rocket plows through the thickest part of the atmosphere. Getting through Part A (steps 1 to 4) is similar to a rocket launch in my view.

When leaders want to step up their game, an intense period of reflection and learning can help them overcome their mental/emotional resistance and move into action.

In my experience, Part A is best addressed through a self-awareness-based leadership program, like the Stillwater Praxeum Foundations (which involves 5 sessions of 3.5 hours each, over 5 weeks and an hour of pre-work/reflection before each session (Praxeum - Leadership Development for Individuals (stillwater.co.in) ) rather than a standalone executive coaching engagement.

Also, it’s not easy to traverse Part A and move to action quickly with just 1 to 1.5 hours of conversations each month, which is the typical structure of standalone coaching engagements.

Executive Coaching is a great way to work on Part B (taking action and building sustainability), though.

b. Difficult to sustain interest:

In my experience, covering Parts A and B through a standalone coaching engagement takes a minimum of 12 hours of 1-1 conversations over 9 to 12 months and not all individuals complete this journey.

Overcoming resistance and moving into action takes longer in a standalone coaching engagement. Also, it’s more difficult to create quick wins that bolster confidence and hope. When Coachee’s don’t see quick shifts in the initial few months, there is a risk that they lose motivation.

Standalone coaching engagements are a slow burn and therefore Coachees might lose interest.

Also, Coachees would typically need to invest at least another 6 to 8 hours on their own, learning new theoretical models and on reflection. It’s much easier to stay disciplined/on-track and do this in a structured learning program along with a cohort of co-learners, rather than as a lone individual.

c. Relatively more expensive:

Standalone coaching is likely to be much more expensive than a leadership program.

The minimum duration of a typical standalone executive coaching engagement at Stillwater is 6.50 hours (Chemistry call of 1.50 hours, followed by five one-hour conversations each month, over 5 months).

Our coaching charge-out rate for individuals who sponsor themselves is Rs 50,000/- per hour (excluding 18% GST). So, the cost of a 6.50-hour coaching engagement would be Rs 3.84 lakhs inclusive of taxes.

When individuals reach out to me for executive coaching, I recommend that they do our public leadership program, Praxeum Foundations, first (Praxeum - Leadership Development for Individuals ( stillwater.co.in )) . The Praxeum Foundations is free for all members of the public (our corporate programs with similar design start at ~ Rs 60K per participant).

I recommend that they take a call on hiring a Stillwater Coach after they’ve done our leadership program and also share that we are completely flexible with the frequency/duration of a coaching engagement – they could even hire us for a one 1-hour conversation each quarter.

In the last 4 months I’ve had a number of people who reached out to me initially for standalone 1-1 executive coaching, sign up and complete the Praxeum Leadership program. Not a single person has come back to us for follow-up executive coaching.

I don’t feel sad that we’ve lost potential revenue because they didn’t sign up for a standalone coaching engagement.

I see this as feedback to us that we’ve created a powerful leadership program.

With our corporate clients who reach out to us to support them on executive coaching engagements too, we recommend that individuals first go through our leadership programs and that we coach them off the back of those programs.

Advantages of a self-awareness based leadership program

I feel that there are two compelling reasons for individuals to consider doing a leadership program before they hire an Executive Coach.

a. Knowing you are not alone & learning from peers

In my conversations, potential Coachees often say that they want to explore 1-1 coaching rather than a leadership program because they feel that they will have more personalised/customised conversations. At a deeper level though I feel that it is their fear of being judged that often propels them to explore a 1-1 coaching engagement.

Many individuals feel that they are the only ones experiencing the fears and insecurities they are experiencing and feel ashamed to speak up about the challenges they are facing, in a group forum (I felt that way for a long time in my career - read about my journey and why I do what I do as an Executive Coach ).

In a program like the Stillwater Praxeum, all conversations are confidential. It’s a safe space. Participants have an opportunity to overcome their fear of being judged and when they put themselves “out there” they find that they are not alone – a number of other people resonate with and also speak about the same challenges/fears.

We’ve had participants with work experience ranging from 10 to 20 years, from top companies, as participants in earlier batches of the Praxeum and past participants have shared that they found their peers' feedback and experiences really valuable.

b. Structured and accelerated development

Introspection/reflection without structure can be unfocused and tiring. The Praxeum Foundations consists of five live sessions of 3.50 hours each with 1 hour of pre-work before each session. A lot of introspection and learning is packed into a 5-week schedule. However, the process is structured in a manner that allows individuals to reflect deeply, without feeling overwhelmed.

?When might a standalone 1-1 coaching engagement be a more appropriate option?

I feel that standalone Executive Coaching might be a more appropriate option in the following cases:

a. For CEOs/senior leaders, when confidentiality is super important – e.g in cases where they would like to share their ideas/thoughts about the company’s future/strategy etc and confidentiality is critical because there could be consequences like employees quitting etc if others in the organisation get to know that information.

b. For senior leaders who are well known in public or public personalities for whom confidentiality is critical.

c. For members of the top management team of a company when they have a fractious relationship with each other, and psychological safety has not yet been built within the team.

d.?In companies that have a highly competitive culture and where there is a risk that conversations in a leadership program might not be kept confidential.

e.?When individuals have had difficult/traumatic life experiences and might find it difficult to share openly about their challenges, in a group setting.

f. When an individual has been through a self-awareness based leadership program and has a very specific goal (e.g how to pitch to large clients and close million dollar deals etc) that they want to work on.

In my experience, for the vast majority of mid-level high potentials a leadership development program followed by executive coaching would be the most effective option.

?Our approach to leader development

At Stillwater, our objective is to help high-potential professionals internalize mindsets that can allow them to problem-solve on their own, long after the coaching engagement is over.

That can happen only when there is a solid foundation of theoretical knowledge, which is followed by rigorous thinking and fearless action that helps them internalize the new mindsets they’ve learnt.

In my experience, kicking off a coaching engagement with a leadership program is the most effective and efficient way to get there.

Our intention is not to coach people over long periods of time – we want our Coachees to become self-sustaining in the shortest possible time.

If you would like to know more about or sign up for the Stillwater Praxeum Foundations program, please check this link out: Praxeum - Leadership Development for Individuals (stillwater.co.in)

If you feel that a standalone 1-1 Executive Coaching engagement would be more appropriate for you, feel free to get in touch with me, Kanishka or Avantika for an exploratory conversation.

All the best!