Sunday, September 7, 2014

How Executive Coaching Services Can Improve Leadership Quality

By Mattie MacDonald


One of the main characteristics of modern corporate life is the immense pressure placed on individuals and teams to perform, to be innovative and to be productive. The competition for advancement is tremendous. Businesses try to identify those individuals that show exceptional promise and groom them for more senior posts. By employing executive coaching services these promising individuals are mentored and polished.

Newly appointed managers often have to accept a leadership role in teams that consist of people that were formerly their peers. This transition is not always easy. A mentor can help the newly appointed manager to adapt to his new role. The mentor will also steer the mentored individual towards personal growth and increased productivity. Another important role of the coach is to help the manager to achieve self fulfillment.

It is not only new managers that can benefit from the attentions of a coach. Many businesses realize that senior managers that have been part of the organization for a long time are in danger of stagnating. By assigning them a coach they can be helped to remain innovative and to keep exploring new ideas and theories. Senior managers often also need to be motivated and they need to identify areas in which they need to grow.

It would be a mistake to expect a coach to provide practical advice on how to manage or how to achieve the goals of the organization. That is the role of the manager. The role of the coach is to help the manager to discover solutions to dilemmas, to apply techniques that will lead to effective decisions and to act as facilitator and motivator.

For mentoring to be truly effective it is necessary to be prepared to make a large investment in terms of both time and money. Coaches are not miracle workers and results can only expected once a solid relationship has been built between the coach and the client. The cost and time factors cause many businesses to only consider coaches for those individuals that show exceptional promise.

There are good reasons why exceptional care should be taken when appointing coaches. They will be working with top decision makers and they will be enjoying privileged relationships with those decision makers. This relationship may inadvertently lead to a situation where the coach can have an influence upon the decisions made by managers. The qualifications and experience of the coach should be carefully examined prior to appointment.

Different coaches follow different theories and they apply a wide variety of techniques and methods in order to achieve their goals. It is vital, however, that the coach be briefed on the expectations of the company, the background of the individual that is to be coached and the goals that need to be achieved during the contract period. This should all be made part of a written agreement between the company and the coach.

Business success on a global scale requires companies to reinvent themselves continually. It also requires leaders that are innovative, creative and energetic. A coach can help managers at all levels to remain motivated, to grow in confidence and to generally become better leaders and managers.




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