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Managing Yourself:
Are You Ready for a Coach?
The world of work is changing,
and fast. Having a successful career means continually
learning and adapting to rapidly evolving environments.
It’s your responsibility to
manage and build on your intellectual capital and adapt to
new challenges in your industry. To identify the best career
move, you need to develop your capacity to self-assess
honestly and be willing to learn new skills and concepts.
You can’t do it alone. You may
think you know what’s best for you in your job and career.
But coaching yourself is like the blind leading the blind:
You can’t know what you don’t know.
The best workforces consist of
men and women who derive deep satisfaction and a sense of
challenge, fulfillment and meaning from their work. If you
don’t enjoy your job, you won’t give it your best.
Do You Love Your Work?
People who love their work:
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Have tremendous energy
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Go the “extra mile”
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Embrace new responsibilities
and challenges with enthusiasm
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Are committed to their
company goals
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Take immense pride in their
performance
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Feel a sense of community
within their organizations
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Are promoted more frequently
The age of customization has
brought us the personal trainer, personal shopper and
personal computer. Now, there’s a proliferation of personal
development services available to help you reap more from
your career: the executive coach.
Coaching occurs all the time
within an organization as a management or leadership style.
But what we are referring to here is coaching from an
executive coach who is professionally trained and hired
externally, and whose sole job is to provide development
opportunities.
The trend to engage personal
development coaching services has grown steadily for more
than a decade. While there is no definitive count of the
number of coaches practicing in the United States and
abroad, their ranks have swelled.
No universal certification
guarantees quality or qualifications. Former outplacement
specialists, therapists, psychologists, HR specialists and
motivational speakers have transformed themselves into
executive coaches. Some have undergone rigorous coach
training programs, and some are talented and highly
intuitive people without formal instruction.
Coaching can have a dramatic
impact on performance, with results besting the lessons
learned in training courses and leadership development
seminars. Many leading companies have instituted executive
coaching programs, including American Express, Corning,
Hewlett-Packard, Morgan Stanley and Philip Morris.
While coaches were originally
assigned to those experiencing difficulties or in danger of
derailment, there is now wider acceptance of hiring coaches
for even the most successful managers. Organizations
recognize that people can grow and change. Having a coach
assigned to you often signals career advancement.
If you are thinking about hiring
a coach for your personal development, or asking your
organization to provide an executive coach, consider the
following.
Who Needs a Coach?
A coach can be most useful at
particular career points:
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You are transitioning into a
new career stage. You are being promoted to a management
or leadership position that requires new skills.
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You lack fulfillment in your
present position and are considering a career change,
within the same company or externally.
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You are experiencing stress
and sense you may be on the road to burnout.
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You want to improve your
ability to manage and influence others by understanding
how to navigate office politics.
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Your relationship and
networking skills have become more pertinent as you
increase career responsibilities and want to learn
better “people skills.”
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You want to improve your
emotional intelligence and learn to better manage your
inner experiences so you can manage others more
effectively.
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You are dealing with global
issues: long-distance responsibilities or actual
relocation.
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You are experiencing
diversity challenges that you’d like to handle better.
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The strengths and talents
you brought to your job are not the ones that will
guarantee future career success.
Are You Ready for
Coaching?
You may think you’d like to have
a coach for several reasons. Perhaps your friends and
colleagues are experiencing positive coaching results.
Coaching is also viewed as a fast-track fad: All
up-and-coming leaders seem to have their own executive
coaches. How you view coaching—as a sign of prestige versus
a strategic need—will influence the results.
Some people are more aware than
others of their weaknesses. Overly ambitious and confident
people sometimes lack a core sense of true value: They
overachieve to prove their self-worth. The best way to
fortify genuine self-worth and self-esteem is to work with a
trained professional and examine self-beliefs.
Unfortunately, some who desire a
coach are unprepared or unwilling to do the work. Coaching
requires tremendous courage to face what other people may be
saying about you, as well as the ability to treat their
perceptions as valuable feedback. A coach can help you
overcome inherent defense mechanisms that keep you in denial
about your shortcomings. Especially when a 360-degree
assessment is used, in which your peers and associates both
up and down the organization provide input, you will need to
trust the process and your coach to achieve results. In the
words of one coachee, “Coaching can hurt … before things get
better, really better.”
How to Pick Your Coach
Once you recognize that you can
benefit from having a coach, you must decide whether to hire
one yourself or ask one to be assigned to you.
Hiring your own coach creates
some challenges: They can be expensive, and you will have to
find the best one for your specific needs. Because you
likely don’t know many executive coaches, you’ll also have
to do some research.
Be aware that in selecting a
coach based on your personal feelings, you may not pick
someone who best fits your needs. In other words, you run
the risk of choosing someone you like, rather than someone
you need. While liking your coach is a good start, having a
coach who can challenge and stretch you toward new
development is what’s most important.
Hire your own coach if you have
questions or concerns about remaining with your company or
personal development issues that are best left confidential.
If you decide to take the plunge, contact your human
resources department and ask for referrals. HR specialists
may already work with coaches who have proven track records,
and these individuals will likely be familiar with your
organization.
You may also contact the local
chapter of a national professional association, such as the
American Society for Training and Development, International
Coach Federation, or other coach and mentor groups. Be sure
to specify that you want a business or executive coach,
rather than a personal or life coach. You want someone with
experience in organizations and with executives. Pick a
coach who has formal education in psychology or
organizational development, as well as experience in
real-world business dynamics.
Having a coach assigned to you
by your company also poses a few problems. You probably
won’t get to choose your coach, and you will have to deal
with confidentiality issues. Because the organization—not
you—is the client, it can set the ground rules. You can—and
should—require a confidentiality agreement in such cases.
Confidentiality Is
Critical
Ask for an upfront agreement
about what your coach will tell your employer. It is
appropriate for your coach to share with HR or your
supervisor:
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Information about goals
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Attendance at coaching
sessions
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Alignment of company goals
with developmental issues
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Achievement of milestones
that indicate progress
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Timeline for the completion
of coaching
Navigating confidentiality
within an organization is tricky. Trust between the coach
and coachee is one of the most important factors
contributing to the success of the relationship.
If you don’t feel you can
confide in your coach about the real issues that concern
you, you would be better off hiring your own coach. The
expense is an investment in your personal development that
will last for years to come. It can make the difference in
having career success on a deeper, more meaningful level.
The decision about who will coach you and how your coaching
will occur is crucial for getting results.
How Does Coaching Take
Place?
Coaching occurs in many
different ways, somewhat dependent on the model practiced by
the coach. Because coaches have many different backgrounds,
there are many coaching styles.
Almost all coaching, however,
includes a process of assessment, setting goals for change
and improvement, a plan for achieving these goals,
accountability and a timeline for working together (anywhere
from 3 months to a year or more).
Before retaining a coach, ask
about methods used, the steps you will be required to
complete, how much time is involved, whether coaching will
take place in person or by phone, which coaching model is
used, whether outside contact with peers will occur and the
limits of confidentiality. Set review periods to evaluate
progress and determine if coaching will continue (and for
how long).
Assessments May Be Formal
or Informal
The most thorough assessment is
360-degree feedback, which provides the coach with input
about you from peers, bosses, subordinates and, in some
cases, your spouse. This process is used in only about 10
percent of coaching situations, however, as it’s expensive
and ties up the time of 10–15 other people. It can have a
serious impact, but feedback must be skillfully delivered.
Alternatively, a coach may
accompany an individual throughout the workday—a process
called shadow coaching. Most experienced coaches believe
many career pitfalls are predictable enough for the
experienced eye to spot without formal assessments.
Coaching can help most common
personality types perform more effectively on the job. Some
dysfunctions occur at both ends of the spectrum of human
personality; people are aggressive, abrasive, domineering or
so task-oriented and introverted that they fail to develop
good relationships.
Key Benefits of Coaching
Coaching makes you more aware of
what is happening around you. Throughout the coaching
process, ongoing questions and feedback are designed to
raise awareness of your feelings and thoughts. As a result,
you become more amenable to soliciting and receiving
feedback.
Successful coaching
relationships yield other benefits and improvements:
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An attitude of gratitude
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Improved emotional
intelligence
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Increased ability to
influence
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Improved relationships at
home and at work
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Greater flexibility in
thinking and behaviors
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Ability to question
underlying assumptions
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Enhanced capacity to learn
continuously
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More receptive to feedback
By virtue of the learning
experience gained from coaching, you acquire skills to
continue learning in the real world without a coach. This
may include better questioning skills, the ability to listen
better, and the ability to be silent and non-reactive when
appropriate.
Some studies suggest coaching
programs have high returns on investments—as much as 500 to
800 percent. While it may be difficult to quantify results
when measuring soft skills and emotional intelligence,
there’s no doubt that investing in personal development
benefits the organization financially and psychologically.
It makes good business sense to invest in leadership
development and growth, and coaching has proved to achieve
lasting results.
Resources:
Anderson, M. MetrixGlobal;
Executive Briefing: Case Study on the Return on Investment
of Executive Coaching, November 2001.
merrilland@metrixglobal.net
Goldsmith, M., Lyons, L. &
Freas, A. eds. Coaching for Leadership: How the World’s
Greatest Coaches Help Leaders Learn. Jossey
Bass/Pfeiffer.
Fitzgerald, C., Garvey
Berger, J. (Eds.). (2002). Executive Coaching: Practices
& Perspectives. Davies Black Publishing.
Morgan, H., Harkins, P., &
Goldsmith, M. (Eds.). (2005). The Art and Practice of
Leadership Coaching. John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
O’Neill, M.B. (2000).
Executive Coaching with Backbone and Heart: A Systems
Approach to Engaging Leaders with Their Challenges.
Jossey-Bass.
Sherman, S. & Freas, A.
(November 2004) “The Wild West of Executive Coaching.”
Harvard Business Review.
Michelman, P. (December 2004)
“Do You Need an Executive Coach?” Harvard Business
Review.
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