There is nowhere to hide. Not even the executive suite is safe from the changes sweeping business today. In fact, the impact of those changes is felt most keenly at the executive level. CEO’s, COO’s, CFO’s – like everyone else – have to hit the ground running and keep running fast. Stockholders and stakeholders demand fast results. Teams must work more efficiently under greater pressure. High potentials and emerging leaders need to be identified and developed earlier and more effectively.
Related article: Why Individual Development Plans are Essential
The vital need for executive coaching
Add to this the quest for job satisfaction and life balance and you have the dynamic tension that creates the vital need for executive coaching. Executive coaching is a professional process that links individual effectiveness to organizational performance. It is a strategic process that helps organizations attract and retain great leaders, enables executive teams to improve leadership and team performance, and supports senior executives responsible for making crucial business decisions and achieving outcomes. It truly provides the “shock absorbers” on the often bumpy road of organizational change.
The powerful advantages in the leadership development process, particularly in areas where performance goals are at risk, has moved coaching top-of-mind for executives and HR leaders alike. Yet there is still a tremendous gap between what is expected of executives and the available resources to help them acquire both the inner-core attributes and outer-core skills and competencies required to achieve those expectations. Executive coaching closes that gap.
Executive Coaching Only for C Suite?
The reality, however, is that while executive coaching is top-of-mind for many executives and HR, only 35% of the organizations recently surveyed utilize executive coaching as part of their high-potential developmental programs. By comparison, 48% of the organizations utilize executive coaching for their C Suite level. For high-potentials, organizations continue to emphasize developmental job assignments (70%) and custom training programs (51%), as their primary developmental strategies.
We were surprised to learn that 65% of the organizations surveyed do not cite executive coaching as an important developmental strategy for their high-potential and emerging leader talent pools. I see this as a significant issue and opportunity for organizations especially in light of what different generations expect from their employers (i.e., Generation X employees want a casual, independent, flexible environment, and a place to learn; Generation Y employees want a structured, supportive, and interactive environment). More than anything else, it is critical to understand that both generations make-up nearly 100% of any organization’s future leader pool and both generations crave continuous growth and “connectedness” with people.
A Powerful Strategy for All Future Leaders
Executive coaching represents a powerful strategy for meeting the continuous growth and “connectedness” needs of future leaders. That said, just like anything else, there is a lot of variability in the world of executive coaching. It is important to never underestimate the importance of hiring external coaches who have a solid “operations” mindset and who have experience on the “firing line” as an operations leader. Building trust and empathy with high-potential coachees is everything and I have found that having operations experience goes a long way toward helping a coach build rapport, trust and credibility.
At Thrive Change Management we help create leadership and cultural structures to get employees out of their limited participation state and into their collaborative state. This is where innovation and emotional engagement powerfully connect individuals to a shared cause and to one another.
Contact us for more information on this or email: jake@thrive-cm.com
First published on Forbes.com
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