Executive Coaching

So let’s assume that you buy the idea of supervision for coaches, but maybe you can’t find or afford an individual supervisor. Group supervision can be a good solution. By group supervision, I don’t mean a group of coaches coming together to discuss practice (I might call that “peer supervision”). I mean a group of coaches meeting with a qualified and experienced coach supervisor, who can facilitate and lead the supervision process for the group. This sort of supervision is not just accessed by independent coaches, it is increasingly being used by organisations for internal coaches. For individual coaches, I see X main advantages of this kind of arrangement:

1. It is highly cost-effective; splitting the cost between, say, six participants clearly saves money for everyone.

2. The participants gain support and insight from their peers as well as the supervisor. This can give synergistic benefits to all, as a properly facilitated and led discussion accesses the insights and views of all group members. This exposes everyone to a more diverse range of experience than that available in one-to-one supervision.

3. For freelance coaches, it can provide opportunities for networking and working in a team  not normally available to them in their day to day work .

In later posts I’ll look at the specific benefits of group supervision for organisations with internal coaches, as well as some downsides.

Appearance: 

Beatific smile and upright posture denoting their superiority to the common herd of coaches who have been trained in coaching.

Most likely to say:

I’m a natural coach; I don’t need any qualifications - they interfere with real coaching. My life experience is what my clients value.

Qualifications:  As above. The gifted amateur takes a perverse pride in not devoting time, effort and money to learning about their chosen profession.

Supervision Arrangements:

None - “I bow to no-one in the superiority of my life experience.”

What to ask:

How committed are you to being a professional coach?

I wouldn’t ask an unqualified mechanic to mend my car, why would I ask an unqualified coach to coach me?

This book is a highly practical guide to buying coaching and it is also blessedly short. A clear structure leads the buyer through a process to ensure best value from an organisation’s coaching.

The authors give reasons to use coaching and discuss other choices of intervention. I liked the reproduction of Jarvis’ Decision Tree (CIPD) to guide the prospective buyer. There are also includes questions to identify “uncoachable” people, whilst acknowledging that an “uncoachable” manager may respond “spectacularly well” to the right coach.

The definition of business coaching is clear, but is superfluous in a sector awash with definitions. Much more helpful for setting boundaries, I felt, were the examples of what business coaching is not suitable for, with recommended courses of action for each one. The book also covers different coaching styles suggesting that coaches are either “facilitative” or “directive” (which sounds like mentoring to me). I think that many practitioners would struggle with these definitions as coaches often use a variety of styles. However, I especially liked the diagram showing where different coaching types sit on facilitative/ directive and individual/ organisational axes, which gave complete clarity to the business coaching addressed by the authors.

The chapter on procurement best practice provides a helpful checklist of factors which may indicate the need for a coach, highlights when internal or external coaches are preferable and outlines a rigorous approach to provider selection. I was pleased to see the discussion on the importance of training, accreditation and supervision for coaches. The section on getting best value includes a practical guide to minimising expenditure. The warning signs that a buyer is overpaying were useful and I liked the detailed breakdown of the costs of coaching, showing how much may be spent on items such as psychometrics, travel and management fees paid to the consultancy providing the coaching. The simple tips on administering a coaching programme to maximise return show how attention to relatively mundane details can lead to massive improvements in return.

In the chapter covering management of the coaching process, the analysis of different stakeholders’ interests and possible conflicts was valuable; I liked the way that it showed how an efficient management framework could help the process to satisfy everybody. The book also provides an interesting evolution of the basic ROI approach, using a balanced business scorecard. I particularly appreciated the authors’ clear recommendation to stop using coaches that are not delivering!

The final chapter is of less practical value than the rest of the book, as it addresses the future of business coaching. It does provide some interesting views on the increasing importance of organisational outcomes.

In summary, Moore and Wishart’s book would be useful for even experienced buyers of business coaching, and invaluable for those with less experience. It covers all aspects of the process in a pragmatic way. I particularly liked the extensive use of check lists, warning signs and pitfalls, and straightforward processes to help the buyer. The chapter summaries give a quick way of accessing information and the case studies bring the text alive. The Tools and Resources Appendix contains useful templates and questionnaires. I recommend this as a highly practical book that will help buyers obtain best value and business results from coaching.

Most people do not really want freedom, because freedom involves responsibility, and most people are frightened of responsibility. 

Sigmund Freud

Freud is well known as the founder of Classical Psychoanalysis or the Psychodynamic School. This quote from Freud is enough to make most coaches tear their hair out. His suggestion that people are frightened of responsibility and freedom and want neither is anathema to most coach’s views. Sir John Whitmore, for example suggests that all coaching has the development of self-belief as its ultimate goal and says:

Self-belief is built when we make decisions, take successful actions and recognise our full responsibility for both.

(Coaching for Performance)

Freud suggested that the mind has three agencies:

The Id consists of inherent instincts, particularly relating to sexuality, and is completely unconscious.

The Ego ideally is rational, moderating the influence of the id.

The Super-Ego is formed within the ego, prolonging parental influence. It is consciously perceptible to a small degree.

Freud saw conflict arising from the clash between the ego and, for example, the sexual instincts of the id or fear of the super-ego. These conflicts arise throughout sexual development and are entirely self-generated and mostly unconscious.

Freud suggested that the ego develops various defence mechanisms, such as repression and reaction-formation, to deal with these conflicts, and therapy is intended to address these mechanisms, ultimately resulting in a stronger ego, which the individual can use more efficiently to make realistic decisions and take more responsibility.

How then does this relate to coaching? On the face of it, the coach would have little time for Freud’s analysis; he or she does not deal with unconscious instincts, these being the realm of the therapist. Typically, coaches are highly goal-orientated, focusing almost exclusively on the future.

The key implication of psychoanalysis for the coach is the importance of the past on the way that individuals behave today. Whilst many coaches pay lip-service to the influence of the past, it is important for them to recognise that not everything can easily be dealt with rationally; there may be strong unconscious elements arising from the client’s past, which influence the client’s ability to take more self-responsibility today. This is one way of explaining a problem encountered by coaches – the client who appears willing to change, but doesn’t. There is a growing interest in the use of a psychodynamic approach in coaching, which can, for example, identify patterns of psychological defences, without digging into the client’s early years. Executive Coaching – A Psychodynamic Approach (Sandler) is a great introduction to this.

Some years ago I did some work with a Third Sector organisation – I’ll call it Growth (not its real name). Their plan was to make coaching central to the way that they worked, introducing a coaching culture. Their plan was effective because they stuck to the ways of encouraging a coaching culture that I outlined on 11 April 2012. The three key things they did were:

1. Regarding coaching as part of the culture. One-to-one coaching was part of a programme of initiatives, including training, team development, and appraisal. Whilst individuals had specific goals, the overall organisational aims introducing coaching spring directly from the intention to promote three things: a person centred approach; staff empowerment and participative team working - encouraging questioning and contributions up the hierarchy as well as down.

2. Leading from the top. The one-to-one coaching was initially taken up by Growth’s Chief Executive, before spreading to other directors and then other members of staff.

3. Rewarding efforts to coach. The results of the programme were monitored and evaluated in three ways: 360˚ assessments to assess change; measurement of “hard” targets such as revenues or costs, carried out as the coaching culture strengthens; assessments of effectiveness by staff members. Success was rewarded with both positive feedback and incentives.  

Interestingly, Growth did not introduce coach supervision as part of the programme. This was purely pragmatic; it was some years ago and there were very few supervisors around!

The evaluation showed a strong positive influence on the performance of both individuals and the whole organisation. Here’s what some people said:

The result was fantastic – the team embraced coaching.

I use a coaching approach now – it’s much more effective.

People are always blaming their circumstances for what they are… The people who get on in this world are the people who get up and look for the circumstances they want, and if they can’t find them, make them.

(George Bernard Shaw (1856 - 1950), “Mrs. Warren’s Profession” (1893) act II)

How can coaching support clients as they take more responsibility for themselves? In this category, I’ll look at the relevance of different psychotherapeutic schools for coaching, whether executive coaching in a business context, or personal. In this first post, I’ll briefly consider the Cognitive Behavioural School.

Cognitive Behaviourists regard the individual’s view of the self as crucial to behaviour and emphasise changing external behaviour.

Cognitive Therapy’s underlying principle is that clients have faulty interpretations of reality as a result of schemas developed early in life. (The similarity with the scripts of Transactional Analysis is striking.) Therapy aims to correct faulty cognitive processing, so that the client develops a more appropriate view of reality and thus behaves more effectively. After successful therapy, the client will become their own therapist, taking full responsibility for future behaviour.

How then would a coach use a cognitive approach?

The executive coach often works with clients to help them to stand back and examine their own perceptions so that they devise more helpful interpretations of reality. This change in perceptions allows the client to change his or her behaviour to be more effective. Once embedded, these more effective behaviours will persist even after the coaching has finished.

It can be particularly effective with “imposter syndrome”, when a coaching client feels that he or she is not worthy of fulfilling a role. Standing back and examining the facts with the support and challenge of a coach may be emotional, but often results in a much more helpful perception of reality, leading to more confident and effective workplace behaviours.

“Coaching supervision is a formal process of professional support, which ensures continuing development of the coach and effectiveness of his/her coaching practice through interactive reflection, interpretative evaluation and the sharing of expertise.” (Bachkirova et al., 2005)

Once again the coach’s development is central, with the coaching clients’ interests implied by the suggestion that supervision ensures the effectiveness of coaching practice. This definition brings in more information about what actually happens in supervision. It facilitates reflection by the coach, it explicitly evaluates practice, and it allows expertise to be shared, so that coaching practice is as effective as possible.

How does this compare with your experience of executive coach supervision?

Often people think that achieving goals is all about having systems, and using acronyms - you know the kind of thing - SMART goals, stretch goals, planning, deadlines and all the rest of it. You can read about this sort of thing all over the place. BUT - there is 1 key question you must ask yourself if you want to achieve a goal:

“Whose goal is it?”

To truly achieve goals, you need to be intrinsically motivated.  Broadly speaking, that means you want to achieve the goal because it satisfies an internal need, rather than being foisted on you by an outside agency.

This idea is founded in Self Determination Theory, formulated by Deci & Ryan. Have a look at this site for more information.

You can find more on my site, where I describe the research that I did showing the positive effects of executive coaching on motivation and therefore goal achievement.

It’s all well and good demonstrating good leadership behaviours and managing your reports. The next generation leader works to cultivate leadership across her or his entire organisation, whether that’s a local team or a global mega company. Here are 5 ways to nurture the leadership talents of everyone in the organisation.

1. Walk the walk. These blogs suggest ways to be a 21st century leader and the best way of instilling these behaviours in your organisation is to be seen demonstrating those leadership attributes and set a good example. You may  believe that you need to talk about what to do, but walking the walk is much more powerful and will be noticed and emulated.
2. Give people space. It’s the leader’s job to mobilise his or her team towards a vision; how the team gets there can be flexible. Once the direction is set, the leader can give her or his people the scope to be creative, to come up with new solutions to problems and to lead change within their own areas. Everyone can become a leader, even if only in a small way.
3. Recognise success. Publicly go out of your way to recognise these acts of leadership in your people. Show everybody how much you and the organisation value the success of your people.
4. Select people to carry out stretching roles and assignments; help them to develop their leadership whilst they are performing the role; don’t leave them to sink or swim.
5. Build a leadership development programme. This is likely to include training, mentoring and coaching. Be the first to take the programme – set a good example and show how important it is.

Appearance:

Thick glasses. Probably rather dusty. Looks tired from sitting up reading.

Most likely to say:

I’ve just read this great book - I’m sure it’ll help you.

Qualifications: 

None (”Why should I go on a course, when I can have all this learning in my hands?”)

Supervision arrangements:

I often have a chat to my “community” on the Amazon site

What to ask:

“What stops you going into the real world?”