Business and Executive Coaching
Coaching is a powerful medium through which to assist people to learn and develop and achieve greater self-awareness. The beauty of coaching is that it is a truly bespoke process providing a safe and supportive environment in which to develop and where the results can be long-lasting and transformational. Coaching can be applied to most areas of organisational life helping to improve productivity, employee commitment and satisfaction.
How Coaching Can be Effective Within Organisations
Authentic Leadership
All businesses need good leaders. To be truly effective, leaders cannot rely purely on technical expertise alone - the ability to influence, engage, inspire, motivate and develop awareness of both self and others are some of the key characteristics of being an authentic leader.
Developing Mental Toughness
Coaching to develop mental toughness is particualry useful for middle and senior executives who operate in demanding and highly pressurised roles. Mental toughness is a significant factor in determining how a person responds to pressure -and how that might result in excessive stress, which in turn affects performance. Individuals will be able to complete the Mental Toughness questionnaire (MTQ48) and will learn to deal with challenges and stressors using helpful tools and techniques.
Promotion
People newly promoted into senior positions often find it an incredibly stressful time as they try to make the transition from their old into the new role where different modes of working are necessary. What worked in the past may not necessarily be the winning recipe for the future - this is not always evident to those keen to make a good impression. Support at this stage is crucial both for the individual and the oganisation in terms of shaping their current and future performance. Many organisations simply don't have the time or resources to dedicate to this area of people development. Coaching in the first few months can take out the stress and strain and give managers the confidence to progreess and make an impact early on.
Improve Managerial, Interpersonal and Relationship Skills
Lets face it, we can’t get on with everyone all of the time … or can we? Our perspectives can hinder our interactions with other people causing difficult relationships, uncomfortable exchanges, conflict in teams and negative perceptions of how we are perceived by other people. Coaching can help to create new insights and perspectives leading to more positive outcomes when dealing with others and help managers work with their team more effectively.
Personal Development – Confidence, Assertiveness, Dealing With Fear
Chinks in our personal armour can hamper our ability to perform at our best and achieve our true potential. Coaching is a very powerful way of helping individuals to overcome personal barriers to success.
Acting As A Sounding Board
There is a saying that ‘feedback is the breakfast of champions’ but being at the top can be lonely and feedback scarce, so how do you really know how well you are doing? Senior executives and business owners can benefit enormously simply by having someone there to listen and to act as a sounding board from which to test ideas, check things out and to receive challenging and honest feedback.
Enhance Work life Balance
We all lead busy lives, which can cause us to loose our sense of focus and what is really important to us. It can also take us in the wrong direction from where we really want to head and diminish work performance. Coaching can help to examine perspectives, refocus and look at ways in which to create more balanced and fulfilling personal and work lives.
Making Training More Effective
As the saying goes, ‘use it or loose it’ – some of the key learnings from training courses are often lost because we simply do not practise what we have learnt when we get back to the workplace. Training can be made more effective by using coaching to help individuals implement and practice what has been learnt and at the same time enhance the return on investment. Coaching is a particularly effective intervention in management and leadership development programmes.
Presentation/Interview/Appraisal Skills
Most managers and executives have to give presentations, conduct interviews and appraisals, all of which can be daunting and seem like a scary place to be – but it does not have to be like that at all. Coaching works by helping individuals get to the heart of what’s holding them back to become more effective in their delivery.
Grooming Women For Senior Management Roles
Statistics show that there is a dearth of women represented at senior levels within business. Coaching women can help to improve their visabiliy, prepare for potential promotion and add diversity to the senior management team.
Career Management
The war for talent is on and organisations need to work hard at retaining their best people - employees often become disillusioned because they don't know whre their career is heading within the business and they need help thinking about possible career routes available to them. In the absence of a career discussion, key employees are liable to seek new opportunities and fulfilment elsewhere. Coaching works by helping individuals work out their key drivers and motivations and what they really want to achieve.
Our Approach
Our approach is underpinned with self assessment where appropriate which can be useful at the earlier stages of the coaching practice as a way of gaining greater insight into a persons strengths and weaknesses and way of behaving. This is carried out using 360 degree feedback, MBTI and competency assessment.
We work with executives, middle managers, supervisors and the self-employed. Sessions typically last for one and a half hours over an extended period of time at a mutually convenient location.
We adhere to the Association for Coaching (AFC) 'Code of Ethics' and work with a strong commitment to coaching confidentiality. For further information on the AFC code of ethics, follow the link www.associationforcoaching.com. For more in depth information about coaching and its benefits, please go to the 'Articles' section.