·         “It is extraordinary to think you can be excellent at something without a coach. The notion that Roger Federer would not have several coaches is ridiculous. One of the best things that happened to me was to get a coach,” says Richard Baker, a former boss of Alliance Boots, a pharmacy.

As someone who has held a number of C-level posts, the above comments (which were reported in The Economist newspaper) resonated with me very strongly.

I’ve discovered coaching; have you?

This comes from a useful article written by Stephanie Sparrow which first appeared in “Training and Coaching Today” and points to evidence of the science behind coaching: if an executive coach can ask their client the right questions they can stimulate their client’s brain in a new way and generate new insight. However, as the piece goes on to point out, too many questions can get in the way of listening and according to Erik de Haan of the Ashridge Centre of Coaching, “asking only a few questions is the mark of a successful coach”. Sparrow also lays out five useful coaching questions suggested by de Haan together with the intention behind them:

Question: Why is this issue important for you now?

Intention: To discover more about the relationship between the coachee and the issue.

Question: What do you expect from coaching?

Intention: To establish objectives for the coaching.

Question: Where have you come across a similar issue?

Intention: To find out more about the coachee’s reaction to past challenges.

Question: What would you advise yourself?

Intention: To help the coachee take responsibility.

Question: If this is a symptom of something else, what is that?

Intention: To bring out another dimension of the problem.

I look forward to readers sharing their own favourite executive coaching questions…

1.      To develop the capabilities of a high-potential manager       28.1%

2.      To facilitate a transition (in or up)                                   19.4%

3.      To act as sounding board on organizational dynamics          13.0%

4.      To act as sounding board on strategic matters                  12.8%

5.      To address a “derailing” behavior                                     12.4%

The survey also reported that the focus of coaching sessions typically shifts during the course of an engagement for reasons including the following:

“Over time the focus often becomes more strategic and discretionary rather than so immediate and results driven.”

“The more senior the executive, the more likely [it is] that the issues will shift as the engagements tend to last longer—partly because ‘it’s lonely at the top’ and there are many key issues where someone with absolutely no axe to grind can be of great help.”

“As trust and new skills take root, coaching often moves to address underlying beliefs and attitudes for deeper, more lasting change.”

“As the coachee becomes more self-aware and understands more clearly how his/her behaviors impact others, the focus of the work changes, and we work on more in-depth issues.”

“You are given a list of objectives that the sponsor of the program has discussed with the coachee and the coach. That becomes the roadmap. But coaching can have a lot of twists and turns.”

The whole report, The Realities of Executive Coaching, which was published in January 2009, can be downloaded at http://coachingreport.hbr.org

Often coaching is about finding the right question to ask: the one that opens your client’s mind to some completely new insight. To do this you have to keep approaching your client’s issue from all sorts of directions. It is a little like being a fossil hunter: gently tapping away at a stone until it cracks open to reveal a perfect specimen hidden inside.

I had an interesting experience recently with a coachee (she happens to be an experienced executive coach) who presented me with a personal issue that had bothered her for many years. I did not feel entirely comfortable with my ability to address her concern and wondered whether it might be something that I should refer to someone with different specialist skills to my own. Nevertheless I thought it worth spending a little time exploring before jumping to any conclusions. After questioning her closely for about twenty minutes I seemed to be getting nowhere and I was feeling more and more uncomfortable with the subject matter. Pulling myself together I put all my focus into thinking laterally about my coachee’s situation and I persisted with the questioning even though some of the questions I was coming up with could have seemed rather odd.

Then suddenly I asked her the “right” question and her whole demeanour changed. It was like cracking open the stone and finding a fascinating fossil inside. She had discovered that a critical assumption about her concern was not what she thought it was and that gave her a whole new perspective: we had broken through a barrier in her thinking. In itself this did not “solve” anything but it did provide us with a step forward in addressing her overall issue.

The lesson here is that it is not always possible to crack open a stone in twenty minutes but do not give up: keep coming in from different angles and you’ll get there eventually.

[Thanks to Cris Janzen for planting the seed that inspired this blog entry.]

Are you trying to create an executive coaching program for the first time? Or maybe you want to improve an existing executive coaching program. I’ve highlighted some important practical considerations from Executive Coaching for Results: The Definitive Guide to Developing Organizational Leaders by Brian Underhill, Kimcee McAnally and John J Koriath. Click here to find a fuller excerpt from their book.

Culture and Leadership Support

If your organization hasn’t used executive coaching for high performers before you should seek a credible executive to sponsor your coaching program. Identify those senior managers who might be more willing to give it a try and ask whether any of them already work with executive coaches or who know others who do. You could also consider some small steps to start with: add a couple of coaching sessions to reinforce existing training courses; or maybe focus on providing coaches for newly promoted leaders. Build momentum by collecting and publicizing testimonials from successful coachees.

Marketing and Communications

A coaching program will need some level of internal marketing to properly position the effort throughout the organization. In a smaller firm, word of mouth may be fine but in a large organization you might need something like an internal website. Communicating the roles and responsibilities of all parties involved with coaching is also key: briefing the executive to be coached; expectations for HR or the coachee’s boss and other stakeholders.

Matching

The personal match between an executive and their coach is absolutely critical. In the matching process you need consider whether the executive is assigned a coach or gets to choose; whether the executive can interview coach candidates, and if so, how; how to check that the match remains good as the assignment progresses and what you should do if things go wrong.

Instrumentation

Most executive coaching begins with some sort of feedback process and you will need to think about how this feedback will be collected: interviews or a 360-degree tool; internally designed or off‐the‐shelf? Can the coach use his own tools? Who has access to the feedback results?

Assignment Activities

You will need to decide how long assignments should last: six months or twelve months? Should these lengths vary by leader or level in the organization? Can executives upgrade from shorter to longer lengths if desired? Who pays for the coaching: the executive’s budget, a central corporate budget, or some combination? How often should coaching take place and who decides? You will also need to consider how action plans from coaching are generated and what follow up work is required with the executive. Further feedback reviews may be part of your plan.

Outcomes

How will you measure the success of your executive coaching program? Here are some areas to consider:

• Satisfaction: Is the leader satisfied with the coach? Will this satisfaction be measured, and, if so, how?  
• Progress: Did the leader make progress back on the job as a result of coaching? Will you measure this through a repeat 360, a mini-survey or an assessment from the executive’s boss? 
• Return on investment: Will this be measured? How?  

Internal Coaches

Will internal coaches be used? Do you need a coach to coach your coaches? What are the boundaries of confidentiality for internal coaches? Is this a part time assignment; will they have enough time or be focused enough for this job? Are they viewed as credible and trustworthy in the organization?

Coach Sourcing

Finding high quality coaches is an ongoing challenge for the human resources and leadership development professional. Look for full service coaching vendors, coach referral networks, recommendations from other companies, professional associations and the internet. Many coaches approach leadership development professionals and company’s leaders directly. In screening your executive coaches you will have to judge the right balance of criteria such as business experience, coaching experience, industry experience, match to the organization’s culture, ability to build rapport, cost and certification.

Coach Community

Building a pool of executive coaches can be a great way for you to strengthen your ability to deliver an effective executive coaching program. Think about how to forge good links with the executive coaching community in general and with your favoured coaches in particular.

Logistical Considerations

You will need to consider the practicalities of contracting with your executive coaches (a formal contract and confidentiality agreement) and how they will invoice for their services. You may need to agree how travel expenses are handled too. Finally, you will need to decide what resources you need to manage the coaching operation: from scheduling meetings to organizing feedback.

Good luck!

The Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology (SIOP) is sponsoring a conference next month focusing on the psychology of coaching, the impact of coaching and best practices in coaching that maximise return on investment (ROI).

A study by The Human Capital Institute and DBM found that 60% of American companies use executive coaches and 78% consider coaching an effective way to develop leaders. But although most coachees and their managers agree that executive coaching is a valuable exercise, the managers need credible evidence to show top management that coaching is a worthwhile expenditure.

The SIOP conference will bring together leading-edge scientists and practitioners to explore meaningful ways to measure the value and return from investing in executive coaching. With executive coaching costing $20,000 to $40,000 for a six-month engagement, it is easy for decision makers to focus strictly the costs especially if they do not have a clear understanding or first-hand experience of the value that coaching. These decision makers need to be convinced that, if properly executed and deployed, an investment in executive coaching can add significantly to their business bottom line.

Watch this space for news on the conclusions from the SIOP conference.

As I mentioned in my recent post about Edward de Bono’s Six Thinking Hats, a significant part of executive coaching is about helping people to make better decisions by encouraging them to think about issues in new ways. A great way to do this is through the use of metaphors, stories and parables.

When reading this week’s sales tip from negotiation guru Tom Beasor I was reminded of the story recounted by Steve Andreas in the forward to the neuro-linguistic programming book “Frogs into Princes” by Richard Bandler and John Grinder.

In the story, a boilermaker was hired to fix a huge steamship boiler system that had broken down. The shipping company owner was in a real flap because his cargo was delayed and he ran the risk of losing the best price for his shipment. Meanwhile the workers still had to be paid and costs were mounting so the owner hired the boilermaker to fix the problem.

The boilermaker listened to the engineer’s description of the problems and asked a few questions then went to the boiler room. He looked at the maze of twisting pipes, listened to the thump of the boiler and the hiss of escaping steam for a few minutes and felt some pipes with his hands. Then he hummed softly to himself, reached into his overalls, took out a small hammer and tapped a bright red valve, once. Immediately the entire system began working perfectly, the boilermaker went home and the ship sailed within the hour.

When the steamship owner received a bill for $1,000 he complained that the boilermaker had only been in the engine room for fifteen minutes, and requested an itemized bill. This is what the boilermaker sent him:

For tapping with hammer:          $ 0.50

For knowing where to tap:      $ 999.50

Total:                                $1,000.00

So…How much would you pay an experienced executive coach who makes a significant difference to your bottom line?

Do you know where to tap?

In a report published last year in Personnel Today, human resources consultancy Chiumento gave some good advice on how organizations can maximize their return on investment (ROI) in executive coaching. Your HR department is probably best placed to play a coordinating role in acting on these simple suggestions.

• At the beginning, discuss and agree what you want to achieve from executive coaching with the coach, the coachee and their sponsor or manager. 

• Ensure that these target outcomes are not only realistic but specific enough to avoid any misunderstanding. They should be genuinely relevant to the coachee’s professional development as well as to the business.

• Draft a “coaching contract” that records these target outcomes and agree at the outset with the coach, the coachee and the sponsor that the targets will form the basis of measuring success of the coaching assignment.

• Develop measures that can be used to monitor success against the coachee’s targeted outcome.

• Get regular feedback during the coaching assignment from a cross-section of other staff.

• Have a half-time review with the coach and coachee to ensure that the assignment is on track and to take corrective adjustment where needed.

• Establish a coaching budget and monitor the costs and hours of coaching against your budget and your arrangements with your coaches.

• Manage the coaches in your organization and be clear about those that deliver quality and those that don’t.

• Integrate coaching with other development initiatives within your organization such as succession planning and performance management.

• Make sure that business leaders are involved in reviewing the effectiveness of coaching. Coaching is much more than delivering statistical improvements like staff retention rates. The involvement of business leaders will significantly improve the way that coaching provides significant tangible improvements to the bottom line.

In my opinion, this last point is the most important. An effective coaching programme that delivers material and lasting benefits to the bottom line will only work if it has the involvement of a fully committed member of the business leadership team.

“An antelope grazing in Africa hears a sound in the grass. Immediately all the neuronal clusters concerned with danger are activated so that the lion is recognized as soon as it emerges from the grass, and the antelope is able to escape. Such sensitization is a key part of how the brain works and why it is so efficient.”

So begins the introduction of “Six Thinking Hats” the book about strategies for improving thinking by Edward de Bono, the guru who coined the term lateral thinking. According to de Bono if we are to be good thinkers we need to be able to maximize our brain sensitivity in different directions at different times. As he says, “It is simply not possible to have that maximum sensitization in different directions all at the same time.”

A significant part of executive coaching is about helping people to make better decisions by encouraging them to think about issues in new ways. Edward de Bono’s “Six Thinking Hats” provides a good framework for this by giving people new perspectives on a situation so they can spot issues and opportunities which might otherwise be missed.

The “Thinking Hats” are described as follows:

White Hat

White is neutral and objective. The white hat is concerned with objective facts and figures. When wearing this thinking hat you focus on facts not opinions or feelings. You listen out for information that is not grounded in fact and you stay neutral and objective.

Red Hat

Red suggests anger (seeing red), rage and emotions. The red hat gives the emotional view. If you put on the red thinking hat you look at a situation using intuition, instinct or emotion. You listen to your gut but also try to think about other people’s feelings.

Black Hat

Black is sombre and serious. The black hat is cautious and careful. It points out the weaknesses in an idea. With this thinking hat on you try to see the negative side and why something might not work. By being pessimistic or defensive you highlight weaknesses and wearing the black hat can help you test the resilience of your theories about a situation or anticipate pitfalls and avoid failure.

Yellow Hat

Yellow is sunny and positive. The yellow hat is optimisitic and covers hope and positive thinking. Hope is a powerful emotion and positive thinking helps you see benefits and opportunities as well as keeping you focused through a tough period.

Green Hat

Green is grass, vegetation and abundant, fertile growth. The green hat indicates creativity and new ideas. Putting on the green hat helps you to think about creative solutions to a problem.

Blue Hat

Blue is cool, and it is also the colour of the sky, which is above everything else. The blue hat is concerned with control, the organization of the thinking process and the use of the other hats. Wearing the blue thinking hat helps you to stand back and manage the process of thinking as opposed to the content or the thoughts themselves. 

Executive coaches should encourage their clients to try on different hats while they are being coached. This gives the coachee a richer appreciation of their situation and provides them with more choices and better solutions.

And this isn’t just for coachees; when coaching their clients, executive coaches should make sure they try on all the different hats themselves too.

Executive coaching works because of the tools and processes that executive coaches use with their clients. Perhaps another way to ask the above question is “How does executive coaching work?”

Executive coaching methodologies draw on a variety of disciplines from business management, leadership theory, behavioural psychology, adult learning models, systems theory, neuroscience and neuropsychology. Neuropsychology, for example, is an interdisciplinary branch of psychology and neuroscience that aims to understand how the structure and function of the brain relate to specific psychological processes and overt behaviours. Greater understanding about the way the brain works can help us learn how to change our behaviour to improve our effectiveness.

The human brain has evolved over millions of years to deal with some pretty basic survival needs. Part of the brain called the orbital cortex is built to detect changes in our environment and alert us to anything unusual. The orbital cortex is also very closely connected to the amygdala which is where the brain processes fear; this is very helpful when you are face to face with a sabre-toothed tiger. But the orbital cortex and amygdala compete for processing energy with the prefrontal region of the brain which is where a lot of higher intellectual functions operate. So when we are under stress or faced with a challenging environment we tend to act more emotionally and impulsively as our animal instincts start to take over our logical and rational thought processes. This is can be less than helpful in a business situation.

By learning from other disciplines, executive coaching can help clients improve their self-awareness and help them explore how to improve their effectiveness. Executive coaches help their clients analyse their goals more objectively and make decisions about what actions they wish to take to achieve those goals. The executive coach provides a framework for this and to support their client make permanent changes in their behaviour to help them achieve their desired objectives.

This example of the relationship between the orbital cortex and the amygdala is just one of many ways in which other disciplines contribute to the executive coaching profession. A good executive coach is alert to new insight from other fields and draws his tools from other branches of learning. Here are some examples of such tools:

• Using lateral thinking techniques to help re-frame issues and give alternative perspectives to problems
• Exploring a client’s core values and how these values influence their personal decision making process
• Identifying the core motivation behind an objective
• Helping a client to identify the full range of their skills and strengths as well as undeveloped opportunities
• Helping a client to brainstorm alternative courses of action to generate greater choices or a wider range of potential solutions
• Provide a non-judgemental, non-threatening, trusting environment to encourage creative thought
• Encouraging a client to express their goals as SMART objectives
• Driving behavioural change through a disciplined and action-oriented development plan

Part of the success of executive coaching stems from the fact that it isn’t just a one off exercise but a sustained period of learning. Executive coaching is not like a morning spent in a seminar being told something that is forgotten within a couple of weeks. Executive coaching is about a close focus on a particular aspect of your personal improvement until it becomes second nature – lodged in your subconscious so you can work towards your goals armed with a new way of thinking and equipped with new skills, behaviours and habits that stick with you for years.