Some executives use coaching to learn specific skills, others to improve performance on the job or to prepare for career moves in business or professional life. Still others see coaching as a way to support broader purposes such as an agenda for major organizational change. To an outsider, these coaching situations may look similar. All are based on an ongoing, confidential, one-on-one relationship between coach and executive. Yet each coaching situation is different, and these distinctions are important to recognize--if only to foster informed choice by everyone involved. This report explores key distinguishing factors among coaching situations, and defines four distinctly different coaching roles. Case examples explore how these roles apply to common coaching issues facing executives and their organizations today.
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First to focus on executive coaching, still a resource today,
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This review is from: Four Essential Ways That Coaching Can Help Executives (Paperback)
I'm Robert Witherspoon, the lead author of FOUR ESSENTIAL WAYS THAT COACHING
CAN HELP EXECUTIVES (Center for Creative Leadership: 1997), along with Randall P. White. OVERVIEW This is a book presents our early thinking about executive coaching: what it is, its power in creating positive change, and how coaching can be used by executives and their organizations. Looking back, it was one of the first paperbacks to focus on executive coaching as a professional relationship--as distinct from a managerial function, or what might be called "managerial coaching" (e.g. as part of a boss's responsibility to develop subordinates, often in conjunction with an annual performance review). We also focused specifically on helping successful people change behavior, since most people we worked with were very successful by any socioeconomic standard. (By contrast, much had been written about dealing with people with reasonably dysfunctional behavior--alcoholics, etc.--but these were not our clients.) THE EARLY THINKING FOUR ESSENTIAL WAYS began as a series of conversations about executive coaching by two practicing coaches. Randy and I came from different traditions. I had founded Performance & Leadership Development Ltd. (P&L) in 1990 to focus on executive coaching and organization development consulting. Before then I'd been a partner at Arthur Andersen with a career in business and consulting. Randy started in private practice in 1994 after a career at the Center for Creative Leadership, where we'd first met. He was formerly in charge of executive coaching and customized programs at CCL, and had published widely on leadership development and related topics. While we worked separately, we sometimes paused to compare notes about our respective practices. Over the course of these conversations we came to spend long hours exploring the purpose of executive coaching--as expressed by our clients when they sought us out--the roles that coaches play, and the various situations in which these roles unfold. When we began these conversations in the early 1990s, coaching was very new in the executive suite. So clear goals and roles were especially crucial--both for getting started and for sustained success. (They still are, although executive coaching has increased dramatically in popularity over the past decade.) Our executives used coaching for a number of reasons: * to learn specific skills; * to improve their effectiveness in a current role; * to prevent derailment, or to prepare for career moves; or * to support a larger agenda, such as obtaining better business results. True, each coaching situation was different. But some distinctions were essential to recognize, both to establish focus for the coaching relationship, and to foster informed choice by everyone: the executive (and possibly family members), the executive's boss, the human resources representative, and the coach (or coaches) providing the service. So in writing the book, Randy and I wanted to probe the key distinguishing factors among the coaching situations we encountered daily in our practices. SINCE THEN... FOUR ESSENTIAL WAYS was published in 1997 and has been widely read by executives, coaches, organization development practitioners, and others. As a result, the coaching continuum defined there has become a useful working model for many people in the coaching process. For some readers, the work, and other recent contributions to the field have fostered a dialogue about executive coaching and the state of the practice, at research centers such as the Executive Development Roundtable, professional conferences, and elsewhere. Overall, reader reactions to the coaching continuum model have been positive. Consider these comments from several perspectives. * Executives in coaching seemed to readily grasp these distinctions and apply them in coaching conversations. I regularly refer to the different coaching roles in my work with executives and organizations (e.g. to clarify expectations and contract for new coaching engagements). * Some organizations employed the coaching continuum to "prime the pump" for coaching in their executive populations. One global professional services firm, for example, gave FOUR ESSENTIAL WAYS to its partners after an elite leadership development program with these words, "read this, consider which coaching fits your needs, then let's contract with a coach to help you work on your agenda over the coming year." * Other organizations started to use the coaching continuum, and some or all of the four coaching roles, as a common language to manage both internal and external coaches for their formal coaching programs for executives. * Colleagues in the coaching field have also been positive. One seasoned coach, for example, said I had helped her to see "the field of coaching in a much more multi-dimensional way." * Several researchers have been favorable. One wrote me, "Your... continuum of roles and distinctions among [each has been] very helpful in researching coaching." So far, readers have focused more on the coaching continuum model (the "what") than a larger practice theory (the "why") for executive coaching. STAY TUNED Looking ahead, I hope FOUR ESSENTIAL WAYS, and other contributions to the field, can continue to foster a dialogue about the roles coaches play. I see a future where coaching is widely available in organizations, and where coaching practice is informed by insights from an evolving practice theory for coaching executives. I continue to coach, to teach, and to write on these subjects--more recently in LEADERSHIP COACHING: HOW THE WORLD'S GREATEST COACHES HELP LEADERS TO LEARN (Jossey-Bass: 2000), edited by Marshall Goldsmith, Laurence Lyons, and Alyssa Freas. I'm happy to say this book has been hailed by Warren Bennis as "the single best collection of writers and writings on executive coaching."
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