The trouble with “life coaching”

The other day a “life coach” called me up to discuss the Center for Executive Coaching’s Executive Coach Training Program. After our call he noted that he wished he had found the Center for Executive Coaching program sooner, because he wanted to focus on executive coaching, not life coaching.

There are many life coaching programs out there, and even certifying bodies to regulate the life coaching industry. If you are a member of a local chamber of commerce, you probably meet life coaches all the time at networking events, where — along with real estate agents and insurance salespeople — they try hard to network and get clients.

I don’t have anything against life coaches, but I do find that, generally speaking, their methodology is quite incomplete and superficial when it comes to coaching executives. Like any good executive coach, they learn basic listening skills. They know how to help people set goals and hold them accountable for action. And they can ask questions to help people figure out the obstacles in their way and move forward to overcome them.

At the same time, life coaching seems extremely light on the kind of content that gets results for executives — whether in for-profit, non-profit, or governmental organizations. Most life coaching programs are missing content about critical thinking skills and organizational decision making, strategic leadership, governance, motivating employees, managing up, building a power base, informal influence in organizations, change management, financial analysis, career management and development, and specific obstacles that executives commonly face.

A good executive coach brings three domains to his or her clients: content (the substance of leading a successful organization); process (the way to coach executives); and context (the “inner game” of leadership). If you want to coach executives, you had better master all three of these three domains. Executives do not have patience for people who aren’t focused directly on helping them get results, and certainly not for the kind of fluff that many life coaching programs teach.

Also, executive coaches understand how to market their services in ways that are not tacky or awkward. You won’t see executive coaches going to low-level networking events at a chamber of commerce. Rather, you will see them acting as thought leaders in their target market, writing articles, speaking, doing research, and building a large network of executive-level clients who rave about them.

If you are considering becoming a coach, be sure that you know which types of clients you want to serve and find a program that helps you succeed with those types of clients.

How to avoid providing your services and advice for free to a prospect

One of the problems that many executive coaches face is how to avoid giving free but valuable advice to a prospect.

Because most people don’t want to hire a professional, many prospects are pretty savvy at asking questions to get “free consulting” before making a hiring decision. At the same time, because we like to show our expertise, some of us have a tendency to provide valuable advice for free — even enough so that a prospect doesn’t have to hire us at all!

Here is what I do when I sense that a prospect values my advice, keeps asking me questions to help his or her business, and yet won’t move forward to work with me on a fee basis:

“I really appreciate these questions, but I’m sensing that we are moving into an actual engagement, and that right now I’m giving away my services for free. Could I suggest that we set up a formal coaching engagement? That way, I can give you all the advice you need without worrying about whether you are going to hire me or not.”

Most serious prospects will agree at this point. However, the above approach also separates out those prospects who really only want free advice. If the prospect says something to the effect of, “Well, of course I intend to hire you, but I just have a few more questions…” then you know that you might not have a serious prospect — especially if his questions are about what you know or problem solving in nature and not about the scope of an engagement.

At that point, I say, “Well, those are exactly the issues we will cover during a coaching relationship. I’ve given you a good sense of how I work, and answered many of your questions so far. At this point, I really feel like you are getting my services for free. I can’t answer any more questions like this without an agreement in place.”

Of course, I happily answer questions about scope, my general approach, and the results I can achieve. But I don’t do free work.

Last week I utilized the above approach with a prospect who had called me again and again with marketing questions. Now the calls have stopped and I know he wasn’t serious about hiring me. So I can move onto other things and not remain under the illusion that if I just answer another question I’ll get the assignment. This person had no intention of engaging my services.

Because most executive coaches are smart and highly skilled, we tend to enjoy showing what we know. Unfortunately, this tendency can cost us time and money, and cause us to focus on prospects who will never hire us.

Don’t give your services away for free!

The genesis of an executive coach

I remember working with the Chief Operating Officer of a large healthcare system. My team of three analysts had just spent three months and countless hours benchmarking the organization’s productivity to determine the opportunity to improve. We had developed reams of PowerPoint documents with charts comparing the system to dozens of other, similar healthcare systems nationwide. We had databases, Excel Spreadsheets, comments from the system’s management, hundreds of Medicare cost reports, and up-to-date input from a network of leading clinical managers from around the nation.
Our analysis was sound, complete, and better than any other consulting firm could have provided.

We discovered that the hospital had the opportunity to save about $12 million in costs without hurting quality.

The COO had just reviewed this material with me, and looked across the table at me.

“That’s about right,” he said. “I was guessing $10 to $15 million.”

This COO had just spent about $250,000 of his organization’s money to come up with a number he already knew. But we both already understood that he had to use an outside firm to justify his instincts to his Board and management team.

Then he surprised me. “I didn’t hire you for this analysis,” he said. “And I didn’t hire you to help us achieve our cost target, because my management team can do that without you. I hired you because I need someone to walk me through the pain that this change program is going to cause. I need someone I can trust, who will support me when the going gets tough.”

It was at that point that the power of Executive Coaching became clear to me. The executives I had been working with were competent, and usually knew what they had to do. But they needed someone who could serve as a sounding board, provide insights, and help them to stay focused and resilient in the face of enormous challenges and pressure.

Many of these executives perceived more value in a few 30-minute meetings with a trusted, supportive advisor than they did in a quarter million dollars worth of highly-
educated analysts on a consulting team. They knew ahead of time what the analysts would find. What they needed was someone who could help them make tough
decisions and do what it took to improve performance.

So I tried an experiment. I started focusing more on Executive Coaching, and less on analysis/consulting.

The results were excellent. I did less work, made more money, and had more fun — without the hassles of managing teams of consultants. My relationships with clients got stronger, and I could work with more executives than before. I worked on more interesting engagements, often by phone and without having to travel.

A wide variety of executives were looking for coaching, although they didn’t use the word “coaching” too often (and neither should you, as you will see when you sign up
for our Certified Executive Coach program).

The problems they faced involved the following issues, among others:

• Gain more influence in their organization.

• Launch a new initiative.

• Get commitment and build alignment among
their executive team.

• Improve their business relationship with their boss.

• Implement difficult changes.

• Grow their organization.

• Improve their leadership skills as they ventured
into new, unfamiliar areas.

• Quickly gain knowledge about new functions (e.g., marketing, finance) where they lacked experience.

• Make a transition to a new role or organization.

• Avoid burn out and balance work, family, hobbies, and health.

• Make decisions with incomplete information.

• Get clarity about organizational strategy and direction.

• Make improvements in response to negative feedback from colleagues.

Usually they had good instincts about what to do and needed someone like me to listen to their concerns, serve as a sounding board, debate with them, ask probing questions, and – when appropriate – to offer advice and insights.

I helped in other ways as well. I interviewed colleagues and constituents to gather input and advice in a safe, objective, and confidential way. I structured and facilitated short meetings with a Board of Directors or management team to gather ideas and develop
consensus. Sometimes I led training sessions and workshops with management and up-and-coming managers about key management topics.

I would never go back to traditional consulting work. Executive Coaching is far too rewarding, in terms of both value to me and value to my clients.

What about you? Are your ready to jump in and startearning the income you deserve, without excessive travel, office expenses, or burdensome hours?

Then sign up today to get Certified as an Executive Coach.

Executive Coaching defined

Executive adj : having the function of carrying out lans or orders etc.; “the executive branch” n 1: person responsible for the administration of a business 2: persons who administer the law : someone who manages a government agency or department.

Coach. n 1: (sports) someone in charge of training n athlete or a team 2: a person who gives private nstruction (as in singing or acting) 3: a railcar where assengers ride 4: a carriage pulled by four horses with one driver 5: a vehicle carrying many passengers;
used for public transport; “he always rode the bus to work” 1: teach and supervise (someone); act as a trainer or coach (to), as in sports; “He is training our Olympic team”; “She is coaching the crew” 2: drive a coach.

Source: WordNet ® 2.0, © 2003 Princeton University
via www.dictionary.com

We at The Center for Executive Coaching like to define Executive Coaching broadly as follows:

Executive Coaching is an efficient, high-impact process that helps high-performing people in leadership roles improve results in ways that are sustained over time.

It is efficient because, unlike traditional consulting ssignments, it does not require invasive processes, large outside teams, and lengthy reports and analyses to get results.

It is a high-impact process because Executive Coaches ypically work with clients in short meetings (i.e., 30 minutes per session). During this time, the coach and client can generate important insights, gain clarity, focus, and make decisions to improve performance.

Executive Coaching works with high-performing people in leadership roles. It is not therapy, meant to “fix” a person. As an Executive Coach, your clients are already
highly functioning, successful people. Like any of us, they need support from time to time in order to perform better.

Finally, your goal as an Executive Coach is to improve results in ways that are sustainable over time. Your clients want some sort of outcome, usually related to improved profits, career success, organizational effectiveness, or career and personal satisfaction. If you aren’t helping your clients get results, you aren’t doing your job. At the same time, coaching is about helping people improve their own capabilities and effectiveness, so that the results and performance improvements last. To use the
time-worn and famous quote, you are teaching people to fish, not feeding them for a day.

The formal definition of a coach is very interesting. Many coaching programs don’t like the idea of Executive Coaches being like sports coaches. They prefer to have coaches asking lots of great questions so that the client suddenly has an “ah-ha” moment and figures things out on his or her own. While this is one perfectly acceptable form of coaching, it is not enough. Sometimes you need to intervene, the way that a sports coach does. You needto make observations, provide tools, move the conversation forward, motivate, and sometimes give a firm kick in the pants.

You can incorporate the practices of Executive Coaching into almost any profession that works with entrepreneurs, executives, managers, and up-and-coming leaders in
an organization.

For instance, if you are a management consultant, you likely already provide coaching as part of what you do. Executive Coaching is the part of the engagement where you work one-on-one with executives to encourage them to make difficult decisions, step out of their comfort zone, stop destructive behavior, embrace change, and shift performance.

For me, a long-time consultant, Executive Coaching is the fun part. It’s when you stop doing the analyses (and most of the time the client already knows the
answer anyway), stop revising the PowerPoint presentation, and sit down face to face with the client to help them improve results. It’s the part of the engagement where the client turns to you as their objective, trusted advisor, as a colleague and confidant.

If you are already a “life coach,” Executive Coaching can help you put some more “meat on the bones” of your coaching content. Too many life coaches lack concrete, results-driven content that resonates with executives.

Executive Coaching combines three components that can help you take your life coaching practice to the next level: process, content, and context. Process is the way you coach Executives, covered in our program. Content refers to your knowledge and ability to
contribute insights with relevance and impact: how to communicate effectively, strategic thinking, marketing insights, operational improvement, organizational development, leadership skills, and financial management (also covered in our program). Context is about who you are, and who you help your client to be – namely how to help them be more effective as a leader in their organization and as a person.

Executive Coaches get involved in all three domains, and our program covers all of these areas.

For people who offer training programs, Executive Coaching provides a new platform for you to adapt your materials. Instead of leading group programs, you can use your training materials to coach executives one-on-one. (And the reverse applies: Executive Coaches often offer training programs).

It is also important to be clear about what Executive Coaching is NOT.

Executive Coaching is not therapy. You are not fixing anybody. However, you can ask powerful questions that inquire about why a client behaves the way they do. What are their beliefs and values that might be causing them to behave the way they do? How can they embrace more empowering beliefs and values to get the results they want to get?

Likewise, Executive Coaching is not the same thing as interim management. You are not stepping in to do the job for your client. Instead, you are a “shadow leader” working behind the scenes to help your client succeed and improve in lasting ways.

Third, your job as an Executive Coach is not a “crystal ball” who magically provides an answer. As a coach, you will intervene and provide advice when appropriate. But successful coaches engage in dialogue with their clients, and then customize a tool or solution that works for their unique situation. Sometimes there is no easy answer, and your value will be to support your clients in making decisions with incomplete information.

Ready to learn more? Sign up today to become a Certified Executive Coach.

The most rewarding moment in an executive coach’s day

Without doubt, for me at least, the most rewarding moment in an executive coach’s day is when a client has a powerful realization and suddenly gains insights about how to be better.

This can happen in one of two ways:

1. You ask some great open-ended questions (via what we call “inquiry”) so that the client has an insight on their own.

2. You make an observation and the client sees new possibilities.

When this happens, the entire premise of executive coaching is realized. That is, you can have short, high-impact meetings with executives — without intrusive consulting projects — and generate incredible value.

For instance, the other day I was working with a long-time client of mine to help him improve the performance of a new business unit. As I asked him questions, he realized that he was not holding his team accountable for the performance he wanted them to achieve. He immediately saw opportunities to engage his team more effectively and focus them on the activities that would generate the best results.

Once he had this insight, I could see his entire demeanor change. He was more relaxed and confident. To borrow the old cliche, he seemed like a weight had been lifted.

There’s no better feeling — for the client or for the executive coach.