Executive Coaching E-Book

Lewis R. Stern

• Herausgeber: John Wiley & Sons
• Kategorie: Fachliteratur
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 229

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2009

Beschreibung

Understand all the aspects of becoming an executive coach, from acquiring training to marketing your practice, with Executive Coaching: Building and Managing Your Professional Practice. Hands-on information on topics like acquiring the right training and making the transition from other fields is written in an accessible manner by a successful and experienced coach. Whether you’re a novice or an established coach looking to expand your practice, you will benefit from the step-by-step plan for setting up and operating a lucrative executive coaching practice.

Leseprobe

Table of Contents

Title Page

Copyright Page

Preface

Acknowledgements

CHAPTER ONE - Is Executive Coaching Right for You?

WHAT IS EXECUTIVE COACHING?

EXECUTIVE COACHING VERSUS COUNSELING AND PSYCHOTHERAPY

MAJOR DIFFERENCES BETWEEN EXECUTIVE COACHING AND COUNSELING OR PSYCHOTHERAPY

COACHING COMPETENCIES

TYPES OF EXECUTIVE COACHING

EXECUTIVE COACHING CHECKLIST

CHOOSING A COACH

STRUCTURE OF AN EXECUTIVE COACHING SESSION

LEADERSHIP DEVELOPMENT GOALS AND ORGANIZATIONAL RESULTS OF EXECUTIVE COACHING

IS EXECUTIVE COACHING RIGHT FOR YOU?

FINDING CLIENTS BEST SUITED FOR YOU

THIS BOOK WILL HELP YOU BUILD AND MANAGE YOUR EXECUTIVE COACHING PRACTICE

CHAPTER TWO - Assessing Your Competencies as a Professional Executive Coach

CORE COMPETENCIES FOR EXECUTIVE COACHES

PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT PLAN

EXECUTIVE COACHING PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT STRATEGIES

CHAPTER THREE - Building and Marketing Your Value Proposition as an Executive Coach

WHAT IS A VALUE PROPOSITION?

YOUR PROFESSIONAL EXECUTIVE COACHING VALUE PROPOSITION

DEVELOPING A PLAN TO BUILD AND MARKET YOUR PRACTICE

CHAPTER FOUR - Assembling and Managing the Building Blocks of Your Executive ...

ESSENTIAL BUILDING BLOCKS OF YOUR EXECUTIVE COACHING PRACTICE

HOW TO BUILD AND MANAGE YOUR COACHING NETWORK

CREATING YOUR COACHING TOOLBOX

BUILDING YOUR OFFICE INFRASTRUCTURE

HOW TO MANAGE COACHING PROJECTS

HOW TO OPTIMIZE LEARNING FROM PROFESSIONAL AND PEER SUPERVISION

CONDUCTING RESEARCH AND PUBLISHING ARTICLES ABOUT YOUR COACHING

BUILDING COMMUNITY SERVICE INTO YOUR PRACTICE

CHAPTER FIVE - Transitioning into Executive Coaching from Other Specialty Fields

TRANSITIONING FROM MENTAL HEALTH PROFESSIONS

TRANSITIONING FROM BUSINESS MANAGEMENT

TRANSITIONING FROM ORGANIZATION DEVELOPMENT OR MANAGEMENT CONSULTING

TRANSITIONING FROM PERSONAL/LIFE COACHING

TRANSITIONING FROM INTERNAL HUMAN RESOURCES ROLES

TRANSITIONING FROM OTHER SPECIALTY FIELDS

CHAPTER SIX - A Plan for Your Professional Executive Coaching Practice

APPENDIX - Practical Resources for Professional Executive Coaching

References

Index

This book is printed on acid-free paper.

Copyright ©2008 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc. All rights reserved.

Published by John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Hoboken, New Jersey.

Published simultaneously in Canada.

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data:

Stern, Lewis R.

Executive coaching: building and managing your professional practice/by

Lewis R. Stern. p. cm.

Includes index.

eISBN : 978-0-470-52769-6

1. Executive coaching. I. Title.

HD30.4.S.4’07124—dc22 2008002753

Preface

This book is the product of 30 exciting years of professional learning. In those 30 years, I have been privileged to work with thousands of leaders and experts in coaching and consulting around the world. The book is also informed by my recent work in several capacities including: cofounder and chairman of the executive coaching forum; co-founder and board member of the Graduate School Alliance for Executive Coaching; founder, director, and faculty member of the Graduate Certificate Program in Executive Coaching at the Massachusetts School of Professional Psychology; and chairman of the Global Convention on Coaching’s Working Group on Guidelines for Coach Training. The book is a practical, how-to guide for people from diverse backgrounds who are interested in exploring, building, expanding, or better managing their professional practice in executive coaching. I believe this information will be valuable to management consultants, organization development specialists, human resources professionals, and coaches with other specialties. External consultants working from outside the client’s organization, either independently or as part of a consulting firm or group, will find this book a useful guide. Internal consultants, or employees in the organization where their coaching clients work, will discover practical approaches and resources to build and manage their coaching practices from within their organizations.

My motivation for writing this book came from several sources. It has been frustrating to see many people call themselves executive coaches when they do not have the knowledge or expertise to serve their clients well. They have lowered the standards of quality as perceived by coaching clients and the public. I have had the privilege of working with professional executive coaches from varied backgrounds; many of them masters of the art as well as experts in the evidence-based nature of coaching leaders and would-be leaders around the world. I learn from them every day as they establish the highest of standards on which the evolving discipline of executive coaching is built.

There are many talented people in executive coaching who believe in setting rigid entry standards into the field. They maintain that the only people who can do executive coaching are professionals just like them. I do not believe that every executive coach needs to have a master’s or doctorate degree in a specific field, 20 years of experience working in different industries, or a senior executive background. I do believe, however, that a base of knowledge, ability, skills, and attributes is required for anyone to do professional executive coaching as it is defined in this book. I also believe that not every executive coach has to be able to handle every possible coaching situation. Smart people with the right attributes and abilities can learn to be good coaches. This book helps you to assess whether you have these attributes and abilities and what you need to learn or compensate for to be a successful executive coach.

My final motivation for writing this book came from the graduate students and coaches I teach and supervise. Each student arrives with a passion for the field coupled with a lack of confidence about coaching. In their two years of extensive study, these students not only learn theory, principles, and practices—they also gain awareness about themselves and discover how to use their strengths and focus their practice accordingly. But each student also craves practical guidance for building and managing a coaching practice. That is the purpose of this book.

As I wrote this book, I often found myself trying to decide if I should take a stance on a topic I feel strongly about even though others in the field disagree with me. I decided to express my beliefs and opinions without apologizing or feeling obligated to represent other views. Read this book as one professional’s perspective and recommended approaches to executive coaching. I also encourage you to consider differing perspectives and recommendations from other experts in the field.

This book is about what I and others have found to work best when building and managing a professional executive coaching practice. Chapter 1 starts by helping you decide if executive coaching is the right match for you. It offers some shared definitions of the field before getting into the nitty-gritty of what an executive coach actually does. I compare executive coaching to other forms of coaching and to counseling and psychotherapy, contrasting the competencies all coaches need with the specific competencies of executive coaches. Since the core of the definition of executive coaching I use is the double focus on leadership development and accomplishing organizational results, I review common goals for each of these objectives. Chapter 1 also provides checklists of what to do before, during, and after coaching; how to match a leader with the right coach; the role of the human resources professional in executive coaching; what actually takes place in executive coaching sessions; an overview of how to market your coaching services; and some suggestions on how to use this book to start or expand your professional practice as an executive coach.

Chapter 2 provides a detailed self-assessment and 360-degree survey to help you identify your strengths and opportunities for development as an executive coach. It includes a template for your professional development plan.

Chapter 3 gives you a step-by-step guide to creating your value proposition as an executive coach and developing and marketing your practice. This plan is based on not only your business goals, but also your personal and career goals. The marketing plan helps you define your target market and build a plan to penetrate it through networking and a consultative selling approach. Guidelines are provided for an array of marketing approaches including market research, marketing materials, e-mail, the Web, targeted mailings, presentations, publishing, advertising, and partnerships and referral sources.

Chapter 4 is a guide to assembling and managing the building blocks of your practice: a coaching network, toolbox, office infrastructure, coaching project management system, professional and peer supervision, research and publication, and community service. The guide is detailed with specific options, suggestions, and examples of coaching tools, office space, data and file management, technology, project scoping, conducting chemistry checks with potential clients, contracting, assessments, and developing and managing a coaching project plan.

Chapter 5 helps you transition from other professional disciplines or coaching specialties: mental health, business management, organization development and management consulting, personal/life coaching, and internal human resources roles. Key strengths from each field are identified as well as potential barriers, and strategies to make the transition from each specialty into executive coaching are discussed.

Chapter 6 puts it all together and helps you develop a detailed plan for your professional executive coaching practice.

The Appendix is an extensive listing of resources available to executive coaches. It includes articles and books, journals, organizations, web sites, assessments, and tools. These resources are based on my personal experience and the recommendations from over 40 leaders in the field throughout the United States and the world.

As I began to write this book, I intended for it to focus solely on the building and managing of your coaching practice. But much of what I and others have found to be critical to the success of a professional executive coach is how to conduct the actual coaching and support our coaching clients. As a result, this book has ended up being as much about the coaching itself as it is about building and managing a coaching practice.

If you are looking for an academic treatise on research and standards, I encourage you to look elsewhere. This book is for the practical professional with a passion for helping leaders do great things through executive coaching. I wish you the same satisfaction that I continue to experience in my work as a professional executive coach.

Acknowledgments

Executive coaching did not really exist as a defined field when I began my work. I started as a consulting psychologist, counseling, coaching, training, and consulting in education and mental health. Three of my mentors, Murray Sholkin, Steve Sholkin, and Harry Levinson, encouraged me to apply my knowledge to the business world. I owe them all a debt of gratitude for expanding my horizons on where and how to practice.

My work in business started as training and slowly expanded into coaching and consulting. I learned so much about management, leadership, and organization development through my 9 years of work with colleagues at ODI, consulting to leaders in many industries on a global basis. My colleagues at Manchester Consulting made important contributions to the development of executive coaching systems and processes, and I owe them a great deal for sharing their experience and expertise. In the two consulting firms I have run, Focus Consulting and Stern Consulting, I have had the opportunity to work with wonderful clients and tenured professionals in all types of coaching and consulting. My thanks go to all of them for their generosity in sharing their knowledge, expertise, and support.

My professional network has inspired much of this book. I thank my colleagues and friends from the Executive Coaching Forum, the New England Society for Applied Psychology, the Massachusetts School of Professional Psychology, the Graduate School Alliance for Executive Coaching, and the Global Convention on Coaching. Special thanks go to my cowriters of the Executive Coaching Forum’s Executive Coaching Handbook and Core Competencies of the Executive Coach, the foundation on which so much of this book rests. Beyond these more formal groups, there are so many other people from whom I continually learn and receive support. Thank you all for easing the loneliness of the executive coach with your community of shared learning. I would also thank all of my students and supervisees for teaching me through their own wisdom and learning.

As I worked on compiling the Appendix for this book, I found it especially interesting that professionals from different backgrounds and geographic locations recommended very different resources. Executive coaching is truly a diverse discipline.

I have learned about the professional practice of executive coaching from so many sources. Each of them has informed me in my thinking and the resources I use. I cannot acknowledge all of those people here; instead I list the individuals who responded to my request to recommend resources for this book. Thanks to them all for their serious consideration and time in providing their recommendations:

Chris Anderson, United States John Bennet, United States Jennifer Garvey Berger, New Zealand Bob Bonnevie, United States Dianne Brennan, United States Gabriele Buzatu, Australia Alain Cardon, France Naiomi Deutscher, United States Susan Ennis, United States Gabriele Ganswindt, United States Susan Glynn, United States Robert Goodman, United States Diana Hammer, United States William Hodgetts, United States

James Hunt, United States Judy Ingalls, United States Wendy Johnson, United States Carol Kauffman, United States Tomas Kottner, Argentina Martie Lancellas, South Africa Madeleine Mcbrearty, Canada Kathleen Naylor, United States Aletta Odendaal, South Africa Ruth Orenstein, United States Linda Page, United States Carol Pelissey, United States David Peterson, United States Susie Rheault, United States David Rock, Australia Ann Rogers, United States Bill Roiter, United States Anne Scoular, United Kingdom Larry Starr, United States Reinhard Stelter, Denmark Monica Sullivan, United States JB Symons, United States Michele Vitti, United States Mary Watts, United Kingdom Gil Williams, United States Ellen Wingard, United States Robert Witherspoon, United States

Marquita Flemming, Senior Editor at John Wiley & Sons, Inc., deserves my gratitude for her great support, especially in the final stages of preparing the manuscript for publication. And I thank Larissa Hordynsky, independent editor, for working closely with me to transform my often less-than-clear or consistent words into more articulate text.

As part of my “day job,” I have written many handbooks, training manuals, articles, and tools for my clients, students, and other coaches and consultants. When I began to develop this book, however, it quickly became evident that I would have to take time away from family and friends. I thank them all for their unfailing encouragement. My daughters have been the greatest of supports, with Abbie, the younger, serving as my editor and formatter as I began to pull the book together. And of course my dog Samantha was always beside me as I wrote, inspiring me and exerting her calming influence whenever papers flew or the computer malfunctioned yet again.

The person who has shown the greatest patience and support for my work, even when it took time away from the rest of our life, is my wife Jean. She is my coach and mentor. I thank her for being there for me every step of the way, in this process and in our life.

CHAPTER ONE

Is Executive Coaching Right for You?

Many people are attracted to the field of executive coaching. After all, as a coach you are regarded as an expert with the ability to help others succeed and be happy at their game. Doing anything called “executive” sounds professional, smart, and prestigious. As an executive coach with several decades of experience and director of a graduate program in Executive Coaching, I get calls just about every week from a wide variety of people wanting to enter the field.