What is Executive Coaching?

by Paul Jozsef

If you’ve ever found yourself wondering if you could do your job better or with less stress, anxiety, or frustration, you may wish you had someone who could help you and provide guidance. Most people working in managerial positions don’t often get enough one-on-one support as they develop their skills in leading others. Even if you have a college degree behind you and know your industry inside and out, you may lack the confidence due to unforeseen concerns or needs. That’s where executive coaching can help you.

An executive coach has a very specific role in helping you to achieve your work-related or career-related goals. In this way, it is unlike counselling or mentoring programs. Instead, it’s tailored to address your specific goals within the workforce. You’ll have a close relationship with your coach and meet with them one-on-one to discuss your needs and concerns. Let’s dive into what an executive coach can offer to you.

What Does an Executive Coach Do to Support You?

When you meet with your executive coach you’ll have a safe and structured place to talk and discuss your needs, concerns, and goals. Having an external space will allow you to speak openly about your obstacles and challenges without fear of judgment or criticism from within the workplace.

What’s Really Going On?

One of the key benefits of an executive coach is that the focus is on getting to the bottom of what’s really preventing you from achieving your goals. Perhaps you are struggling with communication, or you are so worried about the details of a project you don’t feel you can hand it off to another. Many times, there are underlying factors that play a role in why this happens. In order to be the best version of yourself in the business world, you must have an understanding of what’s beneath the surface:

• Anxiety is a common and hard-to-control component of executive life. It’s often not spoken about, though it impacts nearly everyone in upper management roles. There’s also the component of social anxiety, which the digital age has made even harder to manage.
• Workplace stress limits many people from performing at their highest level on a consistent basis. However, there are tools and resources available to help you to achieve more of what you need to balance this stress. Seeing through it, and working through it, can help you lead your workers through difficult situations.
• For others, there may be concerns about depression. Though it is a mental health issue, it may stem from unanswered questions and concerns about your future and confidence in yourself.
• Anger management isn’t something to push to the side and try to deal with. It leaves many excellent executives unable to achieve their career goals because of liability risks. However, learning to manage your anger now allows you to have the highest level of success in supporting others.

Why Do I Need Executive Coaching?

It’s easy enough to see the value of addressing many of these concerns. Yet, executive coaching isn’t always something that people readily see the benefit from until they attend a few sessions. It can be an eye-opening experience.

It’s also something that’s right for most professionals. Whether you are on your way up or you are leading a company and wondering how you got there, executive coaching helps you manage the day-to-day stressors and limitations you face. Consider a few key statistics. In a study from the Korn Ferry Institute, it was found that:

• 6 percent of people say that stress in the workplace has a negative impact on their personal relationships outside of work.
• 16 percent of people quit their jobs solely because of a stressful or hard-to-manage workplace.
• 66 percent have lost sleep over the amount of anxiety, stress, and frustration they have at work – which can impact their health as well.

More so, the study also found that if a manager or executive is under pressure, feeling stress, and struggling to control a situation, that places everyone in their team at risk for the same complications.

To help you determine if you can benefit from executive coaching, ask yourself a few key questions:

• Do you routinely struggle with self-esteem? Do you sometimes feel like you are not good enough to move up in the company or that you don’t have what it takes to do well?
• Do you find yourself frustrating with things like the meaning of your life or the purpose of it? Do you wonder if you are on the right path?
• Do you struggle with personal relationships, many times due to the stress of the job or because of your career path?
• Do you face depression and anxiety – even if you would never admit this – and it’s impacting your quality of life?
• Do you wish you just knew how to pull it all together to do the best job possible?

Executive coaching is for anyone at any level of leadership that recognizes the value and importance of improving their personal management, professional skills, and leadership abilities to achieve more in their career.

How Does Executive Coaching Work?

One of the key benefits of executive coaching is that it’s very much based on your unique needs. That means you control a great deal of the process from start to finish.

Career Coaching: This area of executive coaching aims to help you to make decisions about how to advance your career. It’s not about finding the next job, but more so about creating a plan that fits your goals and then addressing any underlying factors that could be limiting your success on this path.

Business Coaching: In this ever-increasing world of fast-paced business, business coaching can be critical. It helps you to boost your effectiveness in the workforce, creating opportunities for you to lead your team, make better decisions, and learn how to advance your goals.

Performance Coaching: This is an opportunity to learn about your performance as well as to work on your skills to lead others in performing at their best. It can help you with learning better decision-making skills and how to lead through difficult times.

Leadership Coaching: Another area of focus for some people is how to lead. It’s not often something taught well enough, and yet it can define the success of a business many times over. With leadership coaching, your goal may be to grow as a leader, learn how to value your team members and explore areas to help you address failures you may have.

Within the scope of executive coaching, it’s important to know that this is a fluid environment, one that allows you to simply come in and talk. You’re safe here to open up, express your frustrations, and get to the bottom of any concerns you have. For many men and women, it can be a refreshing experience to know that you do have options for improving your skills on the job and that you can balance your life more fully.

How Can Executive Coaching Help You?

No matter where you are in life, executive coaching offers options and opportunities to improve your future. Take a look at some of the key ways it can help you, based on what your specific goals are.

• Learn how to manage and overcome the anxiety you feel daily at work and at home.
• Explore what your life direction is. Work to define your life’s purpose. This can help you to feel more whole and excited about your day.
• Learn to manage and mitigate workplace stress. Find out how you can lead your team to have a positive experience.
• Tackle any instances of workplace-related anger and frustration. Find out why it happens and how to manage these trying situations.
• Learn more about yourself so you can better understand your self-esteem concerns. You can also work on improving relationships, both at home and at work.

What would it mean for you to bring your life back into focus so that each day was what you wanted it to be?

What Happens During Executive Coaching?

When you come in during an executive coaching session, the first step is always to explore what your goals and needs are. Though many people don’t initially know what they want to overcome, they tend to know why they visit. For example, you may be dealing with a need to learn better leadership skills. You don’t know how to do that, or where to do it, but you know the value it can bring to you as you work to advance your career.

During your initial sessions, you’ll speak to your coach about your concerns and needs. There’s no topic that is off the table when it comes to managing these areas of your life. In short, you want to talk about whatever it is that is limiting you.

A plan is developed. Counselling and mentoring happens. You can get advice and one-on-one support that provides you with actionable steps to help you improve your future and your career. It is nearly always essential to speak openly – this is your time to achieve your goals.

What Happens Next – How to Get Help Now

As a licensed and successful executive coach, Paul works closely with you to achieve your goals. This is a place where you can learn and grow. And, it does not have to be hard to get started. To learn more about the successes Paul’s had supporting other executives, give us a call. Book an appointment with us now to learn more about how we can offer customized care to support you as well.