Executive Coaching in New York
We frequently get asked what’s happening in the New York coaching scene – what are people doing? How do the engagements work, how long do they last, who’s getting coaching, etc. We’ll outline a typical Executive Coaching engagement here to give you an idea:
1. A representative from a company identifies someone who they believe would benefit from coaching. In years past, coaching may have been viewed as a last ditch effort to improve an employee’s skills before they were let go. But more and more, coaching has been used as a key tool to develop employees who are of high potential and on their way up. This is the sweet spot for coaching. I break it into three categories of potential “coach-ees”, and we work with the company to determine where their needs fall:
A. High potential, top performer, senior leader wanting to catapult themselves to their next level of leadership. This is an ideal client, we love these. These people are invested in their own success and valuable to the company as they expand their vision, thinking and capabilities.
B. Employee seen as very valuable to the company but facing some issues. This is probably the majority of calls we get in New York for Executive Coaching. The key here is determining if the employee is invested in their own development. If so, they too can be ideal clients and there’s dramatic shifts seen with their work. If not, and they are uninterested in developing themselves, they are not a suitable coaching client and we’ll decline the engagement.
C. Employee whom the company suspects is on his/her way out, but wants to prove they did everything to give the person a chance. This is an old mindset about coaching and not where it is most useful or successful. We don’t get many of these calls, but if we do, we’ll decline the engagement.
2. Once we’ve determined it’s a good fit – that their needs for Executive Coaching match what we offer, we’ll offer two or three coaches from our credentialed and experienced team for the employee to speak with. We find it useful for the Client to get to choose their coach – after all, it’s someone they will be working closely with over a period of time.
3. When the coach is selected and contract signed, we start the assessment work. For Executive Coaching, this includes conversations with the Client as well as a comprehensive 360 assessment (we have qualitative and quantitative methods available). This gives us a picture of the employee from all sides, as well as a sense of the organization’s culture.
4. The 360 feedback is shared with the Client, and together Client and Coach create a development plan for (typically) the next six months.
5. The client shares their plan with the company representative/their Supervisor/whoever is determined to be supporting the engagement from the company standpoint.
6. Coach and Client speak regularly over six months. They are holding the Client to the plan and addressing any of the obstacles that come up in the way of taking the determined actions or producing the intended result. This is where the rubber meets the road and where the Client typically experiences the issues that are keeping them from the development they seek. It’s the Coach’s role here to reflect what the Client cannot see about themselves, their behavior, their viewpoints or how they get in their own way. Moving through these places with new insight, we begin to see new results from the Client.
7. Progress reports are shared from the Client midway through the process, and at the end of the engagement.
8. The Executive Coach conducts exit interviews as necessary and makes suggestions about further steps to take to support and continue the development.
In New York, this is a typical Executive Coaching engagement over six months. In other parts of the country, we sometimes see longer engagements of nine to twelve months, which are extremely useful. Just think about any habit you’ve had for decades and how long it would take to shift it while maintaining many other balls in the air. What if you didn’t even know you had the habit? What if you liked the habit and didn’t want to give it up even though it wasn’t effective? That’s what we’re looking at with Executive Coaching and why the engagements are valuable beyond six months. But as with many things, New Yorkers tend to want results yesterday and sooner. We’re all for that! And, it requires a commitment to the coaching and the projects the Client develops to make those shifts. They get out of it what they put into it.
Our Executive Coaching work in New York has been extremely successful. If you’d like to discuss how it could benefit your company, please contact us.
Also, we have modified this process for groups. See our Management Training Programs here.