While driving through downtown Kansas City with my wife on one of our “reset” trips, it hit me. No, not my wife – although there were times I may or may not have deserved it – just saying. Instead, the thought rambled around in my noggin. I need to answer the question for my clients, “Why would I hire an Executive Coach?” 

A great question to which I have some great answers. 

Executive Coaches Help Find Blind Spots

Executive coaches help you find your blind spots. We all have them, and they are sometimes hard to see; they’re blind spots, not obvious spots. For example, it can be challenging for someone in operations to understand what the employees on the frontline are going through. I read a Microsoft Work Trends Report, which found that “leaders are out of touch with employees and need a wake-up call.” 

The current remote workspace environment exacerbates this symptom. It takes some real effort for leaders to follow up with staff, discover trouble spots, and get a feel for the company’s current standing with the employees.

Coach training includes using employee surveys and one-on-one meetings with managers. They also have company-wide discussions to discover the root of issues within the company that company leaders do not readily see or understand.

We all can agree that unhappy employees and out-of-touch leaders are a formula for struggles and difficulty in succeeding for any company. 

Executive Coaches Build Confidence

Our doubts are traitors, and make us lose the good we oft might win, by fearing to attempt.

William Shakespeare

Confidence is an essential quality in good leaders. When leaders are confident, they feel self-assured and empowered to make good decisions. As a result, they often make better decisions and will encourage trust and confidence in their employees. The opposite is true in leaders who struggle with self-doubt in making decisions in the presence of others. Self-doubters may appear weak and indecisive, demoralizing employees and compromising unity.

A common saying is “fake it until you make it” this mindset is riddled with flaws. Including false confidence, inauthenticity, and deception can be spotted by the employees and cause them to feel that leaders are untrustworthy. 

Coaches can use self-assessment tools and character-building challenges to help build self-confidence. In addition, coaches have the training to use techniques and strategies to help develop professional leadership in their clients.

Executive Coaches Build on Your Strengths

One of the best things about hiring an executive/business coach is that they help discover and grow the client’s strengths. Coaching focuses on self-awareness with the client to use these strengths for the success of the client and company alike. 

Executive coaching uses their training to help the client discover their strengths. When the leaders understand their strengths, they can put them to use in a way that will help their leadership development. Good leaders can discover employees’ strengths and weaknesses and utilize them for positive outcomes for the company. They are creating an environment of growth, development, and creativity in the organization they serve. 

Manage Change

Hiring an executive coach is an incredible tool to help prepare a company for transitions and change. Organizations will face many challenges of change and the individual within that organization, from the C-Suite to the frontline worker. Professional coaching can help better equip team members to adjust and embrace change. 

Coaches have the skills and training to impact the organization more positively and help facilitate decisions necessary to rise to the challenges. In addition, they provide an invaluable service to help guide and manage the change process.

Goal-Setting

A favorite among executive coaches is goal setting and seeing individuals achieve the desired outcomes toward future rewards. Of course, everyone knows how to set goals. We have all done it before, one time or another. However, executive coaches are skilled in helping the client gain the proper mindset for effective results beyond what the individual could achieve alone.

Executive coaches can help educate leaders on ways to develop dynamic, growing objectives that will significantly benefit the organization. In addition, they can help guide the client through the creative process and avoid the pitfalls of setting unrealistic goals that may not be obtainable and usually result in discouragement and defeat with dreadful consequences.