What Is Leadership Coaching and How Is It Beneficial

Leadership coaching has become critical in today’s modern working world. Industries and technology are evolving fast, and it’s important for companies to continue hiring and developing top talent to keep pace, not to mention retain that talent. 

Leadership coaching is one of the most effective ways to do this, through a process of creating change by developing awareness and growth. It can be a powerful upskill for your organization’s leaders, or potential leaders. But knowing what to look for in leadership development programs, coaches, and results can be a tricky task. 

In this article, we will explore:

• What is leadership coaching and its benefits
• The essential elements of good leadership coaching
• How to find the right leadership coaching for your organization
• The benefits of leadership coaching with Careerminds

Let’s start with the most fundamental question (and the reason you are here): What is leadership coaching in the workplace? 

Leadership coaching is a proven systematic methodology based on behavioral science to assess and enhance the leadership abilities of executives, managers, and high-potential individuals within an organization. It is a partnership between a leader and a coach where both parties are working toward specific shared goals that they establish together. 

Leadership coaching can involve a range of different activities and exercises, including workshops, individual discussions, and self-assessment tools. In some instances, it is delivered one-on-one, and sometimes it involves one coach meeting with a group of leaders or executives to help bring about positive change at an organizational level. 

Either way, the coach’s role is to act as an advisor, strategist, sounding board, and guide to their clients. Their job is to help define a shared plan to reach their client’s goals while also analyzing their current leadership style and how it can be improved. Leadership coaching helps these individuals to develop new ways of thinking about their work and empowers them to improve their performance in a structured and consistent way.

The ultimate goal is to transform the quality of a leader’s professional and personal life while also bringing about sustainable behavioral changes and positive impact for the larger team. Truly effective leadership coaching with one leader can have a ripple effect of benefits throughout the company as they apply what they’ve learned.

With this basic understanding, we can answer the next question of what is leadership coaching and how is it beneficial for your organization? When executed well, there are multiple ways leadership coaching can enhance both individual and organizational performance. 

On an individual level, the highly personalized nature of leadership coaching gives leaders the ability to work on their unique needs and challenges, and feel ownership over the process and their results. It provides them with a safe space to develop both their hard and soft skills, and work through any difficult emotions in the process like anxiety, stress, or even anger. 

Leadership coaching seeks to increase a leader’s self-awareness to facilitate behavioral change and develop a deeper understanding of their impact and abilities. This includes helping them engage with new perspectives, interpretations, and behaviors. They’re able to develop their skills and confidence as a leader, and reach their goals more swiftly and responsively than they could on their own to create more sustainable learning and lasting impact.

As these top-potential employees become more aware of themselves, and the impact they have on their own and others’ effectiveness, they will discover more opportunities for growth and learning. Smart leadership coaching programs guide that discovery process with intentional focus to achieve measurable results that provide transformational change at all levels of leadership in a company. 

Leadership coaching also helps organizations to operate at peak performance in a competitive landscape. The improved skills, effectiveness, and confidence of their leaders and top talent will trickle down to every member of the organization. This could result in improved employee morale, talent retention, company-wide communication, and brand reputation.

The benefits of leadership coaching also naturally apply to the financial success of the company, as all of these improvements strengthen an organization’s ability to exceed business goals, adapt quickly to change, and identify new opportunities to grow the bottom line.

What is leadership coaching then really but an essential tool for modern companies to cultivate strong leadership qualities that can benefit themselves and their employees for years to come. It’s no wonder many companies are incorporating leadership coaching programs into their development strategies in order to optimize their overall productivity and performance.

To help you calculate the benefits of leadership coaching for your situation, feel free to download our free Leadership Development ROI Guide. This is a valuable tool for HR executives to calculate the ROI of any current or future leadership development programs you are considering, and help you demonstrate the value add to your company stakeholders.

Now that you understand what is leadership coaching and how it is beneficial, both for individual leaders and for the organization at large, let’s dive into what qualities make a good leadership coach. Whether you are looking for coaching for your executives, managers, or high-potential individual contributors, good leadership coaching should always include a few essential elements. 

Here are some leadership coaching examples and attributes to look out for in your search for the right program. These are qualities and processes that will ensure the most effective and empowering leadership coaching relationship and results for you and your employees. 

One-to-one ratio: When sessions are one-on-one between coach and employee, the program can be more specifically tailored to each individual leader. This can help produce the most effective results and greatest amount of positive change for the individual and, in turn, for their team as well. While this aspect will depend on your situation and budget, it’s ideal to aim for this ratio in your chosen leadership coaching.

Communication: This goes both ways. The best communication is both the coach asking powerful questions and actively listening, and the client being open and honest with their answers. Look for leadership coaching that emphasizes this level of communication, with transparency and feedback encouraged.

Emotional intelligence: Along with good communication, an effective leadership coach demonstrates and encourages a focus on emotional abilities and understanding by helping leaders to identify and work on their emotions and thought processes as well as their pragmatic skills and competencies. Look for leadership coaching programs that include a focus on vertical development–the development of emotional, cognitive, and relational skills such as self-awareness, growth mindset, empathy, and active listening.

Customized approach: Most leadership coaching programs apply a one-size-fits-all approach that isn’t customized to the individual leaders, their levels, leadership styles, and specific challenges. For example, executive coaching is going to involve different aspects than coaching for mid-level managers, first-time managers, or individual contributors who have potential to grow into leaders. So make sure your chosen leadership coaching takes into account the individual levels and needs of your employees going through the program.

Pacing: The best leadership coaching programs work with your schedule and at the pace that is most effective for you. With open communication comes an importance to share any issues or conflicts, so your coach can adjust the plan and keep your progress moving forward. Look for leadership coaching that mentions this flexibility to work with you on this. 

Measurable results: It’s also vital that your chosen leadership coaching program measures and shares clear data of its results in a transparent way at every well-paced step of the process. Many programs do not offer this adequately enough, but it is an incredibly valuable way for you to track your program’s impact, demonstrate its success, and maintain the momentum that your leaders develop in their leadership coaching.

Partnership: The last, but not least, attribute of great leadership coaching examples is a true partnership between coach and client, where goals are identified and set together, successes and setbacks are shared, and transparency is prioritized at every step from the first intake meeting to the final results. Make sure your chosen leadership coaching program is eager to partner with you on every essential aspect of the process.

As we mentioned above, the key to providing your high-potential employees with these ideal leadership coaching examples and benefits is all about finding the right partner who can provide all of these for you and your individual leaders.

Here at Careerminds, our programs are designed to help us become a true partner to your organization and create a leadership coaching program with you that addresses your specific needs. 

We offer a variety of leadership coaching programs that are designed to help you achieve maximum effectiveness, whatever your unique employee and organizational needs. Our coaches work one-on-one with your leaders to achieve a higher level of performance at their specific level. 

For example, our executive coaching focuses more on enhancing leadership and management skills to achieve organizational goals when the stakes are high. Alternatively, our leadership accelerator for new and emerging managers, or high-potential individual contributors, focuses more on developing and identifying the core competencies and behaviors needed to influence outcomes and lead others. We combine both individual coaching and self-guided learning to help them build these essential leadership and management skills. 

We implement all of this with our proprietary SCORE leadership model that was built from the ground up to ensure the most valuable leadership development, succession planning, and culture for your organization. Here’s what SCORE stands for:

• S stands for: Strengths, abilities, skills, and competencies. We empower executives to harness and develop these core building blocks to become stronger leaders.
• C stands for: Career aspiration and motivation to lead. We help them identify a shared set of goals to work towards together.
• O stands for: Orientation of values and principles. We make sure their career aspirations and goals are aligned with their unique values. 
• R stands for: Resiliency, agility, problem solving, and coachability. We guide them through developing the resilience necessary to thrive in a fast-paced business environment.
• E stands for: Experience, work performance, and organizational visibility. We measure and share the organizational impact of the results they achieve, and ensure they are set up for continued success in their career and life. 

This SCORE model–combined with our people-first approach and accessible digital dashboard, tracking, and tools–is at the core of what makes our leadership coaching programs unique. We know that growth doesn’t happen in a vacuum, that collaborative goal-setting is the foundation of managing that growth, and that open communication, transparency, and clear reporting are essential to bringing that to fruition.

Our leadership coaching solutions are designed for your employees to connect with their coaches and colleagues, track their progress, and utilize our many learning resources to reach their goals and become stronger leaders. So no matter what your unique needs and leadership challenges, we are ready to partner with you to engender measurable and sustainable development for your entire organization. 

When you first reach out to Careerminds about our leadership coaching programs, our experts will begin our thorough intake process with you to better understand your unique situation and what coaching your leaders might need. This includes gathering more information about your background, your desired goals, and the level of coaching needed for your participants, including whether they are individual contributors, managers, directors, vice presidents, or top-level executives. 

Once that intake process is complete, you’ll be assigned your own leadership development coaches to work with you and your participants. Together you will set your program goals, conduct an initial DiSC leadership assessment, and create a customized path for you to begin working towards those shared objectives.

Our coaching process is designed to help your employees achieve their personal and professional goals with support and guidance. Participants have the complete focus and attention of their designated coaches, who will partner with them to ask powerful and probing questions, offer different perspectives, and help achieve what they want in their career and in life. 

Most importantly, our leadership coaching programs are highly tailored to you, with open and compassionate communication, transparency and trust, and the highest level of integrity. Everything we discuss remains confidential. We want to hear your stories, your wins, and your disappointments, as well as your thoughts about the coaching experience. 

We are here to be your true partners, and will always be in your corner with your best interests and your agenda at heart. What’s more, we are also here to help you have fun and enjoy the process. 

Leadership coaching is an incredibly valuable tool for organizations looking to develop their workforce, pivot with the ever-changing business landscape, and stay competitive. The benefits of leadership coaching extend both to the individual leaders, or potential leaders, going through the program as well as to the larger organization. 

The most important step is identifying what you want out of your leadership development, as well as the most essential elements to look for, in order to find the best leadership coaching examples that will fit your specific needs.

At Careerminds, we want to help you achieve that higher level of performance and efficiency on both an individual and organizational level, so everyone in your company can reach their goals. Our leadership coaching programs offer customized solutions that can partner with your unique needs and help every level of employee in your organization learn how to develop their essential skills, transform their habits, improve their productivity and accountability, and increase their effectiveness for themselves and their entire team. 

If you are interested in learning more about our leadership coaching and development services at Careerminds, click below to speak with our experts and find out if we are a fit for your organization.

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Rebecca Ahn

Rebecca is a writer, editor, and business consultant with over 10 years of experience launching, managing, and coaching small to midsize companies on their business, marketing, and HR operations. She is a passionate people advocate who believes in building strong people, teams, and companies with empowering culture, content, and communication that facilitates meaningful results at every level and touchpoint. In her spare time, Rebecca is an avid traveler and nomad who also enjoys writing about travel safety and savvy. Learn more on her LinkedIn page.