Coaching in a 21st-century context.
Recent forecasts indicate that talent turnover in the United States looms as an issue, especially voluntary job-changing and with high-performers (PricewaterhouseCoopers 2013). Recognition, values alignment, and sense of purpose and pride will become increasingly important for talent retention compared with pay and promotion (Circle Research 2012; Hay Group 2011). The overarching leadership competency required for fostering those talent magnets is “developing others.” But data from many years of competency assessment conducted by Korn Ferry has shown that developing others routinely falls near the bottom. Leaders can no longer afford to neglect this area.
The coaches in the survey validated this as an area of concern and pointed to specific ways to improve a leader’s practice in motivating and engaging personnel. Two of the top ten coaching themes across all levels of leadership were “motivation and engagement skills/ leading with vision and purpose” and “mentoring and developing others.”
Because coaching is based on the relationship between coach and client, some coaches identified the coaching dynamic as a type of “learning lab.” It allows the leader to build awareness and to practice the skills necessary for engaging and developing others. Empathy, active listening, and clarification of motivation and purpose are all key elements of coaching, and, by experiencing them, leaders gain a visceral sense of those skills in action.
Coaches noted a number of methods to provide objective feedback about a leader’s impact on others, including simulations; live interviews; 360-degree assessment (i.e., assessment that involves direct reports, peers, and managers); self-reflective exercises; and shadow coaching, in which the coach observes the leader on the job. Though these techniques are not new to coaching or leadership development, demand will increase for such approaches that target real-time behavior observation, feedback, and change.
Coaching, with its ability to tap the motivation and purpose of the individual leader and then provide targeted, personalized, and highly relevant feedback, provides a uniquely valuable learning opportunity well suited to the needs of the 21st-century leader. The intensity, volatility, and speed of the contemporary environment invite both leaders and coaches to confront these challenges and opportunities more boldly and to do so in the moment. To the extent that these partners can work together, the success stakes are indeed high.
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