Executive Coaching Articles

Adversity Reveals You

Author: admin, Date: 1/4/2016

“In times of adversity and change, we really discover who we are and what we’re made of.”
Howard Schultz, CEO, Starbucks

How you lead during times of adversity reveals you. Your leadership strengths are highlighted and your leadership flaws are accentuated.
Adversity is in the eyes of the beholder—it can be as small as a difficult employee or customer interaction or as large as a major lay-off or legal challenge. Regardless, how you behave under stress says a lot about your overall leadership.
It is easy to lead during the good times. While obstacles still exist, leaders tend to have the resources (time, people, money) to overcome them. It’s when times get tough that you really need to demonstrate your leadership skills. What leadership strengths or weaknesses do you reveal during times of adversity? What do your employees and colleagues say about you when things are stressful? These are the things I often hear about the “boss” when I work with clients:

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Stop the Mind Reading—Give Candid Feedback

Author: Diane Hamilton, Date: 7/21/2015

Providing feedback (positive and constructive) is Management 101.  Giving feedback to direct reports, co-workers or team members is essential to success.  Providing upward feedback, while sometimes tricky, helps contribute to a transparent environment focused on growth and development.

If feedback is essential, why do we see so many situations where employees don’t know where they stand?  Why do some employees only get feedback once a year during their performance review?

Which of the following situations sound familiar?

  • You notice that sales aren’t where they need to be so you make a sarcastic comment during a sales meeting hoping the team catches on that you aren’t happy.
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A Quick Way to Explore Work/Life Balance

Author: Diane Hamilton, Date: 3/25/2015

My coaching practice presents me with the opportunity to work with leaders in a variety of organizations and industries.  These are leaders at all levels struggling to make a difference in their work and in their lives.  A common thread is the desire to find more “balance.”  (While balance is the popular term, I think it is really more about integration; but, that’s a discussion for another post.)

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The 3 Cs of Building Credibility

Author: Diane Hamilton, Date: 1/30/2015

We hear a lot about credibility these days, particularly as it relates to our elected officials (as in lack of credibility).  It has even surfaced as we evaluate the results of our sporting events (e.g., deflated footballs, blown calls).

Credibility is the quality of being believable or worthy of trust.  As a leader, it allows your employees to put their faith in you to make good decisions, communicate with transparency and be a reliable source of information.  It allows your peers and your manager to know that you are communicating without hidden agendas and that you have the organization’s best interest in mind.

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Developing potential? Focus on strengths and shortcomings

Author: Diane Hamilton, Date: 10/24/2013

For over a decade, the focus of leadership and professional development has been to emphasize people’s strengths rather than concentrate on weaknesses. The concept was popularized by Gallup researchers and led to a series of StrengthsFinder books and tools. For those unfamiliar, the StrengthsFinder is an assessment that reveals dominant “themes” that help people focus on their strengths and abilities and center their work and lives on them. The premise is that it makes more sense to leverage strengths and talents versus trying to address shortcomings.

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Teachable Moment

Author: Paul Dillenburg, Date: 6/27/2013

One of the current buzzwords in leadership development seems to be the idea of “teachable moments.” That is, helping a direct report learn from a practical, job related experience as it occurs. An example of a teachable moment that I was able to highlight for an individual I was coaching may shed some light on how to capture these valuable moments. This excerpt is from a previous blog post.

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Value of Coaching

Author: Paul Dillenburg, Date: 5/16/2013

More and more companies are using leadership coaching to improve their bottom line. It is one of many approaches to developing leadership talent. Three reasons that leadership coaching is particularly effective include:

Individualized attention. Unlike many other approaches to leadership development, each participant gets focused attention to learn about their strengths and development opportunities; and, develop specific action steps that tie to organizational results.

Accountability. Coaching is results-focused. The client creates goals and the coach helps hold the client accountable to those goals. Coaches provide clients with the process, tools, structure, and support to achieve higher levels of performance.

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Enough Already – Delegate (or Just Let Go!)

Author: Diane Hamilton, Date: 5/9/2013

I’ve been fortunate to work with many very good leaders over the years. Those who have been most successful have worked hard to surround themselves with good people. They also know that it takes more than having good people around you—it’s about tapping into and developing that talent that makes the difference.

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Development Planning? Focus on Strengths…Close Development Gaps

Author: Diane Hamilton, Date: 3/14/2013

“People can do great things. However, there are some things they just CAN’T do. I, for instance, have not been able to transform myself into a Popsicle, despite years of effort.” — Brandon Sanderson, American fantasy author

Much has been written over the past several years about focusing on one’s strengths. Thousands of individuals at all levels in organizations have taken the StrengthsFinder® survey. For those unfamiliar, the StrengthsFinder® is an assessment that reveals dominant “themes” that help people focus on their strengths and abilities and focus their work and lives around them. The premise is that it makes more sense to leverage our strengths and talents versus trying to overcome shortcomings.

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How to Measure Results in Coaching

Author: Paul Dillenburg, Date: 2/14/2013

Executive and leadership coaching has become increasingly popular for companies interested in developing and keeping key organizational talent. While the number of coaches in the market has increased, we have noticed that few provide potential clients with a model for measuring success. This isn’t surprising because much of what a coach works with a client on are some of the more intangible aspects of work (e.g., leading others, team effectiveness, communication style, etc.). Though intangibles may be difficult to quantify, our background and experience as evaluation and assessment practitioners, led us to develop a model for measuring success based on 5 key factors:

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