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I met a young lady recently, with around 2-3 years of corporate HR experience. She is currently working with a large international consulting firm in Delhi/NCR. During our informal conversation, she mentioned that she is enrolling for a certification course for becoming an ‘Executive Coach’. I was wondering what kind of training will she get during this certification course and what additional coaching values will she bring to table. I am also aware of several people with large number of years spent in corporate training, but lack the respect as a professional trainer in that space. I am also aware that some of them have done this certification course and announce in their on-line as well as off-line introduction – A CERTIFIED EXECUTIVE COACH. This prompted me to think on the value and process of coaching. This article addresses some of these concerns.
It has become fashionable to use coaches within organisations as well as provide some coaching work. Several models for coaching have been developed over time. There are many consulting firms that offer certification courses to become a ‘Coach’. This article will dwell upon and explore a few issues in this area. These issues may decide whether it is being used as a Fad (in a farcical manner) or as a constructive and meaningful improvement intervention. This article attempts to clarify some of the related challenges and possibly point to workable solutions.
The issues that are being addressed in this paper are:
- Coaching certification – Can certificate training prepare anyone for a coaching role or does it require some innate interpersonal orientation to be a good coach?
- Import of coaching intervention for seniors/ coaches – Does a good coaching intervention help the coachee only or does it hold some key improvement potential for the coach as well?
- Role of ‘right-brain’ faculty in executing a good coaching job – Does a ‘right-brain’ orientation facilitate better role performance as a coach? This will draw from my last article on this subject.
If you review popular business discourse, there are many firms offering fixed-time training leading to a Certified Coach. What is interesting to note is that most of these training programs are around different models and processes of carrying out coaching activity. So the training should be more around process orientation. On the other hand, if you review the pre-requisites for a good coach-coachee relationship, this largely talks about interpersonal issues and characteristics. Most of these are soft skills and largely rooted in the interpersonal orientation as well as fundamental personality traits of the individual. What is intriguing for these certification courses is that how does one achieve these personal attributes by following certain process requirements.
AMA (2008) reported in one of its reports in “Coaching: a Global study of Successful Practices” that one of the top reason for halting coaching was the questionable expertise of coaches, with 53% of respondents indicating that they agreed or strongly agreed with it. It also reports that the coaching field has become swamped with “cowboy operators” who often lack both skills and credentials, according to a study by consultancy Chiumento and Personnel Today (Paton, 2007). The point therefore is how relevant and important are these certifications? It is far more important to identify a Coach based on right experience and behavioural credentials rather than a ‘piece of paper’. Some of the critical behavioural attributes that could help one identify a good Coach are:
- Mature self confidence
- Positive energy demonstrated in the language (choice of words and phrases)
- Assertiveness and Politeness
- Goal Orientation
- Openness to learning – especially listening and reaching out for help
These are not the only attributes but some of the most fundamental behavioural attributes that are critical for effectiveness of a Coach. Some of the attributes above have an overlapping demonstration effect. More than one attribute may be discernible from one set of behaviour. A person who is psychologically mature, will use a positive language and demonstrate positive energy. He is also likely to be assertive and focused on goals in life. All these attributes also have a rub-off effect on people around and that is a key element in a coaching relationship. Now these attributes cannot be taught or learnt in a training program. One learns it over a period of time and is ingrained as a behavioural characteristic only if practiced over a period of time. Therefore certification courses could create awareness about them or trigger them, but can not create them during certification training.
Certification courses can also create a process awareness on how a particular model works. Certifications therefore can at best establish that the contender is cognitively aware of what could help in a successful coaching relationship and what processes could be more effective. Not beyond this. Personal experience and behavioural attributes of the individual are far more effective indicator of whether he may be a good Coach or not. Every organisation and social context is different and one model may not work in every situation. One of the key challenge I see in this certification methodology is that people tend to ignore cultural and contextual realities. Understanding of the context and ability to interpret behavioural signals is a far stronger tool than copying one standard model.
The other thing I have often wondered and heard people saying is adverting this coaching relationship brings for a coachee. It is true the the coachee stands to gain and he is the primary motive for engaging in this relationship. But the way it is defined and expressed could also give away some indicators about the Coach. A Coach must be able to see benefits for himself. If he does not see some benefit for himself, this may bring a couple of challenges to this relationship as well as the process. For one, if a person does not see he could learn from an interaction (extended one at that) does he necessarily possess openness to learning that is so critical to the process of coaching and is so much expected from the coachee. It may also indicate a mind-set where one person thinks he is superior and therefore the other by default has to be a ‘taker’. The commodification of the ‘Coach’ as a person who can transform or give you the tools you need to come closer to your goals vs mentor/coach of a different kind who not only helps you improve but also learns from the process himself. Role of a Coach is symbiotic in nature (both involved parties benefit from mutual engagement) vs a more commercialised version of a coach who is simply hired to help you reach a certain goal.
This kind of mind-set may make it difficult to establish an open and sharing process between the two key players. Another challenge with this mind-set may be lower level of genuine interest from the Coach in this relationship. It then becomes a responsibility of the coachee to pursue this and keep pushing the agenda. This may become a mechanical process, where the ‘superior’ gives away only if and only as much as the ‘junior’ one seeks out. Instead, if the Coach also thinks he may also learn from this relationship, then he is also likely to take responsibility to pursue it and bring some enthusiasm and energy, to the process. I have personally seen that the coachees bring to table tremendous and varied experiences that add to the resources of the Coach. I have also experienced some coachees to bring to table pretty incredible and original ideas to deal with a specific organisational issue. It is very interesting to bring such varied experiences and learning from it by joining dots. I have always enjoyed this kind of assignment more from the point of what it brings to table and how it enables me.
Next let me pick up from the list of behavioural attributes mentioned above that are pre-requisites for a successful coaching relationship. These are – Mature self confidence, Positive energy demonstrated in the language (choice of words and phrases), Assertiveness and Politeness, Goal Orientation, Openness to learning – especially listening and reaching out for help. Each one of these attributes are right-brain driven. I believe one of the key challenges in current organisations is too much emphasis on numbers – metrics that drive and deliver performance. While they are important we forget that they are ‘result’ and ‘byproduct’ of efforts people put in. But people get ignored and their best interests may get undermined/overlooked in the process of a only-metrics-driven business/organization. If only we train people more around right-brain predominance – ‘people’ part of the equation will get its due attention and then performance and results will just flow. If you look around for any organization that is excelling in business results on a consistent basis, they have strong people processes. Most of such organisations have also been led by ‘people-first’ leaders. No wonder they have been able to deliver higher than ordinary performance on a consistent basis. Coaching therefore must dwell on how to sharpen right-brain focus and use left-brain to follow a defined process. Even choice of words and phrases in the language one uses is derived from right-brain faculty. It helps a coach on intuitive and instinctive perceptions. This in turn keeps him one step ahead of what is likely expectation to come across from coachee, whether explicitly mentioned or not. The left-brain helps process the data but right-brain helps make meaning out of such information and guides where it could be sued and how. Similarly, while goal may sit in the left hemisphere, what to do with it and how to deal with it could come from right hemisphere in an innovative and ingenuous way. I have experienced very often an individual gains from asking the right questions rather than finding the right answer. These are just a few examples of how right brain dominance could play a meaningful and constructive role in building the process of mutual learning, called Coaching.
To conclude therefore it is important that a Coach also sees this relationship as beneficial and in his personal development interest. This keeps balance in learning atmosphere and possibly aides in demonstrating what it preaches to achieve. A Coach must sharpen his right brain dominance. This could play a meaningful and constructive role. And to cap it, coaching cannot be defined by or contained by a definite model – through a certification process. A certificate cannot define or indicate effectiveness of a Coach. A good Coach will find a personal agenda of improvement in the process of learning and that in turn will become a motivation factor in pushing him to do his very best and invest in the coach – coachee relationship more earnestly. It must bring relevant experience and behavioural attributes of a Coach to bear on this relationship.
Note: The author has over 3 decades of international corporate experience both as business leader as well as consultant and trainer. He has trained over 48,000 managers in India and abroad. He is a certified international trainer on Leadership and Team building. Has to his credit designing and conducting several training programs on soft skills. Has keen interest in Executive Coaching and Managing Organisational values.