5 Key Benefits of Executive Leadership Coaching

Senior business leaders are under ever-increasing pressure to perform in an incredibly competitive global market.

With the financial pressures of a worldwide economic crisis persisting for many, the rapid development of technology that is redefining working practices, and the challenge of attracting and retaining the best talent, just a few of the issues many are wrestling with, it is no surprise that many leaders are looking for support.    

Many are turning to executive coaching to help them find the answers they seek, but why? What can executive coaching offer these leaders, and how can it enhance their performance?

Executive leadership coaching is a personalised approach to helping senior leaders achieve their personal and business goals. Delivered by a registered coach, the approach targets personal discovery for more sustained success.

So here are five key benefits of executive coaching for senior leaders that we aim to ensure those who work with Gearing For Growth attain.

Critical thinking in leadership is vital to success. A leader's ability to deal with pressure and make the right decisions at the right time separates them and is what people follow.

In fact, it is often the ability just to make a decision and deal with the consequences that highlights leadership qualities.

Executive coaching harnesses this ability and supports its growth. Coaching helps develop an enhanced level of self-awareness, enabling leaders to recognise and understand their own biases and decision-making processes.

It also encourages them to adopt a broader strategic mindset, helping them consistently consider the longer-term impact of their decisions on the business.

A good coaching approach will encourage better risk management in a leader's decision-making process, providing better frameworks to assess risk and manage potential outcomes.

Finally, accountability is crucial in decision-making. A good coach will positively challenge and encourage accountability, helping leaders critically evaluate their decision-making to learn from and continually improve.

Emotional intelligence is crucial for good leadership. The right executive coach will help you develop the interpersonal skills and empathy you need to succeed.

The advantage of an executive coach is their honest appraisal of your emotional responses. Coaches are not there to be your friend; they are there to challenge you to become the best version of yourself and to help you develop your leadership skills.

Your executive coach will also help you develop the right strategies and techniques for regulating your emotions and, where possible, removing them from the decision-making process. Staying calm and clear-headed throughout will help you make the right decision.

Managing your own emotions is only half of good leadership. Developing a good level of empathy to understand and manage the feelings of others will help you to create stronger relationships with your team, helping them to grow and flourish.   

The right executive coach will also support the development of the right social skills to help your leadership. Effective verbal and non-verbal communication skills are essential for developing emotional intelligence. Getting your message across can help motivate your team, manage conflict, and help with internal and external negotiations.

Enhancing your team's performance is crucial to any executive coaching programme. Being a good leader is about inspiring your team to achieve the ambitious goals you have set and helping them overcome any challenges they face.

The right coaching approach will help you identify strategies to motivate your team. Coaches will ask you searching questions that will enable you to come up with an approach that's right for your business.

These strategies will enable you to build rapport and foster trust among your team, which will help them tackle the challenges they face, ultimately creating the supportive culture required for a strong team.     

Driving accountability through your executive coaching sessions will help empower your team members to take ownership of decision-making and foster a culture of leadership. Good coaching will also highlight the importance of recognising success, and rewarding your team's hard work is vital. Nothing is achieved on your own. Good leaders understand this and make sure their team feels valued.

The right executive coaching will be bespoke to your needs as a leader. All activities should consider your strengths and weaknesses, providing feedback and insight into your situation and how it reflects on your business.

The objective, unbiased feedback you receive from an external coach can often be difficult for others within the business to provide, making it challenging to identify any blind spots and areas for improvement you may have.

The assessments and discussions between you and your coach will lead to a deeper understanding of you as a leader, and more importantly, to a list of actionable strategies that enable you to refine your approach to leadership continually. This will foster a mindset of continuous improvement, encourage a good habit of ongoing reflection, and help you make the proper adjustments in your leadership style.

Becoming a better leader is about helping you become a better version of yourself, both inside and outside of work. Executive coaches recognise the importance of creating well-rounded leaders who can separate themselves from work.       

Going through a coaching process will help you establish clear boundaries between your personal and professional life, ensuring that neither is neglected. The key to this is prioritisation skills, which many leaders lack. When you run a business with a small team, everything is a priority, but coaching will help you distinguish between the 'urgent', the 'important', and the 'nice to do'.

Developing strategies around prioritisation and boundary setting can help manage stress levels, which can affect everyone. There are levels of stress that people can manage, and executive coaching can help prevent it from becoming overwhelming.

As with almost every aspect of executive coaching, increasing self-awareness can help you achieve the much-needed work-life balance. Leaders become far more aware of their work habits, how they impact their personal lives, and how more mindful decisions can promote balance.          

As you can see, executive coaching is critical to developing a leader.

It helps improve decision-making and builds good emotional intelligence. The clear, honest feedback you receive from your coach also helps reduce blind spots in your leadership approach, thereby improving the softer skills required to inspire your team.

Ultimately, the right executive coach will help you achieve the work-life balance that many are seeking, enabling you to become a more well-rounded person.