A
leader for me as an executive life coach is someone “who gets the job done,
using the right means matching the situational demands of the task.” Leadership
is also contextual. The personal strengths of a leader that are effective in
one context or situation might not be so in another.
This
often is a sore point for leaders, which hinders progress and development. The
most difficult part of leadership in today’s business world is being able to
adapt to situations and behave in ways that might not come naturally but are
warranted by the needs of the hour.
It
means, coming to terms with situations wherein ground realities & facts,
override one's belief system by rendering them ineffective in dealing with
emerging challenges, due to changes in sociocultural paradigms of an
organization’s work environment.
As
an executive coach, I have seen this resonates with many young professionals in
the corporate world, who excel in performing a specialist leadership role in
let’s say the sales function and then get promoted to a general management
position say as the Head of the Sales Department, which needs a different set
of competencies, interactions with other departments, handling meetings with
more seasoned professionals, more inputs on etiquettes, a more detailed
overview of the business from different perspectives, etc.
This
small fact tends to get missed in most companies and the young leader is set up
for failure for no fault of his/ hers.
Another
yet very familiar case is when individual contributors get promoted as
first-time leaders. Again the thinking is the same as above, and the employee
is set up for failure.
In
both of the above cases, the resultant scenario is stress, mental fatigue,
sense of helplessness as the skills, convictions, and beliefs, that were
effective in navigating through complex circumstances, in their older roles are
no longer useful in their new roles.
Here
is where executive coaching plays a critical role in helping these professionals
come to terms with their current realities, accept the need to change, and
initiate actions based on their commitments toward self-development goals for
professional growth, business advancement, and organizational
development.
Several
organizations have implemented graduated learning interventions at all levels
to address these challenges, learning from the military, wherein officers who
get promoted go through several months of retraining and education on handling
their new postings.
However,
these efforts are too generalized and dispersed. Human Resource departments
handle these as tick-box activities and training departments execute training
calendars for the masses given their time and cost constraints. The result is
that at the end of the year, they show training as being completed but little
or no reporting on the effectiveness of these.
What’s
needed is a more personalized approach to development, which is executive
coaching. Here the employee selects a coach matching their chemistry and
experience and then starts a personalized journey of learning and development
matching his/ her individual needs. This approach while being time and
cost-intensive gives exponential returns in the long run.
An
effective departmental leader, could save millions in costs, and initiate new
projects effectively, bringing in billions in revenue, as a result of insights
and learnings acquired through coaching, giving mind-boggling returns to the
organization.
For
a leader, here is where being genuine to their inner self helps in building
transparent and open relationships with team members.
Leaders,
who rise above their insecurities and individual shortcomings, experience a
level of bonding with others that transcends the challenges they face as a team, leading
to a great work environment of performance, and merit, which motivates individuals
to contribute with a sense of purpose and integrity.
The
leader’s inner state has a key role to play in being able to navigate the VUCA
business world today. Inner peace, calm, and clarity of purpose brought out by
an effective coaching intervention, enables effective leading of teams and
businesses.
To
know more about how coaching can help you grow personally or your organization
develop, contact me at www.percyvaid.com.
