How Do You Determine If An Executive Coaching Engagement Was Successful?

Simple: Neither the person being coached, nor the coach determines improvement.

Rather, the degree of change is determined solely by the leader’s stakeholdersquantitatively over the course of the entire coaching engagement.

This leads to sustainable, objective and unbiased measurable change that ties in directly to business outcomes and what most organizations covet.

Successful change is driven primarily by a leader’s partnership with stakeholders and their ability to obtain feedback, evaluate it, and act upon it.

We see the executive coach as a catalyst for change, not as the driver.

rd&partners’ executive coaching supports leaders by talking directly with stakeholders – we call this Stakeholder Centered Executive Coaching – and listening to their suggestions, asking the right questions, providing a safe space for communication, exploring new behaviors, and encouraging the accountability required to support the change that needs to happen.

Stakeholder Centered Executive Coaching Principles

• Keep it simple and focused
• Support the leader in sharing goals with key stakeholders and fostering greater accountability
• Ask stakeholders for feedback that will help the leader to focus on change for the future rather than shortcomings in the past
• Encourage the leader to adopt new behaviors and follow up with stakeholders in order to make sure the new behaviors are noticed and adapted as needed
• Measure results through interaction with those affected, not according to the leader or the coach

Consistency and simplicity is what makes our approach work.

By maintaining transparency throughout the coaching and consultancy process we ensure clarity about the actions that leaders will need to take on their own.

The Executive Coaching Process:

Every coaching assignment is unique, but the core process still follows a basic pattern and includes similar activities:

• Agreement on specific coaching goals based on a 360 degree performance appraisal management assessment and executive assessments tool which evaluates the leader’s strengths and weaknesses, in addition to an assessment by colleagues who observe the leader’s behaviors.
• In some cases, the client organization already has a complete leadership diagnostic; in other cases, a consultant will conduct a custom talent assessment diagnostic.
• We can then employ the leadership diagnostic tools the client organization already uses in-house and/or our consultants can recommend appropriate tools.
• We can also complement quantitative diagnostics with qualitative interviews that provide additional depth and richness to the assessment.

• Creation of a written development plan that includes agreed-upon goals, targeted outcomes, action steps, timeframes, and other measures of progress.
• Alignment of the leader’s goals with key stakeholders and periodic feedback from this group. We usually seek input from six to eight of the leader’s colleagues, including his or her manager, peers, and direct reports. As appropriate, we will also seek input from critical clients or customers.
• “Homework” assignments between coaching sessions. Recommended reading, assigned practice of specific behaviors, reflection exercises, or written insights about what worked or didn’t work in a given situation.
• Assessment of progress at the midpoint and at the end of the engagement. We’ll survey stakeholders as to their perceptions of change in relation to the leader’s stated goals. This brief online survey targets specific behaviors the leader is seeking to improve, and results in a report that offers a digestible amount of information for a leader to easily gauge success.

One of our primary differentiators is that we believe it is more effective to provide leaders with less feedback more often – rather than the other way around.

We may also suggest additional activities depending on the leader’s situation, including observing the leader in key meetings and/or helping him or her prepare for critical meetings, interactions or presentations as they arise.

Logistics:

Our executive coaching consulting sessions usually take place twice a month, either face-to-face or by phone, and a typical engagement lasts 6 months.

Frequency, duration, and type of meetings are determined by the leader’s needs and travel schedule.

In the initial months of the executive coaching program our consultants will need to spend more time with our clients in person than in later months to properly implement our initial assessments and enact the necessary hands-on time necessary to see the biggest impact.

At rd&partners, we measure success based on the satisfaction of the leader, but even more by the stakeholders’ evaluation of the leader’s progress toward initially selected goals after completion of our coaching engagement.

Because we involve multiple stakeholders, including the leader’s boss and often the HR partner, the leader benefits from a broad support base and potential issues can be caught and dealt with early on.

We are proud of our track record: rd&partners’ average ROI from our executive coaching firm engagements has consistently exceeded 300%.