Executive Coaching: What It Is, and What It Ain’t May 25, 2010, by Peter Mirus in Coaching
Here’s what executive coaching provides: principled guidance that helps you to identify personal and career goals/priorities/values while at the same time assessing benefit and costs associated with those items. Ultimately, the goal is to discover the right path for your executive career within the context of your personal development, and then to help you follow the path successfully while maintaining a good work/life balance.
Here’s what executive coaching does not provide: a ready blueprint for your success. In other words, your coach isn’t going to simply hand you a detailed roadmap for your specific future after the first session—just like reading Good to Great by Jim Collins won’t provide you with a detailed blueprint for the success of your specific company. The principles and guidance are provided, but you still have to participate in the legwork of building the plan. You have to build it so that you can own it. The time that you invest to the executive coaching process must vastly exceed the time spent in session.