... with Executive Coaching

By Shiera O’Brien, Executive NLP Coach, Zenith Coaching.

When you purchase a piece of software, you expect it to work smoothly; deliver on it’s specifications, function as expected, at the speed you want, as long as you need it. Imagine it doesn’t: it starts to slow down, get caught in loops, play havoc with your other programs, hang your computer or crash your entire company network. Of course your IT staff is well-equipped to handle this, or call on the expertise of a computer whiz at the end of the phone!

As a HR professional, when you hire an individual, you are not only getting their skills, qualifications, which you need; but along with them comes their beliefs, attitudes, conditioning and patterns. Let’s call it their brain “software!” You only know its effectiveness, when the individual is installed in your system. It shows up in their performance, and how they think, speak and behave, as they interact with others. This person can run high quality output and be the best investment you ever made, or they can create slow downs, under-perform, get caught in loops, or crash your internal and external people systems.

In the field of coaching, we describe this as their “Neuro-Linguistic Programming”, i.e. how they think, dialogue with themselves, and act it out externally to create their reality. What if you had a way to help your staff run their “brains” or their “thinking” software better, where they recognized the patterns creating their own challenges and chose to use different approaches and perspectives to solve them - particularly at the manager level? A 5% change in behaviour at this level, could have a massive impact at a company-wide level, particularly where an individual has a significant influence in the entire system.

With the latest advances in coaching technology, known as Neuro-Lingusitic Programming (NLP) and Neuro-semantics (which examine how meanings create a person’s experience), executive coaching opens doors for sustainable change within an organization, starting with the individual, which can have a ripple effect through the company.

Behavioural change is at the heart of coaching, and moves way beyond setting goals and motivating the individual. It plays a critical role in helping individuals and organizations to create, adapt to, and embrace change as a challenge and a place to move towards rather than stay in stagnation. Executive coaching works towards 2 types of change: remedial change, where, a person is facing significant challenges, with trouble looming; having plateaued, they are falling behind in their job or under performing; and generative change, where a person is performing successfully and wants to continue the process of personal and professional development, perhaps in the areas of people management or leadership. Both approaches have the impact of bringing about transformational change. The tools and techniques for this are the same - the focus is different!

The first stage in a coaching programme helps the individual identify the new output or results they want. Following that, it is important to identify the beliefs, attitudes, behaviours and values that stand in the way achieving these results. Coach and client work in a number of coaching sessions to integrate new beliefs, thinking patterns and attitudes that serve the individual and the organization better. The goal is always to develop a greater alignment between the employee and the organization so there is a system-wide benefit. There is a huge awareness and learning component to the coaching experience, where the individual is coached into seeing how they are literally “running their own brains” as they perform, communicate, think and take action in working towards their professional goals.

Using NLP and Neurosemantics coaching techniques, it is possible to increase levels of confidence, self-esteem, improve personal relationships and performance significantly and quite rapidly, simply by working with the structure of a person’s beliefs, attitudes and thinking and installing better ones. Ultimately, the purpose of executive coaching is to produce behavioral change and growth in your key people for the economic benefit of your organization. Quality executive coaching must involve behavioural-based coaching for a company to see a solid return on their investment.

A-US based (Business Wire, 2001) survey on the impact of coaching reported significant measurable improvements for executives of between 65-77% in relationships with peers, direct reports, immediate supervisors, team co-operation, job satisfaction and commitment, while the impact on organisations ranged between 48-53% in terms of productivity, quality, organisational strength and staff retention, with a 22% for bottom-line profitability. A final thought: A person’s beliefs are their actions, and anything they are doing or NOT doing is driven by a belief they hold. Sometimes it may be a belief that has long outlived its usefulness - and like your software -it may be time to install some new programs in your organization.