Right quarterly: Coaching - Process of building great leaders

Right QuarterlyFirst Quarter 2014

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EDITORIAL & FOREWORD 02 by Chaitali Mukherjee

CLIENT REFERENCE STORY

Transforming Higher Education through Coaching 04 by Maria Newport, Lizzie Allen and Nick Grage-Perry

POINT OF VIEW

If I were in your shoes: Peer Coaching for Senior Leaders 08 and High Potentials by Gary R. Schmidt

CLIENT REFERENCE STORY

Executive Coaching: A Critical Learning Journey for 12 Senior Leaders at Bajaj Finance Limited by Divya Jain and Shephali Karn

POINT OF VIEW

The Landscape of Leader Coaching in China 16 by Lucy Liu and Michael Cheah

Layout & Design Editor

Ritesh Hellan

Copy Editor

Tuhina Panda

For a copy of ‘The Right Quarterly’, write to us at

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2 THE RIGHT QUARTERLY

by Chaitali MukherjeeCountry Manager - Right Management India

Marshall Goldsmith famously pointed out in his book of the same name: “What got you here won’t get you there.” In every edition of Right Quarterly we hope to provide you with interesting insights and new learning that can help you grow your individual career and business.

In our previous edition of Right Quarterly, we spoke about Global Mindset and the change it has brought about across the world of work. Global Mindset is an outcome of broadening the cultural mindset of leaders, shaped in good measure by the resources available and countries’ policies to support leaders in taking on global roles. To build a global mindset, a leader needs support from his organization. For our first edition of 2014, we wanted to touch upon an important part of the process of building great leaders: Coaching. Whether it is about building leadership capabilities in first time managers, or helping a leader take on the role of CEO or senior business executive, or even helping teams work more collaboratively; the role of coaching in its different forms will always be crucial. Coaching can be of various types: individual coaching, executive coaching, group coaching, and peer coaching, besides others. Knowing the type of coaching relevant for a particular intervention and gauging its impact on the desired outcome is very important to ensure the intervention’s success. In our current edition, we hope to shed some light on how matching different coaching types with various intervention needs allowed leaders and organizations to achieve better business outcomes.

We start this edition with an article on Transforming Higher Education through Coaching, which is a great insight into the

innovative use of coaching for an education institute in Australia. A rapidly changing environment called for internal organizational change and a new perspective proved useful--to view an education institute as an organization of learning. This perspective sharpened focus on the need to evaluate and implement the institute’s short and long-term strategies and the need for the senior management team to work collaboratively to enable change. To achieve this, a team of leaders comprising the Chancellor, Vice-Chancellor, HR Director, besides others, went through a 9-Month intensive Coaching Program. The outcome of the program was that the team learnt to work together with greater collaboration, communicate effectively and align its vision and approach to the University’s strategy. Interesting, isn’t it? Read on to find out more!

The second article on If I were in your shoes: Peer Coaching for Senior Leaders and High Potentials is very simply as the title suggests. The coaching relationship is not just a learning relationship in a vertical hierarchy but has evolved into a peer to peer learning process. Peer coaching allows for the creation of a support system through which coaches can share their learning journeys with people undergoing a similar process. This augments the learning during an individual coaching process and increases its impact on the coachee. How it works is very simple – traditionally, the coach was someone who had been in the coachee’s shoes at an earlier time and shared significant learning from his experience. Peer coaching is a process through which a coachee can share and learn with another coachee, who is in fact in his shoes at the very same time!

Editorial & Foreword

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The third article is on Executive Coaching: A Learning Journey for the Senior Leaders at Bajaj Finance Limited. We want to share the success story of one of our clients in India, where Right Management worked closely with the senior leadership team on a coaching intervention. What was unique about this journey was that the executive coaching program was linked to the ongoing Leader Development Program held within the broader organizational framework of the ‘Business Value Chain’. The focus was clear - the leader competencies (identified as development areas) were linked to organizational capabilities. Desired coaching outcomes were also linked to the desired strategic business goals of the organization. This forward looking approach, accompanied by a robust monitoring process, helped the intervention achieve the success it merited!

The last article explains how the approach towards coaching is changing across an entire country due to evolving business needs, and also influenced by the country’s culture. The Landscape of Leader Coaching in China is about the approach towards coaching adopted in China and how it has evolved over time. It helps us understand how coaching as a process is made more impactful in response to the changing needs of businesses and leader attitudes. I hope that by reading this article, leaders and coaches across regions will closely re-examine the coaching practices existing in their particular region, evaluate their origin and improve upon methods they might have assumed to be the best approach.

What we always want to achieve through the narratives of our work is to share with you the experience and maturity we have gained in

those journeys. In any coaching intervention, the learning can never be expected to be within a certain framework. Each coaching program for a leader is unique because his educational background, professional experience, personality and potential are unique. Hence, each coach also experiences something different with each new coachee. What is also true is that the role of a coach is not to provide the right answers, but only to guide individuals to find the confidence to search and obtain their own answers . Even though some good practices have emerged, the process is continuously evolving and can morph into something different. Hence emerges the importance of and need to share our learning from the coaching practice with you.

We hope you enjoy reading our first edition for 2014. May your coaching journey be as insightful as ours has been!

- Chaitali Mukherjee


Over the past 20 years or so, the Australian higher education sector has been very dynamic. The challenges experienced in this sector include a highly competitive mass market that has seen an increase in the number of institutions and an influx of foreign students. There have been changes to government funding and policy (across a mix of state and federal levels), increased pressure due to the ‘”fees for degrees” and the expectations of customers, changing vocational needs of employers, the impact of technology and virtual learning platforms.

As such, the role of university Vice-Chancellor has evolved from that of an academic administrator to a strategic executive, not dissimilar to the role of CEO in the private sector. Here it is imperative that they are just as aware of the commercial

considerations of the enterprise as the need to uphold the educational standards of the institution.

Context

A newly appointed Vice-Chancellor of an Australian University with campuses in-country and abroad was responsible for leading and implementing the organisation’s medium and long term strategy in this dynamic sector. Shortly after onboarding, the Vice-Chancellor recognized the need to develop capability to drive the requisite change to turnaround and transform the institution. Right Management was invited to develop a solution to the challenge ahead.

Historically development of leaders in the university had been ad hoc, with nominal

Client Reference Story

Transforming Higher Education through Coaching

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FOR SUCCESS

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investment and leadership capabilities not having been clearly defined or supported by the organization. Leaders were not consistently equipped with the capabilities to address critical business challenges.

The university’s Human Resources Director required a cost effective solution to resolve these issues, thus helping in creating a competitive advantage and avoid an unsustainable business mix in the short and medium term.

Both the Chancellor and the Vice-Chancellor of the university had private sector experience, understood the relevant policies and had a clear idea of the business issues at stake. The Vice-Chancellor and Human Resources Director also understood how cost effective and impactful coaching could be in facilitating individual and group behavioural change and leadership development.

Right Management was invited to partner with the university to facilitate coaching programs for the executive leadership team, with the following features:

• holistic consulting approach and executive alignment of facilitation capabilities;

• coach matching process to leverage coaches’ depth and breadth of coaching experience, training and backgrounds;

• best practice coaching methodology being consistent and scalable;

• use of reporting, measurement and quality assurance including pre and post 360 feedback pulse surveys and regular review meetings

Approach

At Right Management, Leader Coaching is an integral part of the talent management process and is a key intervention to supporting organisational effectiveness - see our Organisational Effectiveness Framework (OEF) diagram below.

Leaders are key to implementing business strategy by integrating organisational structure, roles and capability with people systems and processes to embed the values and culture that drive necessary change.

One of the most effective ways of developing leadership capability on an individual and group level is through Leader Coaching.

Business Environment

Strategy

Leadership

EmployeeEngagement

CustomerExperience

OrganisationalPerformance

Structure, Rolesand Capability

People Systemsand Processes

Values Culture

Reference 1.1 Organisational Effectiveness Framework


Leader Coaching involves 3 key steps:

1. Organisation context is made relevant by incorporating and leveraging the aligned components of the Organisation Effectiveness Framework™ (e.g. key stakeholders, the business strategy, culture, values, structure and processes)

2. Measurable coaching goals are linked to business results that improve coaching success and define coaching value

3. Coaching excellence is nurtured, defined, and measured utilising a technology-enabled virtual community, extensive on-the-ground global resources, coach certification and supervision.

Implementation

The coaching programs commenced in late 2012. All members of the university’s executive leadership team undertook a 360 assessment in early 2013, selected their preferred coaches via chemistry meetings, and started on a 9-month long journey. This included coaching meetings to facilitate individual behavioural change helping in bringing about greater team performance.

In conjunction with these programs, executive leadership team alignment sessions were facilitated by a Right Management Master Coach/Facilitator to build consensus and alignment with the organizational goals and vision of the university.

Outcomes

Prior to the coaching intervention, the executive leadership team was siloed, highly competitive and did not communicate effectively.

A year later, the team was more aligned and worked together with the Vice-Chancellor to execute four key transformational projects on time and within a budget, including: a new faculty structure; a shared services model; a new student administration system; and, enterprise wide transformational cultural change. Anecdotal observations of the individuals who report into the executive leadership team included that “the current executive leadership team (including prior and new members) is the best functioning group the university has ever had!”.

At the end of this transformation process, the university had successfully positioned itself ahead of a crowded competitive field through an enterprise-wide rebranding and differentiation process. Without the coaching program and accelerated alignment of the team to the business strategy, the turnaround and transformation of the business may not have occurred in time to avoid the future viability of the institution being compromised (including a $35 million shortfall of government funding). An inability to deliver the transformation program would likely have further negative impacts on the University including campus closure, faculty merger, senior executive attrition, and staff layoffs. Further, coaching program participants reported an 87% satisfaction rating at the end of the program.

Of the partnership with Right Management, the Vice-Chancellor said, “We have found them to be responsive and professional. They were able to help us build on our leadership capabilities and skill sets. The people we have worked with are respectful of confidentiality, listen well and adapt as our requirements have developed”.

Way Forward

Due to the success of the coaching program, Right Management has been asked to design and deliver a customized leadership development program for the

TM

Com

petenciesLe

ader

Capabilities

Organisation

Business

O

utcomes

BUSINESSVALUECHAIN

Reference 1.2 Coaching Business Value Chain

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next two levels of leadership to emphasize the necessary mindsets and leadership capabilities across the organization. The key focus areas of leadership capability chosen by the management team include strategy, innovation and risk, cooperation, communication, delegation and production.

Moving forward, the leaders can levarage the skills developed throughout the coaching and leadership development programs

to drive cultural change and proactively respond to market forces.

The key learning, for all involved, was that the scale of transformation necessary to remain competitive in the sector takes significant effort, sponsorship and time. Persistence, continuity and commitment are key to not only ongoing success of the change programs but to the ongoing success of the organization.

by Maria NewportRegional Coaching Lead & Principal ConsultantAustralia

by Lizzie AllenAccount DirectorAustralia

by Nick Grage-PerryPrincipal ConsultantAustralia

Article authored by Maria Newport. Interviews conducted with Nick Grage-Perry and Lizzie Allen.


In the war for leadership talent, accelerating leadership development is a strategic imperative for many organizations. Executive assessment and development centers are an important element to help high potential leaders and future executives better understand their assets and potential liabilities and hence their leadership styles. Development planning and executive coaching frequently follow a development center. The goal of coaching here is to help participants understand and reflect on the assessment feedback, then to pick their development priorities and create a SMART development plan. Executive coaching also provides a unique third-party perspective not typically available for the participant. This dispassionate objective view is one reason executive coaching is so valuable. But can this process be made even more stronger?

At Right Management we have found peer coaching to be very effective when used along with executive coaching, particularly as part of a senior leader development center. In fact, the peer coaching session is often the highest rated session. We recently were reminded of this during a 2-3 days senior leader program sponsored by a multi-national company running sessions in EMEA, Americas and APAC. It was highly rated by participants irrespective of geography.

What is peer coaching? In her book, How to Plan and Implement a Peer Coaching Program? Pam Robbins defines peer coaching: “Peer coaching is a confidential process through which two or more professional colleagues work together to reflect on current practices, expand, refine, and build new skills; share ideas; teach one another; or solve problems in the workplace.”

Peer coaching, then, is an opportunity to share ideas in a safe and confidential environment.

At Right Management, we use peer coaching as a safe and confidential way to share thoughts and ask for ideas regarding personal development as a leader. It provides for an opportunity to explore issues on the minds of many senior leaders or aspiring high potential leaders, but issues that are unlikely to arise as part of normal conversation. Peer coaching provides the opportunity for leaders to share their career journey, empathize with their challenges and frustrations, and leverage the collective wisdom of peers to explore important issues regarding self-improvement and development.

Networking always receives positive feedback in our leader workshop evaluations. People like to meet new colleagues from the same industry but from different functions or geographies. They like to discuss and explore new ideas, to find solutions to common problems, or simply

If I were in your shoes: Peer Coaching for Senior Leaders and High Potentials

Coaching

InstructionKnowledge Ability

Potential Advising

DevelopmentTraining Skill

Practice

Point of View

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to validate one’s own perceptions about the organization’s culture. These are topics about which an outside coach rarely has in-depth knowledge or expertise, and so ‘networking’ is very valuable to program participants.

Informal networking, no matter how expertly orchestrated and appreciated, has its limitations. Because it is an informal process, chance often determines who meets and speaks with whom. If people are meeting someone for the first time, the conversation tends to focus on external challenges or non-threatening issues. It rarely deals with self reflections or personal challenges. It is unlikely to involve how to advance a career or one’s aspirations of making a big impact on the world. This is why peer coaching is a valuable addition.

Think about it for a moment. You are a participant in a leadership development workshop with perhaps a dozen other senior leaders from around the organization and from around the world. The range of work experience is typically 15 to 25 years. This is a talented group with the potential to climb to the top leadership of the organization. Imagine the collective wisdom and experience that exists in this group! What advice would they have for me? How can that wisdom be tapped to benefit me? How can I help my peers benefit, too?

As the definition of peer coaching suggests, there is no single technique. To set the comfort, we will share here the technique Right Management uses as part of a leadership assessment for development programs.

A typical assessment for senior leaders consists of an assessment day followed by a feedback day that includes meeting with an executive coach. The executive coach works with the senior leader to ensure a clear understanding of the assessment feedback being provided. Implications are also discussed for the current role and for his or her career aspirations. The objective is to create a personal strategic career plan that includes development for short term performance gains, but also development towards long term career goals. These coaching discussions provide an opportunity for participants to self-reflect, to openly and confidentially share their hopes and aspirations along with their concerns or fears. This is a very personal dialogue about issues that are deeply important and personal. Having an external executive coach provides the confidentiality and safety needed for participants to open up and discuss what is not normally discussed in organisations. This is where peer coaching can be a powerful compliment to executive coaching.


The peer coaching session is a semi-structured exercise with 4 to 5 participants and a facilitator/executive coach. We introduce the peer coaching session after the senior leaders have received feedback and reflected on their developmental priorities. The participants are now ready to share and discuss this with others.

The first fifteen minutes of the peer coaching session is preparation time. Participants are asked to prepare a five minute introduction including:

• Who I am, the key milestones of my career to date, what others need to know about me to work with me effectively, my key drivers, and my vision for myself as a leader

• The key takeaways from the development center/workshop so far and the things I want to do better in the future (development priorities)

• Burning, open questions I still have and/or the obstacles I anticipate to my development and career evolution

• The support I would like to get from you (my peers) now…

Following the introduction the peers are told they may ask clarifying questions for 2-3 minutes in total. The senior leader is allowed to provide brief clarifying answers. However, once that is done the senior leader is told they can only listen and take notes – they are not allowed to respond to their peers.

Each peer then provides coaching to the leader in turn. To help the peer get started, they are asked to begin by saying, “If I were in your shoes, I would…” Again, the participant cannot speak – they are instructed to listen and take notes only.

After each peer has provided coaching to the leader, the leader is allowed to thank his or her peers for the suggestions and to identify some of the key messages they found particularly useful and want to take action on. The facilitator helps keep time and ensures participants adhere to the structure of the session. Time is allocated to allow for each leader to receive 15-20 minutes of peer coaching. It is important to note that each leader gives coaching as well as receives it. They are both “coach” and “coachee”. This encourages trust and reciprocity – to ensure confidentiality and to provide equally powerful and relevant advice. The session ends with the facilitator debriefing the activity.

There are many benefits to peer coaching with senior leader or high potential group:

• Leaders realize that they may be “in the same shoes” as their peers, which creates a bond between them, and also increases their engagement in the process

• Peer coaching advice tends to be very practical and actionable, industry and company specific, and reflecs the wisdom of peers. These suggestions often show up in the final SMART development plans

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• Scheduled towards the end of the workshop, the leaders have begin to focus on a few ‘burning questions’ that they feel compelled to share with their peers in a confidential setting – areas where they truly want to improve and are seeking the wisdom of senior leaders like themselves to do so

• Often these sessions spark a common interest that leads to follow up discussions or a lasting relationship between participants

There are best practice factors that determine the effectiveness of this approach to peer coaching. We have found the process to be most effective when:

• An atmosphere of trust and openness exists between participants, which is more often near the end of the workshop after they have participated in other sessions

• Confidentiality is emphasized. This includes limiting the session to only the outside facilitators and the participants – no company representatives or HR staff are allowed to observe

• Participants are not from the same work group and are not in direct and imminent competition with one another for a promotion which may belie the trust that is needed to ask and answer ‘burning questions’ without bias

• The facilitator ensures adherence to the ‘listening’ rule when receiving peer coaching and ensures all participants receive equal time

Executive coaching is a very effective way to help senior leaders and high potentials accelerate their readiness to become global executives. Peer coaching adds unique value by including the wisdom from experienced and credible leaders across the organization. Given the importance of fostering a global mindset, including leaders from different geographies is also highly valued. Peer coaching does this by providing a depth of sharing and collaboration that simple networking rarely achieves. Besides, it’s very hard for a leader not to listen to a colleague who has “been in your shoes”!

Gary R. Schmidt, Ph.D.Practice Leader, Talent Management

Singapore


The BackgroundBajaj Finance Limited (BFL) is a leading Non-Banking Finance Company engaged in consumer finance, SME finance and commercial lending. It is one of the most diversified NBFC in the country, the largest financier of consumer durables in India and one of the most profitable firms in the category. Its portfolio includes Consumer Finance offerings, SME Finance and Commercial Lending.

The company has seen tremendous growth in past 5-7 years and has created a niche for itself, by being innovative on their offerings and continuously being ahead of curve. Along with the company’s tremendous growth in such a short time span people have grown considerably in the system matching the organization’s fast pace. The young leaders of the company have climbed the ranks and are managing complexities of business and in areas of people management & organization development. Hence there was a substantial need to further handhold these leaders in taking up key strategic roles.

In its commitment towards developing its people who are critical to the success of the organization, Bajaj Finance Limited (BFL) embarked on a learning journey with Right Management as its strategic learning partner, in developing leaders for the organization.

Right Management being the talent and career management expert with over two decades’ experience developing and coaching thousands of executives in all segments and across geographies was their partner of choice because of the rigour and commitment towards making the learning relevant in BFL’s context.

The entire process of leadership development in which coaching was an integral part was carried forward by understanding the specific needs of BFL, by deploying proven methods and advanced tools based on extensive leadership research.

BFL internally identified leaders at key positions (from the Senior Management Team of the organization) for the coaching initiative. Right Management designed and executed the entire coaching intervention, by working closely with leaders from BFL to achieve strong coaching outcomes with far-reaching business effects. The areas of development were captured by having conversation with the leaders and their managers, followed by a 360 assessment on BFL’s Leadership Competency framework (also created by Right Management) for all these leaders.

Executive Coaching: A Critical Learning Journey for Senior Leaders at Bajaj Finance Limited

Client Reference Story

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ALIGNwith the

Organization DESIGNthe Coaching

Plan

ACCELERATEPerformance

LEADERCOACHINGPROCESS

Leader Coaching Model

Right Management’s three-stage, multi-step model is carefully designed to link specific coaching practices to the achievement of real strategic objectives. Leader Coaching offers a powerful mechanism for driving systemic change and impacting the entire organization.

Right Management Coaching Model

ALIGN with the organization

DESIGN the Coaching Plan

ACCELERATE Performance

The careful alignment of coaching goals with strategic objectives is the foundation on which our success is built. Right Management works closely with leaders, their managers and other stakeholders to:

Comprehensive information gathering leads to careful planning that involves:

At Right Management we always measure, both to confirm the validity of our model and help clients plan future development. Once planning is complete, Right Management:

• Define in detail the coaching objectives for leader, manager and organization

• Understand the situation of the leader, the culture of the organization and the environment in which it operates

• Carefully match leader and coach, taking into account individual needs, chemistry and expertise

• Determine the metrics by which coaching effectiveness, leader performance and business

• Measuring the leader’s strengths and weaknesses by means of 360º and

other assessments

• Establishing a baseline of business performance for measuring the impact of coaching on actual business functioning

• Creating a coaching plan using a Business Value Chain to translate organizational objectives into a practical coaching agenda

• Coaches to plan by conducting one-to-one coaching sessions and, where necessary, accessing specialized expertise from our coaching community network

• Provides shadow consulting and real-time feedback

• Presents formal evaluation of the leader’s performance and measurement of coaching’s impact on organizational performance and business results

• Aligns leader’s and manager’s understanding of coaching results and plans for future action


Right Management’s Executive Coaching at BFL:

Solution Architecture

Research repeatedly shows that Leader Coaching provides an organization with a clear competitive advantage for optimizing leadership potential. The Leader Coaching solution deployed at BFL was precisely designed to provide exceptional leader coaching that adds up to outstanding individual and organizational impact.

Role of Coaching

The reason why organizations invest in the intervention of coaching is to align the development of organizations in line with business results. It is a strategic intervention which needs creation of a ‘Business Value Chain’ that links the leader competencies to the desired organizational capabilities, and desired coaching outcomes to strategic results. Once it is defined, the ‘Business Value Chain’ serves as a practical guide for the entire coaching engagement.

The success of a coaching engagement depends heavily on the involvement of key stakeholders. This intervention asks for broad participation right from the very top of the organization to teams and other key stakeholders. Involvement and contribution of the stakeholders ensures shaping of the program and evaluation of its success. At BFL, the Coaching Intervention for the leaders involves active participation right from the MD, CEO, participants’ managers and teams. Their inputs and support have ensured the huge success that the programs have witnessed.

Leader Coaching is based on clearly identified and measurable outcomes. The coaching journey for the leaders at BFL was designed keeping in mind both the individual needs and the key business drivers in the current as well as the future context.

Coaching Process for BFL

The coaching intervention for BFL leaders was a yearlong program. The process followed at BFL involved the following:

• Coaching Orientation session was done to introduce the coachees to the entire journey that lay ahead for them and the process that would be followed

• 10-12 One on One Coaching sessions between the coach and coachee with one session every month. The outcome of each meeting was captured and the coachees were given learning assignments that formed the key agenda items for the next session

• Tracking and Coaching Logs maintained for each session of every coachee. These were used to continuously track progress against the defined coaching goals and for any course correction / realignment as required

• Quarterly Audit with the Manager of coachee and HR was conducted, taking into account feedback from coachee’s direct reports as well

• Program Closure with a review meeting with the CEO and reflection on the entire journey

Coaching Experience at BFL

While client has its own experience to share, Right Management was delighted to experience the partnership with BFL. The entire learning journey which has several interventions beyond executive coaching, designed for varied audience groups, was enriching for both BFL as well as Right Management. The results that coaching brought out were phenomenal in certain cases and apparent behavior and mindset changes were observable in the leaders who underwent coaching intervention.

With that success story, BFL continues to grow its leaders’ capabilities year on year via executive coaching with Right Management and BFL has institutionalized the same as the Leader Coaching Framework in the organization- with new set of leaders identified every year who are put through the year long intervention that help build sustainable leadership qualities to drive organizational growth.

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by Divya JainAVP - Consulting Services

India

by Shephali KarnTeam Member

India

We launched the Leadership Coaching Framework at BFL in October 2011 with 8 participants across E08 to E10 identified to undergo the program.

We are a fast growing company and building a strong leadership development framework is critical to support that growth. It has been our endeavor to develop levers that will help leaders broaden their horizon, and add to their intellect and knowledge pool to drive superior business results.

The coaching program is one such lever that we plan to introduce in the organization. Our current thought is that this is a large investment and will thus remain focused to the senior management team in the organization.

Over the years as the organization has started realizing the benefit of leadership development efforts of this nature we will start expanding the framework to cover the next level of leaders.

Outcomes

1. Help senior executives become more effective leaders

2. Facilitate growth in productivity and help senior executives achieve professional and personal growth

3. Develop leadership capability within businesses

4. Help the organization grow from where it is today by effectively addressing forthcoming business and people challenges

Success Stories

So far from a group of 10 senior leaders who have been a part of the coaching process two leaders were promoted last year to take up much larger leadership roles in the organization.

One significant impact for the entire group that has gone through this program has been an increased openness to personal learning and development. For some of the participants there has been an observable change in their management styles.

Client Speak Priyanka Mitra

National Head - Talent ManagementBajaj Finance Limited


The Landscape of Leader Coaching in China

Overview of Leader Coaching Market

Coaching is the current hot word in business circles around the world. You cannot fail to hear the word in any gathering of executives, human resources seminars or trainers network.

“Coaching is partnering with Coachees in a though-provoking and creative process that inspire them to maximize personal and professional potential” _ ICF (International Coach Federation).

Coaching in China has a bright future and the investment from different organizations is predicted to increase. A correlated indicator is the booming coaching certification training in China with large participation from corporations. The main shift will be seen through an increase in internal coaches. But what is also seen as an emerging trend in the past few years is the format of group coaching and team

coaching. These formats are considered as complementary to individual coaching and leadership development programs as they are cost effective for organizations and can leverage the experience of senior coaches to help leaders be effective in their leadership journey.

How Leader Coaching Works in China

Coaching, as a new phenomenon in the dynamic market, is always regarded as a mixture of coaching, mentoring and advising. Seniority can also play a key role in the selection process. The coach in China is always seen as a respected elder or teacher and their role is understood as that of being a mentor who shares his or her wisdom and insight to help the individual address particular challenges.

It has been observed that clients in China prefer coaches who are older and more mature than the employee, have greater

Point of View

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industry experience, and can provide guidance, insight and solutions to the problems that the client is facing. But when the coach asks many questions, it gets the client impatient and they insist on a quick solution. A possible explanation for this can be understood by looking into the Chinese culture - When I was a little girl, I was always told what I should do. Whether it was my parents, teachers or my boss at my first job, there was always someone to guide me on what I should do. If I did not act as advised, I was scolded! This was true for the majority of us while growing up as we were not encouraged to think on our own and for the self. Hence, to be seen as someone providing guidance is attractive to coaches, because it helps them be in control and in a position of some authority.

As time has passed by, more and more coaches have come to realize that just advising someone is not very effective, as the leaders do not show accountability and their personal ownership remains low. This in turn impacts their performance which is a result of their lack of self-motivation.

An interesting fact to be noted which a survey pointed out, was how in China it is necessary to have a deeper emotional connection with the client before real coaching can begin. Often it takes two or three meetings before trust is established. With regard to coaching quality, 2/3rd of the companies surveyed measure the coachee’s (leader) satisfaction with the coaching, while the other 1/3rd didn’t

measure. What was also noted was that the feedback from coachees and the change in performance observed were the two most popular measures of coaching effectiveness.

The story of coaching is changing in China and it will take some time for the process to mature. As per a recent survey, it was seen that Chinese coaches are an average ten years younger than their western counterparts. The number of coaches is steadily increasing as well. These coaches are going through rigorous trainings to bridge the gap in their approach and build on their ability to ask powerful questions considering the business context of the client.

A lot of coaching happens face to face and only in a few cases over the telephone. In sync with the times, virtual coaching has also become widely accepted.

Benefits from Leader Coaching

Today more than ever, the pace of growth of organizations in China is quite rapid. It is hence critical to quickly respond to the change and capitalize on the growth opportunity as bottom-line business results depend on bringing emerging leaders to the peak of their potential within a short time. The reality is that these leaders are developing at a slower pace than what the organization/ role expects of them. Hence leadership development is an urgent priority. As an essential part of a carefully planned development program, Leader


Coaching accelerates individual learning and provides the guidance that the leader needs to bridge performance gaps in their role. This in turn contributes to the larger organization. Over the past 5-6 years, the main coaching focus in China has been on:

• Helping to ramp up the contribution of new leaders, as they face such critical challenges in on-boarding. Many new leaders advance in their careers due to their proficiency with technical skills. But what they always lack are the leadership abilities needed for success in senior executive positions. Coaching assists them in the role change required, especially in the area of people leadership, and aligns the leader’s behavior with the new role expected within a 6-9 month roadmap to achieve them.

• Supporting organizations with High Potential leader Development programs. Individual Coaching and group coaching are always integrated with other leadership solutions, e.g. Assessments, Leader Development workshops, etc. to assist the talent to be more ready to take up new roles in the future. The client has many times shared feedback that coaching is much more effective in enhancing the leaders expected behavior change rather than only training workshops. Coaching helps to build their self-awareness, to have more insight on their blind spots, and remove the barriers they might face when trying to apply their learning from training workshops.

• Strengthen the relationship and

Enhance the leadership skills of Managers to drive short term and long term results at a private FMCG organization going through a turbulent change

The client company has been rapidly growing in the last 10 years and have reached an expected market share percentage. But over the past two years, they have been facing a big challenge in the form of increasingly excessive inventory back logs. So the organization has taken actions to execute a new strategy: Transition from whole sales to a Retail business model. A new shareholder with an international background has also joined and is responsible for implementing the change. Ten sales leaders each handeling

Client Success Stories

How coaching can help leaders in middle and senior management roles is illustrated in the two case studies shared here.

Case1

Case2

communication among leaders across functions and even up the organizational chain. Coaching helps them build on their emotional intelligence, and become more self-aware and empathetic toward others.

• Many organizations also benefit from coaching training workshops choosing topics like “Manager as Coach”. When coaching is used to complement the management style, it has been seen that team tasks get done more efficiently and team development areas improve on as the members feel more empowered while acting upon their responsibilities. The team ends up trusting their leaders more which contributes to a higher engagement in their job and organization. Earlier many managers would believe that people are motivated by money. But this perception has changed as they have learnt to offer something more meaningful to their teams.

COACHING 19

Case1

Case2

Advancing the capabilities of a middle manager to help take on a senior role in a multinational Semi-conductor Company

A Research & Development Director was being preparing for a senior leadership role. The key challenge for the leader was to improve on his people leadership skills, especially empowering others. The Right Management coach worked with him to identify the key competencies he needed to improve on for the senior leadership role and at the same time manage some derailers. e.g.

o Empower his next level to oversee the project review teleconferences

o Ensure he does not end up micro-managing his project updates and reviews

The Right Management Coach also helped him to start reviewing ‘exceptions’ of the project rather than ‘all’ project related tasks. The leader also would need to start coaching the next level on managing project expectations, while also developing their potential leadership competencies by:

• actively participating and taking a leading role in company-wide projects

• actively engage with both internal and external R&D customers

• manage conflicts between various functional units and business units. Learn how to handle the big picture rather than “we” verses “they” mindset

• establish progressively both vertical and horizontal dependencies

The leader was able to successfully transition into the new role as Senor Director in 4 months and then later transfer into a business development role to another business unit. He was also recognized for having the right mindset to manage difficult situations and was able to successfully handhold the down-sizing of more than 100 people within his department as required by the business at that time.

responsibilities for different regions with primarily local work experience are playing a critical role in bringing about the business change. They believe in the new business model, but have so far been unable to achieve the result as expected in the short term, and hence were feeling frustrated and de-motivated. They have failed in gaining the trust of the senior management team. Hence, have become very cautious in their approach and just passively follow what the senior management asks them to do. As a result, business has been affected greatly.

Right Management was approached by their HR and senior management team to design a coaching intervention to help the 10 leaders to improve on their leadership capability. A 6-month development road map was designed, using an integrated individual coaching and group coaching methodology. Our coaches worked with the leaders and their key stakeholders over 6 months to help them understand themselves better and identify their Individual Development Plans using the Hogan personality instrument. This approach helped them to build trust and alignment during the group coaching sessions, while working simultaneously on their individual challenges. The Client feedback shared how the leaders had learned to be more open, make fewer assumptions, influence others and be more proactive in working together and in coming up with innovative solutions that can ensure the success of the new business model.


Conclusion

Coaching has a bright future in China and is seen as a new leadership intervention within the market. Clients value it and plan to use it much more than before as a part of their Leader Development programs. The field of leader coaching continues to evolve, but in general, successful coaching agreements are based on a high degree of professional coaching capabilities and business insight on the coach’s part, and a willingness on the part of the coachee to embark on the ‘coaching journey’.

Today, the globalization of business and the flattening of organizations have created new challenges for leaders in every sector and industry. Hence, it is prompting far-sighted organizations and leaders everywhere to explore ways to effectively align people to meet the needs of business and engage them to work towards acheiving long-term business success. Coaching has been of help in meeting many of these challenges.

Case1

Case2

by Lucy LiuSenior ConsultantChina

by Michael CheahExecutive CoachChina

LEADERDEVELOPMENT

Leadership PipelineDevelopment

Leader Coaching™

Succession Management

Performance Management

ORGANIZATIONALEFFECTIVENESS

Strategy Implementation

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Outplacement

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Right Management’s Talent andCareer Management Capability

2014