Lately I have been hearing a lot about a divide between the executive suite and leaders, managers, and employees at levels below them…especially when it comes to the idea of the executive helping to coach and mentor more junior staff.
So I thought it might be helpful to offer up 3 quick keys to coaching from the executive suite.
1. Strategic: Coach from the vantage point of what skills must this person develop that will most greatly benefit the organization’s goals.
2. Identify: Look at the areas of greatest strength and greatest weakness and identify the skills that are going to be useful and that there is room to greatly improve. By the same token, look at the weaknesses and don’t just work on improving them because they are weaknesses, leave them be if they are unlikely to be improved and aren’t going to help in the organization’s mission.
3. Focus: When working on a skill or a person, don’t let the focus wander onto other skills or other people. Focus on the one task or person at hand and try to emphasize one tip or action that the employee can take immediately that will have an improvement.
I hope this helps. Let me know what you think.