John Mattone

Keynote Speaker on Leadership, Talent & Culture: John Mattone

What to Do if Your Keynote Speaker Cancels at the Last Minute

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Any number of corporate events may involve a keynote speaker, to set the tone for the event, wrap it up on a high note, or generally drum up interest due to their reputation as a speaker.

keynote speaking

Few instruments are as intimidating as this one when there’s an empty hour to be filled. 

But if you’re in charge of booking a keynote speaker, however reliable their reputation says they are, you’re wise to have a backup plan ready. Keynote speakers are human, and they’re subject to illnesses, injuries, family emergencies, and airport issues just like everyone else. Here’s what to do if your keynote speaker cancels at the last minute.

Have Your Backup Plan in Place Well Beforehand

Prepare a backup plan as soon as you book your speaker. Discuss this plan with the event organizers, and perhaps with the “backstage” people like those taking care of the lighting and sound systems. It isn’t terribly satisfying to make a plan for something that probably won’t happen, but your backup plan is like a home fire extinguisher: it’s better to have one and not need it than to need one and not have it. Flesh out your backup plan so that it fills your keynote speaker’s allotted time, including any time you reserved for questions and answers.

Book a Substitute when You Book Your Main Speaker

For many planners, simply booking a backup speaker is the most prudent thing to do. This will probably be a local luminary or business leader so that you don’t end up blowing your event budget, but you do need to compensate your backup speaker in some way. Invite them to attend the event, of course, and offer compensation if they do have to provide the keynote speech, as well as some form of compensation if they don’t. For example, if your backup speaker attends the event and doesn’t end up speaking, invite them to the celebratory lunch or dinner, your treat.

If You’re the MC, Make Sure You Have Extra Material Prepared

An MC with plenty of material is one who can handle a delayed speaker. 

If you are the master of ceremonies, your time on the stage will be brief – unless your keynote speaker has to cancel or is delayed. Have extra material planned in the event that your speaker’s plane is late landing, so your audience won’t be left hanging if they have to wait. Perhaps you could play one of the speaker’s videos to fill the time. Or you could have a trivia contest, complete with modest prizes (like t-shirts, mugs, or copies of the speaker’s books).  Have several short activities planned so you can get right to the speaker as soon as they arrive.

If All Else Fails, Create an Impromptu Round-Table Discussion or Networking Event

Most events with keynote speakers will have an audience that contains at least a few experts on relevant subjects. With a group of chairs on the stage, a microphone that can be handed around, and a decent moderator, you can do an impromptu “expert panel” Q and A session on a topic relevant to your audience. Barring that, you could turn the house lights up and turn the event into a networking opportunity. If you can have a few people handing around water bottles and cans of cold soft drinks, you can help people relax and talk amongst themselves, trading stories and business cards.

Keynote speakers don’t get to where they are by not showing up or being late. When you book a keynote speaker, for the most part, you can be assured that they will show up on time and deliver a keynote speech that will be well worth the audience’s time and attention. However, you’re always wise to have a backup plan in place for the unexpected. Even if you never have to use your backup plan, you’ll be glad you have one!

If you have an event coming up, I invite you to check my speaking availability. I have spoken to some of the world’s most prestigious gatherings, and I also have a YouTube channel you can check out to learn more about my speaking style. Whether you book me or not, I wish you nothing but the best with your upcoming keynote event!

Don’t Confuse Leaders with Heroes

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It can be easy to lump heroes and leaders together into one catchall category, but in fact, they’re different.

Leaders may do heroic things, and heroes may lead others, but leaders and heroes are different in many key ways.

Similarities between the two exist, of course, in that both leaders and heroes produce positive outcomes. But how they produce those outcomes is different. The fact is, in a world that is fast-paced and often chaotic, we need both heroes and leaders. We need leaders at all times, and heroes in exceptional circumstances. It’s important for professionals to understand the difference between leaders and heroes.

Heroes Operate “In the Arena,” Often Cross Lines

Heroes often “cross lines,” sometimes literally. In 1918, as a newly-promoted corporal, Alvin York was assigned to cross German lines in the Meuse-Argonne Offensive and take out a machine gun position. After German small arms fire killed six American soldiers, York took charge, having his men guard a group of enemy soldiers while he took out several German soldiers with his rifle, and then several more with his pistol. Ultimately, York and his men marched more than 130 German prisoners to his command post. Later, after his wartime heroics, York went back to farming in America and worked with charitable foundations for rural children. Few could deny that York was a true war hero.

Leaders Inspire, See the Entire System

But wartime isn’t only about heroics, as George C. Marshall knew when he promoted Dwight Eisenhower to command U.S. forces in Europe in 1943. Eisenhower’s knowledge of military strategy and his gift for organization made him ideal for the leadership task. The Allies needed leaders who could see the entire system, and Eisenhower had demonstrated his ability to do precisely that when he had previously headed Operation Torch in North Africa, commanding a mixed force of nationalities, services, and equipment. As Supreme Allied Commander of the Allied Expeditionary Force during Operation Overlord, Eisenhower provided leadership that ultimately resulted in Germany’s surrender in 1945.

Leadership Inspires Heroism, and That’s a Good Thing

The hero steps in when exceptional circumstances dictate, and the outstanding leader isn’t threatened by this. 

Outstanding leadership often inspires heroic acts, and the best leaders see that as a positive thing. Leaders strategize, plan, and execute, but systems have a way of breaking down or colliding with the unexpected. It is often in those cases that the heroes emerge. They may not singlehandedly capture dozens of POWs, but when they bring in and personally operate old equipment to generate paychecks due to the current system breaking down, they perform a heroic act – one that leadership probably didn’t expect. It is only the bad leaders who are threatened when someone in the ranks rises to an unexpectedly challenging situation and turns it around.

Leaders are specifically tasked with influencing people, and with many of them, it takes solid leadership training to learn how to earn respect and wield influence effectively. Lasting leadership requires trust and personal relationships, and there are times when leadership demands that a leader step back for a moment and let someone else deal with a situation. It doesn’t diminish their leadership but actually enhances it.

Sometimes leaders do heroic things, and sometimes heroes go on to become great leaders. But leaders and heroes are not the same. By understanding the real nature of leadership, with the help of leadership training and leadership coaching, true leaders do what they can to prevent the unexpected and the disastrous, but they are as appreciative as anyone else when heroics are called for and delivered.

Leadership training is about helping leaders “see the system” so they can plan their actions accordingly, for the success of the overall organization. Leadership coaching is the key ingredient in successful leadership because it not only provides opportunities and encouragement to practice proven leadership habits, it helps leaders identify their own shortcomings and develop plans to overcome them. If you are in a position of leadership or are tasked with developing your organization’s leadership team, I invite you to learn more about my leadership coaching and executing coaching services

How to Make a Business Case for Executive Coaching in Your Company

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A trained and engaged executive team offers both tangible and intangible benefits.

Well trained leaders tend to lead happier, more productive teams.

As one example, a study by Performance Sales Executive Council found that executive coaching of key sales reps resulted in an 8% increase in performance. For another, a study in the Manchester Review, covering executives from Fortune 1000 companies found that executive coaching resulted in better customer service, cost reduction, and higher profitability.

But what about the intangible benefits of executive coaching? Surveys have found that trained and engaged leaders produce better working relationships within a team, better employee ability to see things from other perspectives, and an overall improved work atmosphere. One study reported that executive coaching cuts executive stress levels, and what’s more, the results of effective coaching can spread throughout the organization.

Executive coaching is an investment, however, and organizations expect a strong business case for that investment. Here’s how to make the business case for executive coaching in your company.

Identify What Your Coaching Culture Looks Like

When making the business case for executive coaching, it’s important to be able to articulate what you want the culture to look like afterward. For example, you may conclude that working with an executive coach would result in stronger decision-making, fewer mistakes, and higher team satisfaction levels.

Coaching helps the leadership team identify and address performance gaps, and if you know what some of those performance gaps are, you can use that to define what your organization’s post-coaching culture will be like. For example, poor communication and lack of transparency may be problems, and coaching can help leaders to solve them. As a result, the post-coaching culture will be more connected and engaged, and less likely to cultivate idle rumors in ways that can damage the company.

Costs, Outcomes, and Benefits

The costs of executive coaching will, of course, depend on which coach you work with, as well as the number of executives who will participate in coaching.

Spelling out costs and benefits – both tangible and intangible – is key to your business case.

Fortunately, executive coaching has enough of a proven track record that the business case for it can confidently predict outcomes with specific monetary values attached, such as:

  • Better employee retention, with associated lower turnover costs
  • A more positive work environment that facilitates strategic account development and higher sales volumes
  • Greater customer satisfaction
  • Increased bottom-line revenues

Calling out these financially-driven outcomes is important, but it’s also important to call out non-financial outcomes. If morale has taken a dip, for example, then it’s reasonable to expect that coaching will lead to the identification of the causes of that problem as well as specific steps to be taken to solve it. The business case for executive coaching should emphasize the numbers, but it shouldn’t neglect the outcomes that are less readily quantifiable.

Who Are Your Early Adopters and Champions?

Trying to make the business case for executive coaching as a single individual is more challenging than making that case as a group. Knowing that there is already buy-in for executive coaching will help make the case. Therefore, it’s wise to float the idea with multiple leaders, making the case to them and ultimately presenting the business case to decision-makers as a unified group.

Identifying early champions of executive coaching will also result in more enthusiasm when the plan is approved. If the decision-maker were to impose executive coaching on the leadership team out of the blue, people are more likely to question that decision. But when the case is made by the people who will actually participate, you can expect greater enthusiasm once the coaching process starts.

There is a strong business case to be made for hiring an executive coach. Multiple studies have shown that it produces both tangible and intangible benefits. But it may take more than quoting a few studies to make a strong case and make executive coaching happen. By identifying what a positive post-coaching culture will look like, spelling out the expected qualitative and quantitative outcomes, plus gaining buy-in from the participants, you can make the best possible case for investing in executive coaching. If you’re interested in learning more about coaching, corporate culture, and corporate transformation, I invite you to check out my books, which explore all these topics in detail.

Why Leadership Training Could Save Companies Billions of Dollars

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We like to think that successful businesses are led by highly competent people with strong leadership skills who really care about their teams and the future of their organization. But reality doesn’t always back this up.

Frontline employees need and deserve competent, well-trained leaders.

One recent study found that nearly two-thirds of employees said they would rather have a new boss than a pay raise! And it isn’t what bosses do that’s the problem in most cases, it’s what they don’t do. Too many leaders fail to inspire, think mediocrity is acceptable, lack vision, don’t collaborate, and don’t practice what they preach.

How do employees react to bad leaders? According to the study referenced above, they take their time accomplishing tasks, hide things from their bosses, put in the minimum required to get the job done, take sick leave when not actually sick, and take longer work breaks. In other words, they don’t feel valued, so they don’t see why they should have to give their best. Bottom line: poor leadership is costly.

By contrast, however, strong leadership has the potential to save companies millions, if not billions of dollars. A 2016 Gallup poll estimated that lack of leadership in US corporations costs up to $550 billion per year. Leadership training programs have the potential to save the corporate world significant sums of money. Here’s how.

Lower Turnover

Employees have access to more information about their employers than ever before in history. Websites like Glassdoor allow employees to share their honest opinions about their employers (and their leadership), and today’s employees and job seekers are far less likely to just shrug off signs of poor leadership.

Employee turnover is expensive due to the direct costs of exiting employees added to the additional costs required to hire and train replacements. And the number-one reason why people quit their jobs, according to a Gallup poll, is that they believe they have a bad supervisor. In other words, people leave bosses, not jobs. Leadership training programs are one key to developing the supervisors, managers, and team leaders that employees don’t want to leave.

People are likelier to leave bad leaders than to leave bad jobs. 

Fewer Missteps

A poorly-trained group of leaders, when faced with a major challenge, can resemble a 21st-century version of the Keystone cops: incompetent, uncoordinated, and baffled. Only it isn’t funny when it concerns a business that represents people’s livelihood. Leadership training programs not only help individuals develop their own leadership skills, but they also help leaders align their objectives and coordinate their actions accordingly. As a result, there is far less trial and error, and fewer missteps that require backtracking and doing things over. It’s clear how an aligned, well-trained leadership crew will incur fewer unnecessary corporate costs than an untrained, ill-informed leadership team would.

A Better Promotion Process

One of the best side effects of an outstanding leadership training program for top organizational leaders is the emphasis on the long term. The best leaders not only want their tenure in leadership to go well, they also want the leaders who come after them to succeed as well. Leadership training helps organizations learn to recognize emerging leaders and help them develop their skills. As a result, there are fewer top leaders who arrive at their positions because it is “their turn,” and more top leaders who are there because of their competence, and who have had the time and training to become leaders and hit the ground running once they are promoted.

A well-trained, well-managed workforce is essential to business success. But so is a well-trained, well-managed leadership team. Accomplishments and experience are important factors in choosing leaders, but simply putting someone in a leadership position in no way guarantees that they will lead effectively.

Leadership training programs are how the truly outstanding organizations succeed compared with their counterparts. Because without excellence in leadership, there’s little use in expecting excellence from the rank and file employees. If you’re interested in leadership culture, I encourage you to check out my books, which go into detail on the crucial topics of leadership coaching and corporate culture, as well as the importance of solid leadership training and coaching.

How to Get High-Potential Individuals Interested in Leadership

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Seeking a competitive advantage for your organization is a full-time job in itself. Because of the pace of business today, the five-year-plan of old may be squeezed and condensed into a one-year-plan.

Time will move forward, whether or not we (and our organizations) do.

Technology continues to evolve rapidly, as do consumers and workforces, and the business that wants to develop and maintain a competitive advantage must accomplish more, in less time than in years past. But however fast the pace of business, organizations cannot do without great leadership. The effect of exceptional leaders is obvious in terms of higher productivity, increased creativity, and avoidance of missteps.

Yet leadership isn’t static. Wise companies are the ones with a constant eye on emerging leadership, both within their company and in competitors. It may be that the easy part of creating a strong leadership succession is identifying emerging leaders because you must also pique their interest in leadership. Here’s how to do it.

Look for These Qualities in Potential Leaders

Promoting someone to a leadership position solely because they have paid their dues and it is “their turn” is a huge gamble. You’re far better off looking through your ranks and identifying the behaviors and attitudes that pay off in leadership, whether someone appears destined for leadership in the next year, or the next ten years. Here are some key characteristics to look for in people when determining the most promising leadership potential:

  • Leadership by example – whether or not they are in a position of leadership, some people are perceived as a leader. They show up on time, set high standards, and demonstrate an example of everyday excellence.
  • Dedication to personal growth – through learning new skills, asking about opportunities, and sharing what they have learned with others
  • Trust and respect from coworkers – a characteristic that you simply cannot put a price on!
  • Decisiveness – because while it’s good to evaluate all options, ultimately moving forward requires making unequivocal decisions based on sound reasoning
  • Passion – regardless of how mundane their tasks may be, when a person is engaged in what they’re doing, that passion is contagious

Definitions and Goals for Leadership Promotion

Suppose a new leadership position opens up in your organization. Now is your chance to help an emerging leader take their first steps and develop their leadership skills further. The first step is to define what “leadership” means in this job context. Maybe you need a shift leader, or perhaps your company is creating a new team that needs a team leader. Define what this person will be required to do, because otherwise, how will you know whether they’re meeting the challenge?

Clearly define leadership positions. People need to know exactly what will be required of them.

You must also define your decision-making process for promoting someone to this position. Sure, you may feel like you know exactly who would fulfill the position optimally, but you have to make sure you’re not promoting someone solely based on a hunch. If you were telling someone else how to choose the right person for the position, what would you advise that they look for? Would they come to the same conclusion you would? Explore your options for fulfilling the position first, because you want to be confident that the emerging leader you’re considering is indeed right (and ready) for the promotion.

Frame Leadership Training to Maximize Interest and Effectiveness

Of course, leadership development involves more than simply promoting the right person for the right leadership position. Leadership training is essential too. Researchers at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore found that how you frame the concept of leadership training influences both enthusiasm for participation and training effectiveness.

Specifically, they found that when a leadership training program was framed in terms of “improving leadership skills,” people were more interested in participating than they were when the identical program was framed as “becoming a leader.” What’s more, educational materials framed in terms of “leadership skills” produced significantly better content recollection than did the same materials that were framed as “how to be a leader.” It would appear that people are more interested in learning and applying leadership skills than they are at being labeled a leader!

Ultimately, when you take the time to really evaluate people, and to identify the right people for leadership positions, your leadership training programs will produce measurable results. If you are responsible for leadership succession within your organization, I encourage you to find out more about my leadership coaching services. 

What Navy SEALs Can Teach Us About Leadership Culture

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The Navy Sea, Air, Land (SEAL) teams have been around in some form since 1943, at which time they did recon and cleared beach obstacles for troops arriving for amphibious landings. They undergo what many say is the most demanding military training in the world.

The first groups of what later became Navy SEALs cleared beaches in advance of amphibious landings in World War II.

The jobs SEALs are asked to do are about the closest thing we have to “superhero” work in the real world. They tackle the missions that are exceptionally risky, sensitive, and logistically challenging, sometimes collaborating with special forces from other military branches.

Trust, collaboration, and interdependence are essential to successful SEAL missions, and it turns out that businesses can learn quite a bit from how this elite team of modern warriors operates. Mission, team, culture, and leadership are key components to SEAL success and the high esteem in which they are held.

Leadership, Structure, Strategy, Culture Intertwined

In many businesses, everyone understands the importance of leadership, structure, strategy, and culture, but too often businesses work on improving each of these as if they existed in their own silo. In reality, leadership, structure, strategy, and culture are interdependent and must align toward common goals for maximum effectiveness.

To break away from an “every person (or department) for themselves” mindset, it’s necessary to ask some tough questions, like:

  • How would we define our organizational culture right now?
  • What systems, structures, and attitudes need to change so goals align across our organization?
  • Are we treating leadership, structure, strategy, and culture as if each exists in its own bubble?

The answers to those questions can help organizations move toward a mission-oriented, team-oriented approach to achieving goals.

Moving from “Me” to “We” Requires Excellence Across All Dimensions

Entitlement, egocentricity, and selfishness pervade the top ranks of too many businesses today. And this can be a particular risk for the small startup that suddenly grows into a large enterprise. That same self-focus that can be necessary for getting a business off the ground can become an albatross around the neck of a larger, more mature enterprise.

If you look at the Navy SEALs, their priorities are mission, people, and purpose, and making good on these priorities requires teamwork. SEALs form teams of individuals with multiple, complementary motivations and skills, and they make sure never to lose sight of the mission and higher purpose. It requires honest, regular feedback, and agility when things don’t go as expected. It cannot work without trust, honesty, respect, and loyalty – qualities that businesses need to carefully cultivate as well.

Honest communication and feedback are indispensable to teams that deliver results.

Steps to Building a Healthy Leadership Culture

Moving from the “Me” culture of the complacent or egocentric business to the “We” culture that has made the Navy SEALs the legendary entity they are, requires taking several key steps:

  • Performing a diagnostic assessment, because you can’t go in the right direction if you don’t know where you are now
  • Matching strategy to culture
  • Defining behaviors and attitudes that drive real results
  • Connecting every team member to the mission
  • Assigning change agents where appropriate
  • Building an overarching narrative that speaks to the main mission of the organization
  • Measuring and monitoring performance, behaviors, and attitudes regularly

When you consider leadership training programs or leadership coaching, are you focusing solely on training program participants, or are you considering the potential improvement in the organization as a whole? After all, the best leadership training program available can only do so much when a business suffers from low morale, lack of purpose, backbiting, and turf wars.

While occasionally, the name of an individual Navy SEAL will make the news, for the most part, we learn about them through the actions of the organization itself and the demanding missions the organization tackles. Businesses can learn from this. It’s not the actions of a singular leader that determine long-term success, but the coordinated actions of a group of properly trained and coached team members who know how to work together to accomplish goals, and who leave their egos at the door.

Business missions are usually nowhere near the level of complexity and risk that the typical Navy SEAL mission is, but that doesn’t mean companies can’t learn from the military’s cream of the crop. I invite you to learn more about my corporate transformation services because when the team works together as something greater than the sum of its parts, that’s when the previously unattainable can happen.

Helping Leadership Culture Survive Mergers and Acquisitions

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A 2018 survey by Deloitte found that mergers and acquisitions (M&A) activity was accelerating this year. There are not only more deals, but larger deals, and technology acquisition is the top driver of mergers and acquisitions.

When companies combine, both leadership and culture must redefine themselves for the new entity.

Financial and legal due diligence are givens during M&A activity because it’s absolutely essential that every technical and legal aspect of the transaction is done correctly. But in all the details involved in a merger or acquisition, it can be easy for leadership to place the concept of leadership integration under the new entity on the back burner. This can lead to large, but avoidable problems.

Leadership Challenges During Mergers and Acquisitions

During a merger or acquisition, the risks of losing people, experiencing lower productivity, and logging lower profit levels are elevated. The leadership teams of each party to the transformation may do things differently, and this can exacerbate risks. It’s not unreasonable to include leadership training of the new, merged leadership team as part of the merger or acquisition process. The new business will be different from each of the formerly separate businesses, even if one company is essentially “swallowing up” the other.

When the leadership teams of the businesses that are going to merge or undergo an acquisition are pulling in different directions, or have different priorities, difficulties can arise. It may seem like a luxury to use leadership training during the midst of the great upheaval of M&A activity, but in fact, it may be one of the best investments the new, merged company can make.

The Strong Leadership Integration Team

A strong leadership integration team can be the difference between a mutually-beneficial, productive change in leadership and a confusing disaster. Will a new CEO be named once the new entity is formed? If so, CEO coaching may be a smart investment to help ensure that the transition is smoother and more productive.

It’s also important that the leaders in each organization know who their cohorts are at the other and how the leadership structure will change. It may not be possible at the outset to know exactly what roles each leader will assume, but with a leadership integration team, hammering out those important details can be done with transparency and the least amount of disruption.

Good Leadership Integration Inspires the Rest of the Team

Transparency and honesty are the keys to maintaining positivity throughout the M&A process.

A successful merger or acquisition doesn’t simply graft one company onto another. It requires blending of two corporate cultures – a task that is no less challenging and no less important than the legal and financial merging of the companies. When leadership appears baffled or at loose ends, it hardly inspires confidence from the frontline workers. Therefore, leadership training should be a priority at the very beginning of the merger or acquisition process, as should formation of a leadership integration team.

When leaders have defined goals for the process, know what they want the new organization to look like, and have a practical plan to get there, it carries weight with the everyday employees, who may sometimes wonder if their needs are considered as the two businesses combine. Strong leadership and clear goals inspire team members’ confidence that the merger or acquisition makes sense and will lead to better things for everyone.

Leadership changes are inevitable when two companies merge or when one acquires another. The stakes are high, as is the risk of misunderstandings or turf battles. It’s critical for the leadership of both businesses to take a proactive approach to the merger or acquisition, bringing in leadership training help if necessary, so that upheaval is kept to a minimum and there is less confusion.

When leaders get out in front of the merger/acquisition narrative, they can shape it better than they can if they’re simply reacting to the latest legal or financial step in the process. This benefits not only the leaders themselves but every team member from the companies that are combining. If you’re interested in learning more about meeting the many challenges of corporate transformation, including the challenges of going through a merger or acquisition, I encourage you to check out my books, which go into depth on many of the most relevant topics surrounding cultural change and cultural transformation.

Why All Managers Should Understand the Basics of Coaching

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The terms “managing,” and “coaching” are often used interchangeably, though they’re not the same thing.

Managers who understand and use business coaching principles are better managers. 

While the two processes have some common ground, there are key differences. Managing is primarily about overseeing the work of other people. Coaching, on the other hand, is more of a two-way communication process aimed at helping people unlock their potential.

Managers who have basic business coaching skills benefit themselves, their direct reports, and their organization because coaching skills can help solve problems before they can become intractable.

Key Coaching Skills Managers Should Learn

A study by Julia Milner and Trenton Milner focused on nine key coaching skills, and their presence or absence among a group of managers:

  • Listening
  • Asking questions
  • Giving feedback
  • Helping with goal-setting
  • Demonstrating empathy
  • Empowering employees to arrive at their own solutions
  • Acknowledging people’s strengths
  • Providing structure
  • Promoting a solutions-focused approach

They evaluated managers’ self-reported skills in these areas, as well as their skills as evaluated by 18 coaching experts, both before and after the managers received coaching training.

The Good News and the Not-So-Good News

Most managers considered themselves good listeners even before having received coaching training, and they were right, for the most part. But they consistently overestimated their ability to empower employees to arrive at their own solutions, and they overestimated their skill at acknowledging employee strengths.

However, after undergoing training in business coaching, the managers improved significantly in these areas, and their overall coaching ability improved by over 40% based on multiple assessments of the participants before and after undergoing coaching training.

Basic coaching training can significantly improve managers’ skills in key coaching principles.

What Coaching Accomplishes for Managers

When managers understand and practice the core concepts of business coaching, they accelerate learning, achieve genuine behavior change, and improve business results. Accelerated learning is essential in today’s business environment, where customers, technology, and the competitive environment are in constant flux. Achieving behavior change is likewise notable because it can be all too easy to slip back into old habits after training, and coaching helps prevent this.

And of course, every business wants improved business results. With businesses facing constant pressure to achieve greater goals (often with the same or fewer resources), the ability to put coaching to work to improve the bottom line means a better workplace for everyone.

But perhaps one of the best results that can be achieved by the manager who learns and practices basic business coaching principles is that they make the transition from “teaching” team members to helping them learn. As a result, the manager no longer has to function as “the answer person,” because team members are confident that they can learn the answers themselves.

Have you ever attended a high school football game and seen a highly competent pep band director in action? If so, you’ve seen what great coaching looks like. Once the band starts together and gets through the first couple of measures of music successfully, the director can leave them to their own devices for the rest of the song, because the band has learned how to rely on itself. And you can bet that the band has great respect for their director because they know the director has great respect for their abilities.

Business coaching is not the same thing as “telling people what to do.” Nor is it the same thing as micromanaging. Rather, it is a specific set of skills that managers can and should learn, both for their own benefit and for the benefit of the team and the organization as a whole. If you are interested in learning more about positive work culture and the role that coaching plays, I invite you to check out my books, as well as my speaking and training services.

2500 Words: The Definitive Guide to Life Coaching

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Life coaching is sometimes misunderstood. Some consider it a modern form of counseling, while others may consider the life coach to be little more than an expensive “agony aunt.”

The life coach performs totally different functions than the best friend or poker buddy.

It may be easier to begin by defining what life coaching is not. Life coaching is not consulting, nor is it mentoring, therapy, or counseling. Life coaching addresses defined personal projects, business or career issues, or transitions in a person’s life. It involves looking at what is going on right now, identifying challenges or obstacles, and defining a course of action that will overcome those obstacles to reach important personal goals.

Some life coaches consider themselves general practitioners, while others may specialize in issues such as confidence/self-esteem, career change, self-care, managing stress, channeling creativity, or mastering the art of balance among home, career, and personal development.

In short, life coaching is about guidance, empowerment, and improvement of one or more aspects of life. It doesn’t exclusively focus on professional life like business coaching does, and it’s less laser-focused than CEO coaching is. While life coaching is similar to career coaching, it may include non-career goals, such as developing the motivation and discipline to exercise.

Who Are Life Coaching Clients?

The one thing that people who hire life coaches have in common is their desire to be better people overall. Perhaps they have goals and want to learn how to achieve them faster, or maybe they face particular challenges or stresses that they want to overcome. People who hire life coaches often want to solve particular objectives, often:

  • How to gain clarity on what they really want out of life
  • How to define the steps they need to take to reach their goals
  • How to identify obstacles so they can be overcome
  • How to remain accountable to themselves for taking action

They may be professionals, blue-collar workers, or CEOs. They may be parents who face unusual challenges, like a child with a chronic medical condition. But in most cases, the people who hire life coaches are people who want to make a life transformation and want to maximize their chances of success. They know that friends and family members may not be able to be impartial, and they may not feel like they need the specialized services of a mental health counselor. They want to keep moving, keep learning, and become the better all-around person they know they can be.

What Should Clients Expect from Life Coaches?

Life coaching isn’t a trivial investment for most people, so it’s important to know what to expect from a life coach. If you hire a life coach, you should fully expect that, assuming you engage with the process to the best of your ability, you will get more out of life, produce better results in your personal and professional life, make choices more effectively, see steady progress toward your goals, and learn how to maintain better balance among all the stressors of everyday life.

Clients should expect a potential life coach to create a plan stating approximately how many coaching sessions will be needed, how frequently they will be held, and whether they will be held in person, by phone, by video-conference or some mixture of communication methods.

While clients certainly can’t expect the life coach to do all the work, they can expect to come away from life coaching with a better picture of what their true purpose is in life. They should also graduate from the coaching process with higher self-confidence, better motivation, and better discipline to put confidence and motivation to work. In short, they should come away from life coaching as a better version of their current best self.

Therapists, coaches, and mentors all help people excel, but in different ways, and through different approaches.

How Life Coaching Differs from Therapy

There are some obvious differences between life coaches and therapists. For one thing, therapists are required to be licensed and are regulated by state laws as to their level of education, type of training, and continuing education. Therapists work with people who are dealing with mental health issues, substance abuse, trauma, grief, or difficulties with intimate relationships. Therapy often involves exploring the past and deep-seated events and experiences that have influenced mental health.

By contrast, life coaching focuses on the present, the future, and how to bridge the two most successfully. A life coach will help a client identify goals and obstacles, and develop the discipline, motivation, and accountability to overcome obstacles so they can achieve their goals.

Coaching often involves addressing an individual’s mindset, attitudes, and thinking patterns by identifying problems like negative self-talk and self-limiting beliefs. The person seeking life coaching is assumed to have the answers they need within them, with the coach’s job being the facilitation of discovery of those answers.

One other important difference between therapists and life coaches is that therapists usually charge on a per-session basis, while life coaches often price their services based on coaching packages or programs. Coaching packages may last anywhere from six weeks to six months, and sometimes longer.

Can Life Coaching Improve Your Career?

Absolutely! What’s going on in our everyday, non-work lives affects our performance at work. Think about a time you went into work after a great weekend, rested and enjoying the afterglow of doing things you loved with people you loved. You probably performed well at work that day. Likewise, think of a time you went to work with a vague backache because you didn’t sleep well, or after getting up and realizing you forgot to get coffee at the supermarket. That day at work was probably far more challenging, right?

Life coaching helps with confidence, which carries over into every aspect of life. It can also help us with relationships by helping us understand and implement healthy boundaries or learn to listen more effectively. Life coaching often addresses issues with interpersonal skills, overall wellness, and effective time management, and these are issues that apply whether or not we’re at the office.

A life coach can’t teach you how to write a quarterly report that your manager will love, but a life coach can teach you how to manage your time and expectations, so you don’t waste any of your time wishing things were different or otherwise engaging in behaviors that work against your progress.

How Can Life Coaching Help with Work-Life Balance?

One of the most important things life coaching can impart is what the elusive work-life balance is, and what it is not. People, families, jobs, and co-workers are in a constant dynamic state, so you’re not going to achieve a work-life balance that is “once and done.” The fact is, most of the time we can only maintain balance momentarily, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t pursue it.

By helping clients prioritize and overcome self-imposed obstacles, life coaches can help with work-life balance.

How we are when we’re not at work affects how we are at work, and vice versa. But there will be times when work must take precedence, such as when there is an important and hard deadline to be met, come what may. Likewise, there will be times when non-work situations must take precedence, such as in the event of illness, natural disaster, or a well-earned vacation.

Life coaching can teach us how to keep our eyes on the goal of good work-life balance, even during those times when such a careful balance seems impossible. With life coaching, we can’t avoid those hard and stressful deadlines or non-work issues that happen to all of us. But life coaching helps us recognize when things are out of balance, why they’re out of balance, and how to bring things back to the center once a crisis subsides.

What Qualities Should a Life Coach Have?

Life coaches are human, after all, and because of the one-on-one nature of what they do, they should have certain human qualities in abundance, aside from their professional qualifications. For one thing, your life coach should genuinely care about you and your success, as well as the balance of all the major aspects of your life.

Your life coach should also have strong emotional intelligence, demonstrating behaviors like:

  • Considering people’s feelings and emotions
  • Thinking before speaking
  • Having strong self-control and emotional control
  • Knowing how to deliver criticism and feedback constructively
  • Being authentic to who they are
  • Showing empathy
  • Knowing when and how to apologize
  • Keeping commitments

Your life coach should understand that you, the client, are unique and that whatever tools or techniques they have been taught in their training need to be adjusted for you, your goals, and your situation. And your life coach should be genuinely excited about your progress, helping you to see just how far you have come during the coaching process.

What Are Life Coaching Sessions Like?

Your initial life coaching session, after you have hired and committed to the coaching process, will be different than subsequent coaching sessions. Your coach should establish rapport by encouraging you to talk about things like what your day has been like, what is important to you right now, and how you hope the life coaching process will help. You may also answer more probing questions like who your role models are and how they came to be that. You may talk about your usual decision-making process, career aspirations, and how you spend your free time.

Subsequent coaching sessions will probably commence with talking about how you are, what you feel good about, and what you are struggling with. You will talk about what has happened since your last coaching session, any breakthroughs or insights you have developed, and any decisions you have made.

Coaching sessions may take place in person, by phone, or by video conference.

You will probably talk about progress on any “homework” you were given at your last coaching session, as well as progress you have made toward the goals you are working on with your life coach. You will talk about what you have struggled with since the last session and discuss whether this indicates that a goal should be modified, or whether you, for whatever reason, were not able to make progress.

Your coach will talk to you about the goals or tasks you will take on before your next life coaching sessions, and how you plan to make progress toward them. And you will probably discuss how you might get stuck on your way to your goals, how to get unstuck, and how to maintain accountability to yourself as you work toward your next goals.

How to Choose the Right Life Coach

Successfully vetting life coaching candidates requires both heart and mind. The fact is, you probably won’t “click” with every life coach candidate you talk to. Their bona fide qualifications matter, of course, but so does their ability to develop a rapport with you. If you worry that establishing a good working relationship will take too much time, then perhaps that coach isn’t the right one for you.

You can and should ask a potential life coach about results. References and testimonials from clients are valuable, and you should follow up with them. You may be able to find online reviews of some life coaches, and you should read them, but with a skeptical eye. A client who failed to make progress and trashed their coach online may have worked with a genuinely bad coach, but they may have worked with a good coach with whom they could not establish a good rapport.

Life coaching is not a highly regulated industry, and because of that, it’s important that you gather as much information as you can, from as many reputable sources as you can.

Qualifications to Expect from Life Coaches

Because there is so little regulation surrounding life coaching, you can find life coaches with a range of backgrounds. Many of them have experience in business, and some may have a background and qualifications in counseling. Fortunately, life coaches who are simply not qualified in any way are often quickly flushed out of the profession, but you should still be willing to follow up on any qualifications a life coach claims.

It is also important that you dig a little to make sure that your chosen life coach is not in pursuit of a particular agenda. Did they get into coaching because they couldn’t make it in any other field? Do they impose a coaching style or worldview on their clients, regardless of the client’s background?

Ideally, the life coach you choose should have the training, education, and experience necessary to develop successful coaching programs, and while they should have trusted tools and techniques, they should understand the limitations of those tools and techniques. You should expect your life coach to provide you with solid references as to their education, training, and previous clients, and you should follow up with them to ensure they’re valid.

Life coaches tend to have similar backgrounds as other types of professional coaches.

What Is ICF Certification?

The International Coach Federation (ICF) is an international nonprofit organization that was founded in 1995 and is dedicated to establishing and maintaining standards for coaches. Today, many coaches consider ICF certification to be essential to a successful coaching career, although ICF certification is not required for a person to advertise their coaching services.

To earn ICF credentials, a life coach must complete coaching-specific training that meets the organization’s standards and achieves a designated number of experience hours in coaching. ICF-certified coaches must also partner with a mentor coach and adhere to the organization’s code of ethics and core competencies.

The ICF also offers accreditation for coach training programs. If your chosen life coach has completed an ICF-accredited training program, you can be confident that the training curriculum aligns with ICF standards. The organization offers a searchable database that coaches in training and coaching clients can use to learn whether a particular training program has been accredited by the ICF. If you don’t know where to start in evaluating a life coach, you can begin by asking if they have ICF certification or if their training was ICF accredited.

Conclusion 

Life coaching has similarities to and differences from other types of coaching, including career coaching, business coaching, leadership coaching, and executive coaching. For some people, life coaching is the type of coaching that makes the most sense when considering goals, lifestyle, and work-life balance. Choosing to work with a life coach is not a trivial decision, because working with an outstanding life coach can indeed help you transform your life. If you’re interested in learning more about coaching, I invite you to check out my leadership coaching services.

Glossary of Terms

Business coach – a professional who works with business professionals to help them define business and career goals, develop a roadmap to success and develop the persistence and accountability to achieve business goals.

Career coach – a coach who helps clients at many different career stages. Clients may be just starting out in their careers and want to make the most of it, they may be at a career crossroad, or they may be nearing the end of their career and interested in making the most of their professional legacy.

CEO coach – a coach who works with CEOs, often starting as soon as a new CEO is appointed. These coaches work specifically on career and decision-making processes that are unique to the CEO experience.

International Coach Federation (ICF) – an international organization dedicated to ensuring that people in the coaching profession are qualified, educated and trained and that they adhere to the organization’s code of ethics. The ICF also offers accreditation services to coach training programs.

Leadership coach – a coach who works with people in professional positions of leadership, including team leaders, managers, executives, and others who are expected to provide leadership and have a measurable stake in moving the organization toward its goals.

Life coach – a coach who works with clients who are interested in achieving personal and/or professional goals, and who want to develop their motivation, discipline, and self-accountability so they can reach their goals without wasting time or compromising on the qualities they value most.

Maximizing ROI on Leadership Training Programs

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Leadership training programs range considerably in quality.

“Feel-good” team exercises may be a fun diversion, but they may not produce the ROI you want.

From the quick, “feel good” seminars that let managers check off a box stating they’ve implemented leadership training to in-depth training programs with pre-assessments, post-assessments, and major time investment, leadership training programs abound.

But you would be hard pressed to find an upper manager interested in implementing a program that won’t produce a measurable, positive outcome. Therefore, if you’re in charge of leadership development, you have to be ready to make a positive business case for any leadership training program you are interested in using.

Many of the metrics that assess the effectiveness of leadership training programs are nebulous, and may not be straightforward to measure. But that doesn’t mean they can’t be measured. You simply have to know what to look for and how to assess performance before and after the leadership training program.

Potential Outcomes from Leadership Training Programs

After a successful leadership training program, you should expect to see higher employee productivity, better customer satisfaction, and better employee retention. Clearly, some of these will take more time than others to recognize, so it’s important to understand the time scale on which you can expect to see improvement.

For example, employee productivity may increase very soon after a team leader completes leadership training, particularly if the leader is in regular communication with the team about the training and expected outcomes. It may take a bit longer to see higher levels of customer satisfaction simply because of the time it takes for a transaction to process from beginning to end. And it may take a period of months before you can accurately assess employee turnover rates, but that’s OK, because employee turnover is a critical metric, and one worth examining over the long term.

Collecting the Data That Indicates ROI

Measure pre- and post-training skills and attitudes to help quantify training ROI.

To be able to measure the effectiveness of a leadership training program, you should conduct pre- and post-training assessments of participants. Better still, conduct those assessments as well as collecting “360-degree” feedback from the trainees’ direct reports, peers, and superiors. Differences in pre- and post-training data should be evident. And over the longer term, you can look at how many people who completed the leadership training program ended up being promoted to having greater responsibilities, which is a good measure of their leadership abilities.

Articulate Business Needs and Choose Trainees Carefully

Before choosing a leadership training program, it’s essential that you define what you want the end results to be. For one company that may be bringing in 10% more clients over a defined time period, while for another it may be reducing team turnover rates by 30%.

When considering candidates for leadership training programs, talk to them and ask them what they want and need in terms of leadership training. They should be able to answer the question with some specificity: “I want to learn which technology to buy for the call center team to help them work more efficiently,” or “I need to delegate key tasks more effectively,” are statements that indicate someone is ready for training in being a more effective leader. It is the participants who genuinely engage with the program who will deliver the results showing a positive ROI for leadership training.

No executive or senior manager wants to spend money on a leadership training program that doesn’t produce a measurable ROI. At the same time, it’s important for top leaders to understand that measuring ROI for leadership training programs isn’t the same as measuring ROI on a new piece of equipment. Leadership training ROI is measurable, but it may require more work, more listening, and more reliance on qualitative factors than measuring other types of ROI.

I have seen first-hand how outstanding leadership training programs can propel companies forward. Making the case for leadership training may require producing some hard numbers for the decision-makers who control how resources are spent. But making a business case, and then demonstrating the result afterward are powerfully convincing and should ultimately make your company a better place to work. If you want to learn more about leadership training, corporate culture, and cultural transformation, I encourage you to check out my books, which explore these critical topics in depth.

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