Executive Leadership Coaching – Is it an Expense or an Investment?

Salvador Vergara, Vice President, Strategic Partnerships

Coaching has long since been attributed to the improvement of performance and bringing out the absolute best in an individual. Probably the most visible representation of this is through sports. Teams and individuals leverage the leadership and guidance of coaches to help fine-tune their craft and teach how to operate at optimal levels. This holds true for business leaders and managers who seek to bring out the best in their high-potential employees. Several studies justify the positive impact of implementing a coach and reveal that improving performance drives bottom line results.

For me, it all comes down to retention of talent and cultivation of culture. Companies spend millions of dollars onboarding new talent and training them, sometimes integrating individuals into the overarching business strategy. Outside of compensatory reasons, people are looking for work that is satisfying, contributing to the greater good and/or their community and fostering an inclusive culture. What better symbol of your commitment to your employee than investing in her/his professional and personal development? You cultivate and nurture a top-performer or a high-potential (hi-po), and one can argue that birds of the same feather flock together. That supportive and synergetic culture begets the desire to perform well.

If executive leadership coaching is viewed as a cost, that tells me there is a fundamental, cultural belief that success rests explicitly on a singular person. Additionally, those who view coaching solely as a cost often don’t have a clear understanding and/or personal experience demonstrating how coaching is so invaluable. The focus of the company is likely myopic, and long-term sustainability and longevity is overlooked and deprioritized. Unfortunately, employees in these scenarios are regarded as simple assets rather than valuable contributors to productivity, collaboration and culture.

Conversely, when employees are considered true assets and ambassadors of an organization’s brand or identity, executive coaching is an investment. Success is derived from their people-related investments; you get out what you put in. Oftentimes the sponsors of coaching have personal experience with coaching, or have seen firsthand how coaching impacts someone’s confidence, ability to perform more effectively, or become a better leader and communicator. These kinds of organizations embrace cultural growth, change and development.

Join me February 24th as my panel and I discuss changing the narrative that coaching is just a one-time expense or something punitive. This webinar will demonstrate that coaching is a critical part of an organization’s overarching business strategy and exhibits their commitment to advancing the trajectory of their most valuable employees. Hear from coaches, business leaders and coachees themselves on the ways coaching has impacted how they influence others, how they inspire and motivate, and how they learn to contribute more effectively and efficiently.

Register: hrQ COACH Roundtable Series – Executive Leadership Coaching

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