Top 5 Reasons Leaders Need an Executive Coach

Why leaders need an executive coach?

In an interview given to a magazine leading entrepreneur & certified executive coach Mr. Deepak Sawhney said that no matter how well-trained people are, few can sustain their best performance on their own. In this regard where people cannot continue their best performance, we need coaches. The best coaches are therefore those who can take the collective abilities of a team and push the team to perform at higher levels. Coaches are facilitators of performance! Without a coach, we could be limiting our career success.

So why do leaders need an executive coach?

There are five good reasons why we need executive coaches. They are:

 1 Bring structure and process

The world has become a place where we jump from problem to solution, and meetings and challenging conversations have no beginning or end, and there is lack of definite structure and process. Coaches in such working condition apply certain methods and proven roadmaps that help get us from point A to B.

 2 Help see through the fog

Coaches also help defog and therefore rightly called “defoggers.” They help defog the clutter in our lives that confuses us and slows us down when the pile grows bigger. Thus coaches are of immense help as they enable us to cut through various sort of fog. Thus we need Coaches to create a safe environment in which people see themselves more clearly and identify gaps between where the client is and where the client needs or wants to be.

 3 Create clarity

Having clarity is extremely powerful! Once the fog gets cleared, a leader becomes more efficiently capable of moving forward and understands exactly where to go. Hesitancy and indecisiveness are created by the confusion that blocks the road to success and growth. Coaches thus enable us to see the road ahead clearly.

4 Corral emotions

Emotions can get in the way of great decision making! Neuroscience proves that we feel before we even think. The part of our brain that processes decision making, memory, and emotional reactions are called the amygdala. When it believes we are in danger, the amygdala slams a door shut between the thinking parts of the brain and doing part of the brain; it can send us into a “fight-flight-or-freeze” state. This can save our lives. However, when it comes to decision making, being in a high emotional state: angry, overwhelmed, excited, or stressed out does not contribute to thinking clearly. Coaches, therefore, help clients open the “thinking-brain-highway” and overcome the “fight-flight-or-freeze” state.

5 Get results

Coaches are all about moving clients to take more committed and strategic action. A coach gets you to do something that takes you forward to attain desired results and objectives in a set period. Mr. Sawhney quotes Arnold Schwarzenegger who once said, “You don’t get bigger muscles by watching me lift weights.” Hence coaches move people forward and enable leaders to achieve levels of performance to the degree that may not have been otherwise possible if left to his/her endeavors. We need coaches to guide the building of the structure, accountability, and support necessary to ensure sustained commitment.