How does high impact executive coaching work?

High Impact Executive Coaching brings a different perspective

Imagine you are the CTO in the middle of a major transformation process around digitalization. And suddenly you realize that the company you work for has decided too late for this process. The owners are not ready, they are too old, they decided too late, and now you are in a shemozzle because the transformation is not working. It looks like the company will not survive.

What would most CTOs do? Please sit back and think for a moment.

To simplify: most likely, a CTO would first investigate the technical details, reanalyze what went wrong, state the obvious to his colleagues, perhaps argue for a moment with the owners, and finally explore whether and how to move forward. Downsizing might be a solution, but the owners do not want to think about it. They want to move forward without the transformation process. A year later the company goes bankrupt, and in the meantime the former CTO would have found a new job because CTOs are in demand, but at the same time most of the people in the company would have hated the CTO.

Too brutal? They would not leave the sinking ship? I think this is the reality in many family businesses.

What could High Impact Executive Coaching contribute?

We all know that digitalization processes are extremely challenging, complex, and still without a set of rules. Difficult decisions must be made and most likely unpleasant truths will be discovered. For many leaders, this is also personally challenging. My High Impact Executive Coaching will help you navigate these uncharted waters. And it will help you tackle unusual situations.

You may have asked me to work with you when you realized it was too late (example 2), or when you realized it was going to be more challenging than you thought, perhaps two years before the situation arose (example 1).

Example 1 – There is still time to do something

The situation is tough, you feel some discomfort and uncertainty, but you would never admit it to your colleagues. Many coaches would focus on the business aspects or teach you how to improve your communication skills. In High Impact Executive Coaching, we focus on you and what is happening under the carpet:

We will begin to understand your behavioral and emotional patterns and explore the discomfort you were beginning to feel.
We will think about the organization as a system and what kind of role you play in that system, perhaps you are seen as a black knight or as a savior?
The next step will be to become more aware of the resistance in the system to this process – for example, you may discover the excuses, the overly rosy visions of the future, the emotional difficulties of the owners.
Together we can complement your brilliant analysis of the technical issues with a focus on the human side and on you and your interaction with people.
With the right attitude, good questions and a willingness to bring your colleagues on board, it may be possible to work together to find a way out of this difficult situation and convince the owners of a different plan.

I will help you understand the psychological barriers in yourself, within your colleagues and within the owners so that you will be able to overcome them

Example 2: Calling me when it is already (too) late to solve the problem

If you think that you have managed well so far, no mistakes from your side, it is only about the others, then I am probably not the right choice for you. But if you want to understand the whole picture, including yourself and your personal impact, then I am the right person to talk to. However, you would need some courage to face deep questions.

Now that the horse has bolted, we can only work on how to create a good ending and what we can learn – about you and the company. Something must have gone wrong, or the company would not have gone bankrupt.

First, we focus on why you did not see reality as it was: at what moment did an avoidance emotional pattern kick in? What do you learn about your pattern? What could you do differently next time?
What was the relationship with the owners, how did it develop? Why were you not able to be more convincing with the owners or your colleagues? What did you fail to consider or take care of? What do you learn about your own reactions? What could you do differently next time?
Why was there so much resistance in the system? What was the resistance about? Why could you not resolve it? What was your role in it? What did you learn about your patterns? What could you do differently next time?
We would also think about the pain, the experience of loss, of lost trust, of despair of the people who work for the company. The last thing you could do would be to design a process for leaving the organization without hatred or despair, and that takes those emotions into account and is honest about what has happened.

Does that make sense?

The aim of High Impact Executive Coaching

High Impact Executive Coaching focuses on you as a unique person in a challenging role and context. Together we will work out how to manage these situations better by managing yourself better – this is the core of my High Impact Executive Coaching approach. It will ultimately improve your leadership and your life. If you want to hear more about it, please contact me under claudia(at)claudia-nagel.com or give me a call on 49 173 673 2772, see https://claudia-nagel.com/contact/

How does “High Impact Executive Coaching” work?