For executives, a coaching session often offers the only opportunity for them to take time to focus on themselves, reflect, get personal insights, make shifts in their thinking and implement that new thinking and behaviour.
Lynda Aurora, director of executive coaching in Asia-Pacific for Impact Coaching & Consulting, said that while few organisations in Hong Kong have a coaching culture, using executive coaches is an effective way to support senior management changes and help individuals struggling to be more effective in their communications with fellow managers and other employees.
Myles Downey, a coach and director of studies at The School of Coaching in Britain, defined executive coaching as: 'The art of facilitating the performance, learning and development of another.' Most often in the form of a one-on-one focused conversation, such coaching is intended to enable an executive to reflect on key issues that affect his or her effectiveness, explore the options, decide what action to take and then implement it.
A change of chief executive at 3S Swiss Solar Systems saw general manager Michael Raber implement a coaching exercise. 'I used executive coaching over four to five months to get my people to work together because our CEO was leaving the company and we needed to stabilise the management team,' he said.
'We learned more about how to lead people. I learned about my strengths and weaknesses. There was discussion about different types of people, how to deal with them and how to bring together these styles and personalities.'
Mr Raber brought in an external coaching company, and together with other senior managers they analysed the situation, assessed the people involved and devised a programme comprising coaching sessions roughly every two weeks.
Each session was followed by practical implementation of the recommendations, then an analysis of what had been done and how it could have been done better. The exercises helped improve the whole organisation. 'It was something that we achieved together and it was what kept the management team [together] and proved a really valuable experience,' Mr Raber said.