Let’s dive into the 7 signs you’re ready for executive coaching. If you say yes to three or more of the signs, that means you’re ready!

#1. You Want Your Organization To Grow Regardless Of Any Obstacles

Your coach must:

• Have a proven process to gain clarity on your business’s future and create a strategy to get there.
• Help you discern the highest ROI on your time and focus in these areas. We only have so much time in a day. Do you know where your time should be going?
• Help you and your team set and execute needle movers/goals/KPIs. Your coach should make sure you are leading your team in particular areas and are reframing obstacles.

#2. You’re Committed To Help Your Leaders Cultivate And Elevate Others

Your coach should have tools and processes to help save you time and heartache. As leaders, we want our people to be more fulfilled, more relaxed and doing more strategic work than ever before. That’s what’s going to move the needle. We need to get work done through others and we also want to have some fun!

• Have proven tools to assess leadership excellence and to optimize the performance of leaders. Our performance motivation tools mentioned in my previous blog are a great example.
• Have proven tools to assess individual contributor excellence and to optimize performance.
• Be an expert on performance motivation. Performance motivation creates an environment where your team is pulling themselves forward. Fear pushes people forward. Vision pulls people forward. We want to create that intrinsic motivation and your coach needs to have proven tools to empower you to lead in this way.

#3. You Want To Ensure An Emotionally Engaged Culture Of Loyal And Devoted Employees

Your coach must:

• Understand the timing, structure, messaging, results assessment of an optimal engagement survey. In a previous blog, I showed how an SBM (Safety, Belonging, Mattering) Index gauges how your team feels and determines what they need the most.
• Know how to create and execute a Cultural GAME (Growth, Appreciation, Measurement, Engagement) Plan. I dive more deeply into what a Cultural GAME plan entails in a previous blog.
• Have at least two decades of experience building high performance, high engagement cultures that deliver remarkable business results and win Best Places To Work awards.

#4. You Want To Propel Sales And Create Deeply Engaging Marketing

The tools your coach uses are critical. What tools does your coach have that created these results for others? As a leader, getting out of the activities and into the strategy is essential to growth.

Your coach must:

• Optimize your sales force performance, reporting and engagement with a proven playbook. An example of this is our Create Content That Converts blog and infographic.
• Optimize your marketing approach, budget, ROI and customer experience with a proven playbook.
• Have a proven process to help your team close 50% faster and harvest 44% more of their pipeline.
• Have a proven process to make your marketing 300%+ more effective.

#5. You Need Help Getting Out Of The Details And Into The Strategy

Where is your company going? Who else do you need to help you grow your company? What other influencers need to come in and help take your company to the next level? Your coach will help you navigate these issues.

Your coach must:

• Have a proven process to get you at 85%+ of your Highest Value Activites. These are activities that energize you, tap into your strengths and may be challenging but feel good to do. They are how you add the most leverage to the organization. This will ensure you aren’t spending time in the weeds. You want to be working on your business, not in your business.
• Help you boost your energetic weight and executive presence to have more influence, get more powerful Board members, supporters and influencers to help you.
• Help you gain tremendous clarity on future possibilities, new products/services, new partnerships and the structure and ideal terms of these.

#6. You Have People, Communication, Team or Social Challenges You Want To Change/Optimize

Your coach must:

• Have a proven process for you and your team to navigate change and create emotional resilience.
• Have created record fast recruiting, retention, onboarding, referral programs to new employees.
• Have a proven process to ensure you have the right people in the right roles, doing the right things and delivering the right results.

#7.  You Have Places You Feel Stuck Or Don’t Understand Why You’re Not Getting Results

Your coach must:

• Use neuroscience to help you see into your blind spots and change your most challenging behaviors.
• Help you understand and edit your belief structures that limit your happiness and performance.
• Help you expand your vision to see entirely new ways of getting results.

What’s Next? Verify Their Qualifications

1. Held multiple operational roles. They can’t coach you on your diverse people issues if they haven’t been there.
2. Have had multiple exits, mergers and acquisitions. Many experiences equal many lessons learned! Benefit from their mistakes, pain and perspective.
3. Have triumphed in the face of diverse challenges. Your career and company is not cookie-cutter, it’s way more important than that.
4. Have been consulted by people you respect. These are smart people and companies similar to yours in diverse industries. Their testimonials should include a real person’s full name and the name of their organization.

If you are ready for executive coaching, get a good coach! The ROI will be profound. Pick a coach that has experience in the areas you need.

If you get a coach, commit fully. Be all in!