There is a vast body of literature available on executive coaching. The industry is maturing, there are certification programs, associations and a growing number of practitioners offering very distinct niches. They discovered analogies between coaching and consulting, coaching and therapy, sports coaching and business, introducing the corporate athlete, the high performing executive. Coaching services are offered on all levels of the organization separately, or as part of overall leadership development and training initiatives. Deliverables vary according to specialization:
- improving performance by changing behaviour or by providing expertise including how to manage time, how to set goals, how to get things done, motivate and inspire employees, even on how to think and how to “manage energy”
- providing support and perspective in the course of difficult projects
- improving emotional intelligence
- problem employee intervention
- organizational transformation
- and many more.
Coaches who provide the services are typically accomplished leaders themselves in various disciplines of business, sports and academia.
It seems there is no demand that can’t be matched; one might think that executives must be satisfied with the service they are getting. In fact, when typed “executive coaching fails” in Google, only four results come up (October, 2004) and all of them are based on one single article by Steven Berglas in the Harvard Business Review, which only looked at the downfalls of executive coaching in relation to underperforming executives.
This either means that this is the one industry that achieved perfect customer satisfaction, or that unsatisfied executives are silent.
The purpose of this article is to draw attention to three interrelated factors that are outside the boundaries of the reality of both executives and coaches.
The three interrelated factors are:
- principles and power
- vertical hierarchy
- essential leadership
People often mistake principles with values. By its original definition principle means both truth and beginning and a secondary meaning is catalyst of manifestation or realization. The reason for the confusion is relativism and strictly rational thinking, which –among other things- assumes that things may start anywhere. In reality however what people think is a beginning, is in fact a continuation, which can only be seen and understood from the right vantage point, which is on the level of invisible causes “above” visible consequences. They are above, because cause is primary and results are secondary.
In business, principles are replaced with money, which means that their foundation is relative and temporary and “organization” happens according to relative circumstances, where what is “right” and “wrong” is determined strictly by the interest of stakeholders. The balancing act between “values” and money (stakeholder interest) is senseless and hopeless. Maybe this is the reason why references to principles in mission statements are so rare. The most common words in mission statements are customers, quality, leader, communities, best, excellence (Guy Kawasaki: The art of the start), all terms that are subordinated to performance and execution.
Who are the people who perform or execute? How are they “organized”? This is where vertical hierarchy comes in. To understand vertical hierarchy, the direction of organization must be clarified. A simple way to illustrate the organization is by skills and functions the evolution of which is horizontal, and by principles, the realization of which is vertical.
Since principles represent the beginning/truth as well as the cause of organization, “formation” starts with them, meaning that people organize around principles, and thus the realization of principles happens from top to bottom. Looking at the organization of functions and corresponding roles, there are 4 main categories:
1. Main Integrator,
2. Specialized Integrators,
3. Integrating Specialists,
4. Specialists.
Closest to the principles is the Main Integrator, who “represents” the principles as well as unity and who is ideally also the catalyst of the organization.
The Main Integrator is above all functions. The person on this level is the essential leader, who doesn’t need an organization for self realization. In a business setting this person should occupy the highest leadership post. In addition to principles, the Absolute Integrator is concerned with concept, strategy causes, standing in a contextual vantage point and naturally his mental model is supra rational.
Next in the hierarchy is the Specialized Integrator. In reality this is the function that should be called executive, since this post represents the highest level of actual execution. The best analogy is clearly the CEO or (with some compromise) vice presidents. They are specialized since their “territory” is well defined but within that territory they represent –although indirectly, relying on the Main Integrator- principles and they also act as integrators, ensuring principles are properly represented on lower levels of the organization and that principles are manifest in functions.
The Specialized Integrators’ evolution is vertical, which means that for them skills are “levers of transcendence”, they only use them temporarily, as a means of getting closer to principles. As their ability to internalize principles grows their mental model shifts away from rational to supra rational.
Before continuing the descent down the hierarchy, it must be noted that by definition executive coaching (where executive describes the highest level of executive positions) can be applied only to Specialized Integrators and it should be evaluated on the base of how it contributes to the vertical evolution of these players.
A brief definition of evolution in this context is the realization of principles and the organizational concept (the whole) through the actualization of potentials. There is however no room to elaborate on the question of evolution in this article.
Next down the hierarchy are Integrating Specialists where the player’s evolution is horizontal, which means that it is skill based and functional and it is concerned more with specialization and much less with integration.. In the corporate world Integrating Specialists should fill the roles of facilitators. Their mind set is practical and rational. They have almost completely realized their potentials, which are defined by skills and aptitudes on the “skills plane” so to speak. Their high level expertise provides an integrating force towards specialists. They are capable of listening and are driven by consensus, finding win/win scenarios. Thus Integrating Specialists are substantial leaders, which is a different word for managers.
Specialists are rational thinkers, as well who operate on the horizontal plane, concerned with realizing potentials by strengthening their skills. They face the most challenges “understanding” principles. Since their attention is on the “result grid” without understanding causes, they tend to be opportunistic with quite a material value system.
It is not difficult to see that this hierarchy is almost completely opposite to how corporations are organized today.
Almost all posts are occupied by specialists and facilitators. The same can be observed in the strategic environment. Overall there’s more specialization than integration, which typically results in disintegration, fragmentation and the proliferation of “fields”. Since there is no “absolute point (of reference)” and everything is relative, the style of operation is manipulation.
We can observe this proliferation in the specialization of executive coaches, as they are trying to carve out various niches, and similarly to the consulting field, they “devise” various processes that they quickly patent and license, taking an opportunistic approach to offer “unique values” to their fellow specialists.
This is the key to why most executives in such circumstances are neither happy nor dissatisfied. Both the coach and the executive operate on the same horizontal plane, i.e. in the same reality, so neither of them realizes that the often quoted 3rd party perspective is nothing more than a different angle on the same plane as opposed to a higher perspective, which it should be.
Essential leaders would not find any value in current executive coaching practices and deliverables, since they can achieve self observation, self correction without direct support, and skills are not necessary for their self realization. Also, their perspective is the highest, which means that when they end up performing any kind of intervention, they “know more” than the experts in that their knowledge is direct and essential as opposed to the knowledge of experts, which is reflective and substantial. For an essential leader the modus operandi is radiation (direct impact), for the “horizontal coach” and all horizontal players, it is reflection (manipulation).
How about coaches, who are Main Integrators? It follows from the previous points that they would not be able to provide “useful value” to the majority of current players (Specialists and Integrating Specialists), since specialists are the farthest away from principles, and they can’t understand them, let alone internalize them. They would only be able to coach Specialized Integrators at best, but only outside the corporate setting, which means that the Specialized Integrator would be literally “lifted” above the corporation to a higher vantage point where no “corporate components” and no manipulation are present and most importantly no money would “change hands”.
A Main Integrator can only operate effectively in a position of power, since he represents true and absolute power. Positions that are not based on principles only represent pseudo – power, which is always relative and this again explains why people with pseudo power need to constantly modify their thinking, behaviour, value system and leadership style. Their feeble rationalization for this is that “change is reality”.
The real danger of “horizontal executive coaching” is that it further strengthens patterns of fragmentation, which contributes to the deterioration of thinking, turning CEOs and other executives into superficial corporate fashionistas, who increasingly work on themselves as “ products”, turning to fashion consultants, “personal branding” consultants and executive coaches in a never ending pursuit of (in lack of any foundation) change itself.
