Coaching Leadership Style

Welcome! I hope you will find this page helpful in learning more about my coaching leadership style and approach to executive coaching and who my typical clients are. I am a seasoned coach with 20 plus years senior executive level experience in a variety of industries and organizations. My coaching practice has included executive coaching and running peer coaching groups for senior leaders since 1996. I currently have over 70 active corporate clients. My background includes extensive participation in formal coaching schools and I am certified as a coach with the International Coach Federation (ICF).

Though my experience and qualifications may be comforting – just knowing that I have walked in your shoes – effective coaching  ultimately boils down to the relationship and ‘chemistry’ we have. Only read further if you are someone that is forward-looking and action-oriented. I am ‘an early adopter’, thrive on being at the ‘crest of the wave’ and choose to ‘live on the edge’ in many aspects of my life. I like working with leaders that are high performing, intrigued with the idea of “upping their games” and coachable.

A while ago my own executive coach pointed out to me that my involvement in search and rescue/mountain rescue (I have two certified search K9s and train in wilderness, avalanche, water, disaster and human remains detection) seems to importantly impact how I approach the flow of possibility and deal with adversity -dealing with life and death situations lend perspective!

I also like to think of myself as a “global citizen” – I was born and raised in Sweden and had to learn how to adapt to a new culture when I moved to the United States to do my graduate work at the University of California. I find inspiration in nature and currently live in the Pacific Northwest – unlimited opportunities for outdoors adventures…climbing, hiking and skiing are part of the allure for us!

Interestingly, my family is spread out in different parts of the world! Not surprisingly, I am actively working to expand my coaching leadership style and practice globally and virtually.

Why Do Executives Choose to Work with a Coach?

As an executive today you are probably short on time and can ill afford to go to week-long training workshops, only a fraction of which provides learning that is relevant to you. You, like many executives, may also feel isolated and  challenged by the need to keep up with learning at the velocity required by your changing business environment. With increasing demands on performance, stress induced by a 24/7 work environment, and a pace of change that is accelerating at breath-taking speed, you may want more than just a sounding board and support. You may want a partner that has walked in your shoes and knows what you are up against. Someone that is comfortable with a heightened level of expectation, including that of playing a key role in co-generating solutions to problems and facilitating  new levels of awareness and leadership. Enter the new “executive coaching leadership style” that is just recently emerging, one that is not wed to a particular model or school of coaching, but is willing to work with you to provide what you want, depending on your situation and need. This is the kind of coach I strive to be.

What Do Forward-Looking Executives Today Want?

If you are like most forward-looking executives today, you probably feel you are expected to be nothing short of a magician in terms of performance and results. With the added pressure and requirements to learn at higher speed, you need a partner that has t experience and sophistication and can help you come up with an organized game plan that provides context, comfort and structure. These may be some of your wants:

• To work with an advanced coach that is solutions-based, not just coaching-services based. That means being able to together invent solutions on-the-spot! You don’t want a process that is focused on chasing the symptoms, but work at the dynamic’s level — where the ultimate drivers of your thinking, behavior and performance operate. If you know these dynamics, your situation and frustrations become crystal clear, and very, very coachable.
• To tweak your ability to learn and how quickly you learn and integrate new knowledge.
• A partner that can guide you and act as a catalyst to help you move up several levels in your personal and professional awareness and development. For example, you may want to leap from the Responsibility level to the Inspiration Level. Part of what that means is that you expect your coach to introduce ideas, perspectives, concepts, principles, models and theories that fit your situation. Truly high-end coaching tends to be more concept-based than activity or goal-based. This may also mean that you expect your coach to go beyond tweaking or upgrading paradigms, to actually introducing new perspectives. You may know that ‘something is missing’ but you are not sure what, exactly.
• A Coaching Plan that is far more than an intake or assessment process, and much more than a list of sequenced goals and milestones. Rather, the Coaching Plan is an organized game plan at a more profound and forward-looking level.
• In addition to working with specific issues and problems you are interested in designing a lifestyle, not just organizing and reaching goals.
• To change your experience of life and make it more inspiring by upgrading how and where you get creative, intellectual and emotional energy. Think a lighter, cleaner, higher source: a solar powered car vs internal combustion engine.
• Help you transcend yourself, a fancy way of saying ‘get over yourself’, yet it means more than that. If this is on your want list, you probably recognize that you are reacting to yourself, others and situations, and have a sense that there is a place beyond this.
• You want something for yourself that seems impossible. You want a coach that can help you generate this flow of possibility. Imagine the environment that is bigger than you are, where your coach can help you push the envelope.

At a more concrete level you may be faced with one or several of these challenges:

• Clarifying your personal and business vision, purpose and direction.
• Aligning values, goals and actions with desired business results.
• Improving your organizational impact and executive presence.
• Integrating your position as a strategic “player” in your organization.
• Productively facing new challenges and responsibilities.
• Effectively managing organizational change.
• Creating an environment for continuous learning and action.
• Achieving balance between work/life issues.
• Identifying and leveraging management/communication style strengths and overcoming limitations.
• Increasing effective communications and management of style differences.
• Addressing work conflicts and/or team issues with staff or peers.
• Overcoming career challenges and “burnout.” Increasing enthusiasm for life and work.
• Transitioning from a “corporate career” to business ownership and/or consulting/coaching.
• Identifying your “passions’ and future options for your personal and professional life.
• Effectively using time, skills and resources.

SUCCESSFUL Coaching Leadership Style