People Skills 2.0: Assessing derailed executives

There is a saying in executive coaching that prescription before diagnosis is malpractice. In other words, it would be a breach of duty to treat the symptoms without doing tests to understand the root cause of the troubles.

 

There has been a great deal of media coverage in the last few years about the subject of malpractice. The most publicized forms of malpractice are medical malpractice by physicians and legal malpractice by attorneys, although malpractice suits against accountants (Arthur Andersen) and investment advisors (Merrill Lynch) have also been featured in the news.

 

How does this apply to coaching derailed executives?  Without a clear idea of the person’s strengths and weaknesses, you are only guessing what is needed. This is no time to guess. Take the time to assess the true situation before you recommend a fix.

 

In my book “The Prodigal Executive” I included a lesson I learned from a derailed executive named John (real case, but not his real name). The telephone call from John’s manager was intense and anxious. The manager described John’s behavior as being hostile.

 

John would speak to people in critical ways. He would call people “stupid” and raise his voice when speaking with a peer on the phone in another part of the country. When I met John, he was somewhat distant, intense, and had that “big city” pushiness. John could not understand why he was being asked to work with a coach.

 

Furthermore, John could not understand why the others had so much of a problem with him. After a few coaching sessions, John seemed to become more positive. Suddenly he refused to have me interview his peers. John could not handle the truth. He did not want to know what others really thought of him and it was in fact difficult to make a diagnosis and develop a coaching plan. 

 

His opposition regarding the 360 degree feedback assessment continued. This passive aggressive style defended against truly making a diagnosis and engaging him to make meaningful change. Not only was John derailing, he made sure he derailed the coaching during the assessment phase.

 

Coaching is Urgent, Assessment is Important

 

In coaching a derailing manager, before you can prescribe exercises to change behaviors, you need to make a diagnosis identifying the nature or cause of the real malady. Here the term truly means “knowledge through and through.” The more information you get the better.

 

But don’t think that taking time to do the important work of assessing does not  mean you are not doing the urgent work of coaching. Even when you are making the assessment, you are beginning the coaching process. This is much like when you go to the doctor you feel better even before a prescribe treatment. Why? Because you know you are doing something to solve the problem.

 

One part of the assessment is to determine if the person is actually coachable. That requires some coaching to begin with. So give them something to work on and see if you get some traction on positive change. This will provide another data point. Typically a lack of traction means the person may not want to change.

 

So how is your bedside manner? Like a physician, one aspect of being a coach is to provide the results of the lab work (assessments) in a way that is motivating to the derailed executive. Giving feedback is both an art and science. The art is that the style, tone, and personality of the words need to fit the personality of the person. If not, the information can be experienced as harsh and hurtful. Instead, you want to present the information in a way that will engage the person you are coaching.

 

Another aspect is that when the facts are stated in a way that is not acceptable, the derailed executive is apt to become defensive and has a greater chance of rationalizing the information away. When you give feedback, remember the derailed executive needs to feel supported and not attacked. This will also be important so the information will help the person see their behavior from a different perspective.

 Bruce Heller, Ph.D. is an executive coach and writes for SDNN.

Tags: SDNN

This entry was posted on Tuesday, July 14th, 2009 at 10:59 am and is filed under Job & Careers . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.