An embedded approach to executive coaching.
Serving as a fractional coaching officer, we become deeply familiar with your organization to actively develop more aware, confident, and productive people leaders.
Why coaching makes personal and business sense.
All the greatest achievers – from elite athletes to renowned CEOs – have coaches behind them. Plain and simple.
No matter how far you’ve risen through the ranks or how effective you are in your current role, all leaders (at no fault of their own) lack the ability to see themselves as others do. As the stress of growth mounts and candid team feedback becomes harder to extract, executives often find themselves in a dangerous echo chamber. Not to mention, it can be lonely at the top – without a space to vulnerably work through challenging interpersonal issues and business decisions.
Here’s where coaching comes in. The right mentorship from an experienced peer in the C-Suite space provides a critical, objective perspective, allowing you to sharpen leadership and communication skills, understand how to forge durable relationships, and hone your ability to motivate others.
What distinguishes our executive coaching?
At Wayforward, we approach coaching from a different angle. Instead of providing advice from afar like traditional services, we embed ourselves within your organization. As a fractional coaching officer, our ongoing engagement is focused on developing your leadership team or up-and-coming successors.
Up close and personal
Through first-hand experience, your coach gets to know the organization and key players, enabling better planning and implementation.
Bringing C-suite experience to the table
We’ve walked a mile in your shoes and know how to solve real-world business problems.
Hitting the ground running
We will swiftly assess the current state of leadership and immediately begin working with team members on key competencies to close identified gaps.
360-degree view
We conduct a root cause analysis and collect feedback from all stakeholders to inform the coaching plan and develop measurable objectives.
Effective yet cost-efficient
Access the horsepower of a coach with C-Suite experience without committing to a permanent, full-time salary of one.
If this sounds radically different than outside leadership coaching you’ve experienced in the past, that’s intentional. Here are several drawbacks of traditional appointment-based coaching.
Our previous coaching engagements.
National private equity firm
When the firm experienced declining KPIs around SaaS acquisitions, it was clear that their leadership’s ability to blend cultures, systems, processes, and teams was slipping. They engaged Wayforward to quickly investigate why, help their team members develop awareness around what was holding them back, and ensure a stronger approach to get things back on track on an ongoing basis.
Regional manufacturer
After experiencing significant growth in the wake of COVID-19, the local company was grappling with tanking employee engagement, which impacted their ability to deliver on time for customers. The company initially engaged Wayforward for an employee experience assessment and implementation of an action plan to eliminate the root causes of issues. Afterward, the leadership team requested we remain on board to coach members of the executive team and up-and-coming managers who would be the succession plan for other leaders.
Professional services firm
Facing staggering levels of turnover, a relatively inexperienced HR staff couldn’t support senior leadership in a coaching capacity. As a result, the remaining staff was overwhelmed, and the firm struggled to deliver essential client services. The firm engaged Wayforward to assist members of their leadership team with self-awareness and the development of more effective behaviors to eliminate turnover.
International manufacturer
The company wanted to send European engineering executives to a major US facility. Wayforward provided a savvy set of native eyes and ears these non-native speakers could trust while we guided them through unfamiliar people dynamics.
Dispelling misconceptions about coaching.
Michael Jordan had a coach. Steve Jobs had a coach. Jeff Bezos has a coach. Most of the CEOs you know likely have a coach. Everyone on the team at Wayforward has their own coach. We practice what we preach. It’s important to maintain awareness of what our leadership teaches those around us and those that report to us. Developing our effectiveness as leaders is a central facet of a continuous improvement culture in an organization. It should start (and continue) at the top.
The adage that “time is money” wins out here. That insanely busy schedule – the grind – is generally more proof of a need for coaching than anything else. An executive’s time is valuable because of what they can do with it. Maximizing the effectiveness of one’s time is one of the most compelling reasons for utilizing a coach.
Research shows that organizations that offer leadership training alone can see up to a 22% increase in productivity. When coaching is actively incorporated for the individual, that figure rises to 88%. (Gerald Olivero, Denise Bane & Richard Kopelman, Public Personnel Management)
Doing fine is fine – if “fine” is the goal. Otherwise, we’re underperforming and holding the business back from its realistic potential by setting our bar for leadership too low. It’s much more likely that your leadership team has aspects of leading that challenge them, and can use guidance to improve those areas for the good of your business results.
If you'd like to learn more about our Executive Coaching services, schedule a quick, no-nonsense exploratory call with our Chief Advisor to help determine if we're the right fit for your company.