I am often asked Why Executive Coaching? Executive coaching offers professionals of all levels the time and space to reflect, share their concerns and bounce ideas with a trusted external coach. Coaching supports a leader’s thinking, using proven frameworks, and supporting thinking to find solutions that have a real impact on business results. Executive coaching aims to help the client develop leadership in a professional context. Clients report improved relationships with key stakeholders, direct reports, management teams, colleagues, and customers.

Executive Coaching starts with a contract between the client and coach; the contract can take many forms, but a joint understanding of the challenge is critical for both and for the coaching to be effective. Coaching enables the client to gain new insights and perspectives, transition from role to role, adapt to future responsibilities or external trends, and enable greater self-awareness, confidence, and balance to their leadership style. The client and coach seek to develop a relationship that encourages increased awareness, reflection on alternatives, finding new perspectives and reviewing outcomes and learning. I will not attempt to offer instant or ready-made solutions. My approach will instead be mainly goal-oriented whereby, through careful identification and discussion of a current challenge, the client gains new insights.

As an Ashridge Executive Coach, I believe in a relational style of coaching and that the relationship between coach and client is at the heart of effective coaching. A mutual and co-created relationship is essential to long-term coaching success, rather than a remedial problem-solving contract that offers little, long-lasting results.

The Ashridge Centre for Executive Coaching, Ashridge is an internationally recognised Centre of Excellence and provider of coaching standards. Ashridge coaching aims to build bridges between science and practice, and to promote academically sound and ethical foundations for the executive coaching field.