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From March 2008
By Walter F.
Loeb
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Sponsored by
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If you want
to lead, you have to have a coach.
The late University of Michigan football coach Bo Schembechler said
that the first step every leader must
take is to listen. He felt that after
you listen to your associates, they will
listen to you – because if you don’t
like them, you cannot lead them. This
philosophy also applies to retail
executives. |
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Sam Walton listened very intently to what
customers and associates had to say; David Glass
of Wal-Mart called it managing by walking
around. Similarly, Gordon Segal, CEO of Crate &
Barrel and Kip Tindell, CEO of The Container
Store, showed the same awareness of their
customer’s wants and needs.
Consumer-oriented, leadership coaching has
proven to be very helpful in making executives
better leaders and listeners. In their book
“Executive Coaching for Results” authors Brian
Underhill, Kimcee McAnally and John Koriath
offer many ideas that help leaders in the
industry with their professional personal
development.
Through coaching, a leader has a rare
opportunity to impart one-on-one attention and
hold private discussions to resolve operational
questions. It is an intense leadership
development process that usually has the
approval of senior management and for which
there should be a checklist of expectations.
Among the ideas that can be developed:
Choosing and committing to a purpose. As
leaders, new ways of responding and behaving can
generate creative tension and some discomfort.
The coach helps individuals articulate an
exciting purpose and, possibly, a new course of
action.
Building clarity. Coaching can effectively
support and enhance this process.
Learning through practice. Rather than offering
solutions, a coach helps leaders to look at
resistance in order to understand consequences
and to find new strategies to practice –
stretching beyond current limitations for new
behaviors.
Any leader who wants to grow within an
organization will profit from coaching. Through
the initiative of a leadership-development
strategy, executives can exchange ideas,
challenge themselves and, through coaching,
develop the right strategies. This benefits
everyone – the leader, associates, customers and
the company.
According to the Center for Creative Leadership,
70 percent of a leader’s learning development
comes from prior work experience, 20 percent is
on-the-job learning and 10 percent is from
formal education and training (coaching and
mentoring fall under on-the-job training). All
mentoring and coaching projects are linked to
the overall corporate objectives.
Coaching is an emerging resource that many
companies are beginning to use. It is likely
that more executives are going to use coaches,
since the demand for innovation and newness will
cause major changes in any organizational
structure of retail companies. Through coaching,
aggressive leaders can anticipate the impact of
change.
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