It’s Calling Us Forth! - International Coaching Federation
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It’s Calling Us Forth!

Posted by Sara Smith, MCC | February 19, 2019 | Comments (7)

Earlier this month, I presented at a Human Resources conference in the USA. It was a great opportunity for me to share some of our ICF research results with a potential client audience. If you are not familiar with the work our ICF Research team is doing, I invite you to check it out. For our research, we are partnering with organizations that are key to increasing the visibility of coaching like the Human Capital Institute (HCI).

I’d like to share three things with you from my experience. The first is a little bit about the study, Building a Coaching Culture for Change Management. Second, I’d like to share the reaction of the HR professionals as well as ICF San Antonio Chapter members in attendance. Finally, I’ll look at how the combination of the three can spell business opportunity for coaches!

The Data

In our fifth joint study with HCI, we looked at the impact a coaching culture can have on the success of change initiatives in organizations. Barbara Trautlein, author of Change Intelligence, tells us that the failure rate of major change initiatives in business remains a consistent 70 percent since researchers began measuring in the mid-1990s. That means that up to 70 percent of organizational change does not meet expectations…or fails. That is a lot of wasted time and money.

So here is some key data from our study:

  • Of the 442 organizations surveyed, about 30 percent were considered high-performing organizations (HPOs), meaning that they met or exceeded business expectations in 13 of 15 categories over the last two years (see the research report to learn more about the categories and criteria)
  • HPOs were consistently more successful at managing change than their peers (by an average of 20 percent) at almost every kind of change
  • Strong coaching cultures are more than twice as likely to be HPOs

Let’s connect those dots: HPOs represent about 30 percent of the participants in the study. They exceed their competition in business results and effectiveness of change. Strong coaching cultures are twice as likely to be HPOs. Why should you care?

Reactions of the Audience

This gets to my second point: As I was beginning the presentation, I asked my audience how many of their organizations used coaching or had a coaching strategy. Three hands went up. Out of 250 HR professionals in the room, three hands were raised. Now, perhaps it was after lunch and some in the audience misunderstood or didn’t hear the question correctly. Even so, three was a stunningly low number. The message for me was that intermediate to small companies—which is a huge marketplace—are not on the coaching band wagon yet. At all. ICF Chapter colleagues in attendance were paying attention and beginning to think of ways they can engage their business community.

Business Opportunity for Coaches

It is important for you to know that one of the things we do on the ICF Global Board is focus a lot of attention on investing our monies effectively. One way is to partner with organizations that help bring credibility, visibility and a value proposition to organizations that would hire you (no matter where in the world you may be).

There are three legs to this stool to move our profession forward:

  1. ICF partnering to bring research that articulates the value of coaching to markets globally
  2. Publicizing and delivering the research as far and wide as the global and regional realms can reach
  3. Depending on our 34,000+ coaches to leverage that information to become more successful

That third leg of the stool is what calls us forth…each one of us. This profession of ours is calling out the professionalism in all of us.

As I prepared for the meeting, I realized I had been on the sidelines for years, hoping someone else would spread the word. As I asked the chapter members  what would be their next steps, I heard them strategizing how to become the voice for coaching in their part of the world—leveraging what began at the HR conference to create coaching opportunities.

I believe this is where we stop being “consumers” of ICF and become “contributors” to the profession. I love sports metaphors, so consider this a call to get out of the viewing stands and get onto the playing field.

Sara Smith, MCC

Sara Smith, MCC, is the 2020 Chair of the ICF Professional Coaches Global Board. She is principal of Smith Leadership. Sara worked for IBM for nearly 30 years and finished her tenure as an internal executive coach and transformational consultant. Since leaving IBM, Sara continues to work with business executives, athletic coaches and university executives. Sara has been involved with ICF since 2001, where her passion for the profession led to her to become an active member in ICF North Texas. She was part of the chapter leadership team for eight years. She founded the ICF Southeast Region and served as its co-leader for six years. Sara has a bachelor’s and a master’s degree from Texas Christian University and is a Certified Professional Co-Active Coach (CPCC) and a Master Certified Coach (MCC).

The views and opinions expressed in guest posts featured on this blog are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions and views of the International Coach Federation (ICF). The publication of a guest post on the ICF Blog does not equate to an ICF endorsement or guarantee of the products or services provided by the author.

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Comments (7)

  1. Dear Sara,

    Thank you for sharing your findings around the fact that, up to the moment, small and medium companies haven’t sought much. The same story happens to be the same in my country. We’ll look for the way to increase coaching penetration into this area.

    Also, thank you for provoking some thoughts on becoming ‘contributor’ to the profession, that’s actually aspiring.

    Yorde L.
    Bangkok

    • scsmith@slweb.net says:

      Yorde, Thanks so much for your note – and for giving consideration to the idea of being a contributor. I think we are on to something here – being our own strongest advocates. No one will be able to speak more authoritatively to the potential client organizations in Thailand that the coaches of Thailand. Thank you so much for your support!

  2. Jacquie Fedo says:

    Thanks Sara! Appreciate you sharing how you leveraged the research and data. ICF Colorado in partnership with ICF Global is sponsoring a booth at the bi-annual Colorado Society of Human Resource Managers this fall. We are crafting our strategy to share with these professionals the value of coaching. Wonder if you would be willing to share your presentation with us? Cheers, Jacquie Fedo, ICF Colorado 2019 Chapter President

  3. scsmith@slweb.net says:

    Hi Jacquie, I would love to share the presentation and will. Since your event is this fall, give us a month. Ann Rinton and I are scheduled to collaborate a bit more to make it a little more user friendly. And we will add notes to help the presenter, as well. I’ve got a list of interested parties and you are on it Thanks for asking, Sara

  4. Stan Ward says:

    Hi Sara – I’m intrigued by this third point:

    “Depending on our 34,000+ coaches to leverage that information to become more successful.”

    Could you suggest two or three specific ways we can do that as coaching “contributors” and not just “consumers”?

    • scsmith@slweb.net says:

      Stan, I missed putting my answer in using the “reply” option. See the next entry. =) Sara

  5. scsmith@slweb.net says:

    Hey, Stan! Thanks for the question – leveraging this as a way to get organization clients’ attention and then pursuing the opportunities is the punch line for us, isn’t it. Here are the points – stated in order to build to the big finish. 1) HPO’s quantified success in making organizational changes is better than the rest of the pack by 4% to 31%. Have a client quantify the value of those percentages in speed to market or increased revenue. 2) HPO’s are twice as likely to be coaching cultures – direct tie-in to higher levels of success. That puts coaches into the picture. 3) We show what it takes to have a coaching culture (budget, acceptance, coaches in the system, external coaches and coach like leaders.) That’s where the business savvy coach asks their client what is compelling about for them and is ready to say, “I can help you get there.” The other interesting point for me, is this data makes it clear what clients will want to buy – which translates into what we need to be able to sell.

    The slide deck will be available in the next week or so (I’m finishing up speaker notes with help from our global staff). Hopefully, we will be able to schedule a webinar to present the material and do a little skills transfer to those who are interested. Thanks again for the question, Stan. Cheers, Sara

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