18 insights • Spring 2010 • Insights Magazine is published by the Northeast Human Resources Association

Executive CoachingFEATURE

At the heart of every successful executive coaching engagement is the creation of clear and actionable development goals by the executive or manager “coachee.” Created in partnership with his

or her coach, these goals become the foundation of a robust and sustain-able development plan.

What’s the best way for coachees to set and prioritize their coaching goals? While in-depth conversations with one’s coach provide the starting point for developing a set of coaching objectives, it’s also important for coachees to take into account the input of colleagues, direct reports, superiors and other stakeholders as part of the goal setting process. Such data helps identify issues for the coachee to focus on during the coaching engagement, sheds light on how other people perceive that individual at work, and provides critical insights on how an individual can improve their on-the-job performance.

Companies and organizations typically use 360-degree assessments to help provide executives and managers with multi-rater evaluations of their job per-formance. But in many cases, the feedback (especially qualitative/narrative) from such assessments is limited and raises as many questions in the minds of c oachees as it answers.

A MORE GRANULARLEVEL OF DETAIL

Coachees are oft en looking for more granu-lar, personal and contextual feedback than

that which traditional 360-degree

Going Beyond Traditional360-Degree FeedbackBy Richard Koonce

Insights Magazine is published by the Northeast Human Resources Association • Spring 2010 • insights 19

assessments provide. Th at’s why it’s oft en valuable for executives and their coaches to employ a tool I call a Narrative 360-Degree Assessment and Stakeholder Analysis. Th is customized “fi eld” assess-ment instrument picks up where tradi-tional 360s leave off , and allows for the collection of large amounts of real-time verbatim data from a coachee’s col-leagues, direct reports, superiors and other stakeholders.

Based on structured interviews con-ducted with a population of people iden-tifi ed by the coachee (with agreement and inclusion of the boss) these assessments can capture critical real-time perceptions people have of the coachee, identify and corroborate key trends in people’s per-ceptions and opinions, and shine a light on where the coachee may be challenged or experiencing confl ict with others in the organization. Equally important, these interviews can oft en highlight the true nature of key stakeholder relation-ships, reveal critical nuances of corporate culture, uncover organizational “stories” that are key to understanding how work in an organization actually gets done, and provide the basis for rich coaching con-versations to follow!

A JOINT PRODUCT OF COACH-COACHEE DISCUSSION

Narrative 360-Degree Assessment and Stakeholder Analyses are best designed through in-depth conversations between the coachee and coach when a coaching engagement fi rst begins. In the course of a coachee and coach beginning their work together, it normally comes out that the coachee has specifi c areas of interest they’d like to focus on as part of the coach-ing engagement. He or she may also have identifi ed specifi c areas for professional development and training they want to address as part of a coaching relation-ship. And, of course, there are normally workplace challenges that even the most high-powered coachee is dealing with that need to be addressed in the context of the coaching engagement as well.1

For example, coachees typically report having challenges with issues such as:• Teambuilding• Managing through infl uence• Managing up• Delegating work to others

• Managing change• Cross-organizational

communications• Dealing with offi ce or

organizational politics• Goal setting• Time management• Fostering workplace morale• Stakeholder management

When coachee priorities and job chal-lenges are identifi ed early in a coach-ing engagement, it provides the basis for designing a narrative assessment instru-ment that can be used to assess a coachee’s current strengths and weaknesses in doing a particular job, or handling key aspects of it.

STEP ONE:DESIGNING THE INSTRUMENT

Typically, the coach and coachee work collaboratively (back and forth by email) to come up with “buckets” of questions to be asked in each area identifi ed as a challenge for the coachee. In some cases, the coachee will also approach his or her boss for suggestions of questions to ask. Aft er some refi nement, a questionnaire is developed which the coach will use in conducting in-depth interviews with persons the coachee identifi es. Th e ques-tionnaire typically consists of 20 to 35 questions.

Next, the coachee identifi es the popu-lation of individuals he/she wants to have interviewed as part of the assessment process. Normally, this includes no fewer than eight individuals and can go as high as 20 or 25. Th e reason to interview at least eight individuals is to assure anonymity of responses. More oft en than not, the typical population of people interviewed is somewhere between 10 and 25. Th is needs to include a critical mix of direct reports, colleagues, superiors, other organizational stakeholders, and in some cases external customers, board members or others.

STEP TWO:IDENTIFYING INTERVIEWEES

Th e coach and coachee next develop a positioning note (typically a private email) which the coachee sends to each person he/she would like to have inter-viewed. Th e email briefl y outlines the

nature of the interview request, the coachee explaining that he or she is work-ing with a coach and is interested in get-ting that individual’s feedback on specifi c areas of their job performance. Th is is usually couched as being in the context of “managing changing business priorities” and the need to “optimally align my own performance and that of my team with changing business goals and objectives” or language to that eff ect. (In essence, language that anyone might apply to themselves.)

Th e tone of the email is friendly, col-legial, explains that the interview will take about 30 to 45 minutes, and that individual interviewee responses will not be reported back with attribution to the coachee. Instead, the note assures the prospective interviewee that their input will be reported back to the coachee only in aggregated form and used as the basis for ongoing coaching discussions and leadership development purposes. Th e email indicates that the coach will do the interview (either face-to-face or by phone) at a time convenient to the interviewee. It then concludes by asking the prospec-tive interviewee to respond with an email indicating their willingness (or not) to be interviewed.

As you can imagine, this email is criti-cal in eliciting people’s willingness to be interviewed as part of the assessment process. Coachees are thus advised to consider carefully the people they want to approach for interviews. Besides send-ing the email request, I also encourage coachees, where possible, to informally ask people if they would be willing to be interviewed. One might think it would be tough to get people to agree to sit for a 30 to 45 minute face-to-face or phone interview to talk about their boss, col-league or subordinate, but this is usually not the case. In my experience, people usually agree to be interviewed, if their schedules permit, largely because ano-nymity of responses is assured.

STEP THREE: CONDUCTING INTERVIEWS AND ENSURING CONFIDENTIALITY

All that said, anonymity of inter-viewees’ responses to questions asked is critical to completing a candid and impactful Narrative 360-Degree

20 insights • Spring 2010 • Insights Magazine is published by the Northeast Human Resources Association

Assessment and Stakeholder Analysis. As the coach sits with each individual interviewee, he or she again empha-sizes that all comments the intervie-wee makes about the coachee will be kept in confidence and only reported back to the coachee in an aggregated, formatted way. The coach then typi-cally says to the interviewee some-thing like this:

“Th ank you for agreeing to meet with me today. As you know, I am ‘George’s’ coach and this interview is part of a series of interviews I am con-ducting on his behalf with members of his team and other key stakeholders here at ABC Corporation.

Th e purpose of this interview is to gather input about how George is performing his current job responsi-bilities. George is interested in using input from this and other interviews to help him:

• Enhance his performance in his current job

• Increase his self-awareness of how he’s perceived by others

• Confi rm areas of professional strength

• Identify areas for further development

• Develop a customized leader-ship development plan

• Contribute to his ongoing suc-cession and professional growth

For all these reasons, I’d like to ask you questions in a number of specifi c areas . . .”

OUTCOMES OF THE PROCESS: A HYPOTHETICAL CASE STUDY

So what outputs are typically derived from conducting Narrative 360-Degree Assessment and Stakeholder Analyses?

Consider the hypothetical case of “Brett,”2 a bright and intense business executive in his late 30s with a proven track record of meeting aggressive sales goals in his previous sales jobs for a Zurich-based import-export fi rm. Brett had recently been promoted to a high visibility job spearheading his com-pany’s business development activities in Southeast Asia, but the new job was causing stress both for him and the

members of his 150-person multi-cul-tural team.

Brett and his team were essentially managing a start-up import/export operation in several diff erent Asian countries at once, and it was putting Brett under tremendous pressure to perform (bring in revenues, staff up the offi ce, and manage various business teams and offi ce operations). To get a handle on his new job responsibilities, Brett retained a coach, and the deci-sion was made early in the engagement to conduct a Narrative 360-Degree Assessment and Stakeholder analysis with a set of Brett’s teammates, direct reports, colleagues, superiors and cus-tomers. Th e interviews were conducted through both face-to-face and phone interviews. Th e interviews focused on gathering information about Brett’s per-formance in seven key areas including:1. Management style2. Setting and meeting critical business

development goals3. Building and aligning an offi ce team4. Delegating work to others5. Offi ce administration and

operations6. Interpersonal relationships at work7. Relationships with the company’s

home offi ce in the U.S.

After completing 25 interviews and organizing the findings by subject area, the coach produced a report for Brett that outlined what interviewees considered to be his key strengths, and also what they regarded as poten-tial areas for further professional development and growth. The report included:• An executive summary of findings• Detailed verbatim comments orga-

nized by each of the seven areas noted above

• In-depth recommendations as to how Brett could act on the findings

• Post-report questions and exercises to complete

• A stakeholder mapping question-naire to complete

• A suggested list of recommended leadership development/training options

• A recommended list of leader-ship readings to complete with a

particular focus on communica-tion and teambuilding

Broadly speaking, people expressed

a great deal of goodwill for Brett’s activities in managing the office, but they also were quite specific with feedback and suggestions as to ways Brett could become even more effec-tive in his job. Among other things, it emerged that people wanted Brett to:• More clearly and consistently com-

municate the goals, priorities and sales targets of the office to all lev-els of employees—so everyone knew what they needed to do to make the office a success.

• Put a formal reward and recogni-tion system in place to acknowledge people for significant contributions on the job.

• Put greater emphasis on training and development for all levels of employees, so that people could become more effective in their jobs. (Interviewees also said this was critical to recruiting and retaining high quality talent.)

• Demonstrate more “retail leader-ship” in the office (management by walking around).

CREATING SHIFTS IN THINKING AND SELF-AWARENESS

Brett reviewed the report’s fi nd-ings and recommendations in depth with his coach over the course of sev-eral coaching meetings. Th e discus-sions eventually led to some signifi cant shift s in Brett’s perceptions, thinking and management style. For example, he realized he needed to become a stronger communicator at work, and actively align people around com-mon work values and business goals. Second, he came to recognize the importance of formally acknowledging people for jobs well done, especially as the offi ce grew in size. So, he instituted a formal reward/ recognition system, and coupled this with more frequent employee communications eff orts. Th ird, he began to emphasize training and career advancement ladders for employees to build morale and retain strong sales and customer service talent in the operation.

Insights Magazine is published by the Northeast Human Resources Association • Spring 2010 • insights 21

Coaching tools you may want to use in conjunction with a Narrative 360-Degree Assessment and Stakeholder Analysis

Executive coaches can use many diff erent coaching tools in conjunction with Narrative 360-Degree Assessment and Stakeholder Analyses. Among those you may want to consider are the following:

Th e Myers-Briggs Type Indicator. Most of us are intimately familiar with the MBTI because it is widely used by organizations to help individuals understand their personality preferences on four key scales. We have either taken it, adminis-tered it, or both! By taking the MBTI, an individual gains insights into where they like to focus their attention, the way they take in information, how they process information to make decisions, and how they like to organize their world. It is a tre-mendously valuable tool for executives and managers to use in understanding and managing themselves, and the people they work with!

Th e Wilson Learning Center’s Social Style Matrix. Much less well-known than the MBTI but still very useful is the Social Style Matrix. Based on the work and research of Wilson Learning, the social style matrix can be a valuable tool in help-ing people understand the dynamics of communication they experience with peers, direct reports, colleagues, superiors and others—both at work and in their personal lives. It can be particularly useful in helping people understand why (and with whom) they have apparent personality confl icts or communications disconnects. Th e matrix identifi es four diff erent social styles at work in life and organizations today: Drivers, Expressives, Amiables and Analyticals—each with its own prefer-ences and characteristics. No social style is any better than any other but everybody has a preferred social style in their dealings with others. A full description of these social style types is included in the book, Th e Social Styles Handbook (2004 Nova Vista Publishing.) Th e book contains many useful exercises, and works very well in tandem with the MBTI.

Th e Burke-Litwin Model of Organizational Performance and Change. Th is model of organizational dynamics, developed by W. Warner Burke and George H. Litwin, provides leaders with a practical toolkit and roadmap for driving organi-zational change in areas such as mission and strategy, culture, leadership, systems, management practices, and organizational structure. Used eff ectively by a coach with a coachee who is a change leader, it can both facilitate and accelerate change by focusing the leader’s time, energy and eff orts in those organizational domains that will yield maximum results.

Over the course of five or six coaching sessions that followed com-pletion of the report, Brett not only developed a much better grasp of the leadership and management chal-lenges he faced in his job and how oth-ers perceived him in his role. He also got a firm handle on what he had to do to become a better, more decisive executive on the job. He articulated and embraced a robust set of business and development goals (based on the seven areas of questions noted above) and continues to use these goals as the basis of his activities at work, and as the principal underpinnings of his ongoing professional growth and development.

An important concluding note: As a final step in the assessment process, Brett took the opportunity shortly after he completed formal work with his coach to report back to intervie-wees about what he had learned from the assessment process. In a special meeting he held with interviewees, he shared what the process had meant to him both personally and profession-ally. He also thanked interviewees for the time they took to be interviewed. This gesture is a critical part of bring-ing successful closure to the 360º nar-rative assessment process.

CONCLUSIONSCompleting a Narrative 360-Degree

Assessment and Stakeholder Analysis isn’t always a necessary part of a coaching engagement. But it can be a very powerful tool to help leaders at any level in an organization under-stand how others see them, identify and prioritize development goals as a result, and take concrete steps to increase their professional effec-tiveness on the job. What’s more, including the leader’s team and other stakeholders in the assessment pro-cess has important benefits of its own. It sends a powerful signal to a leader’s colleagues and direct reports that he/she values the insights and feedback of others, is open to personal growth and change, and is willing to embrace and integrate the feedback of others in developing a robust professional development plan.

NOTES1. Two clarifications about coaching:

Coaching should always be posi-tioned with executives and manag-ers as a premium professional or leadership development off ering. Just as world-class athletes and musicians oft en have coaches, so too do many of today’s most successful leaders, exec-utives and managers. Also, coaching should not be confused with mentor-ing. Mentoring is usually done by a fellow or more senior executive on an informal, ad-hoc basis. Mentoring and coaching can be used together,

if desired, in a company and can be separate components of leadership development programs.

2. Th is case study is broadly based on some of the author’s coach-ing engagements of recent years. Names, circumstances and story particulars have been altered for pur-poses of illustration and to ensure confi dentiality. ■

Richard Koonce is a certified executive coach based inNewton, Mass. Contact Richard atrhkoonce@aol.com.