Rajesh is an extremely senior and successful sales leader in a global corporation in the technology industry. He has had a very successful track record and has always been seen as a dependable hand when it came to getting things done. Be it a tough client or a difficult project or a major initiative, if things had to be moved and people mobilized and results delivered, Rajesh was the man. Rajesh loved being called upon to help in this fashion, especially by senior stakeholders and he never disappointed. Until of course it was his turn to be disappointed. Rajesh was expecting a big role in return for all the things he had done and unfortunately for him, that did not happen.

That is when Rajesh’s manager suggested that he work with a coach to figure out what was coming in his way and we started working together.As Rajesh and I started working together, we realized his many gifts – high energy, optimism, results focus, communication skills, an informal style and of course very strong relationships. If Rajesh had a second name that would be “relationships”. His view was that relationships were everything. Be it customers, senior stakeholders, his managers, his team members, his friends – it was all about relationships. He would constantly see how he could help. Being nice, liked, loved, appreciated, were important and going to great lengths for this kept him preoccupied.

He believed that relationships would always pay. Unfortunately, this came at the cost of results with the team, strategic thought in a critical interaction, misplaced humor in a social setting and inability to assert or take a stand in peer relationships. After our initial explorations, we started looking at feedback from his stakeholders and many things fell in place. The moment Rajesh was able to see these unintended consequences in his singular quest to build and maintain relationships, he was able to start making quick changes.

Rajesh and I started discussing ways in which he could be more deliberate, thoughtful and strategic in his everyday actions. He also confronted some of his unhelpful ways of thinking that were contributing to his over using his “relationship” skills. It took Rajesh several months of contemplation, action, continuous feedback and the support of a peer network to make progress. Difficult business circumstances and people circumstances served as fertile test grounds for Rajesh to try his new behaviours.

Today, Rajesh is able to demand performance and take a stand with peers on professional matters. He focuses on substantive issues in meetings, lets his competence rather than his charm do the talking and no longer goes out of his way to be seen as likeable and popular.

Caveat:

The intent of these client stories is to illustrate the typical development needs that leaders encounter – needs that come in the way of delivering peak performance. The focus is not on the “how” or the methods adopted by the coach to help the coachee.The identity of the coach and the coachee have been concealed to preserve confidentiality.

Abstract

“Mergers & Acquisitions are a business reality among mid-size corporations.  In such contexts, entrepreneurs constantly seek coaches to resolve some of the professional dilemmas arising out of these crucial decisions.  

In the case I am about to narrate, the entrepreneur was confronted with an acquisition question – “to sell or not to sell”  a company that he assiduously built.  As a coach who worked with the entrepreneur I present the case in the form of a fable to illustrate how a “well structured non prescriptive coaching process” help the coachee come out with a framework that he used as a permanent acid test to resolve this acquisition issue.   The framework evolution happens through a 3 stage process with ample emphasis given to the emotional aspects: 1  Data collection and analysis 2. Reconciling the data, and the Business Context through unveiling the real story. 3. Moving the Coachee from Reconciliation to Action.The Coach also used certain alternate interventions in line with the subject matter expertise that was required to ensure that the coachee was able to reconcile his personal aspirations and had realistic expectations from the market place.”  

The Coachee’s dilemma

I was immersed in a breath taking view of the vast Bay of Bengal from the top floor of my Coachee’s office, when my coachee began talking about a business dilemma he had to overcome. To sell his company or not to sell his Company – that was his question.   He was telling me that a large multinational had offered him 6 million USD and this would mean enough money for him to retire in peace.  Knowing that he owned a large majority of the company, his friends at the Club kept pushing him with some “good” advice like, “What are you waiting for man – Collect the cash and go to the Caribbean”. It was then that the Coach in me awoke to the scene and I decided not to give him free advice like his friends but to skilfully unveil the story behind the question.  If deciding to cash out was so simple for him, I realized I would not be sitting in front of him.

It was my job as a Coach, trained in Skilled Helping to adhere to the strict belief that the answers to the Coachee’s questions lay deep inside his intellect and that it was my duty to shine the torch and get him to own the question and the answer.  Now came the challenge of adapting a structured Coaching model to this M&A situation. I proceeded to acquire as much relevant data as possible through dialogue and assessment tools.

Stage 1 :  The data acquisition and analysis stage.  My first attempt was to understand my coachee’s personality type and to establish the relevance of this acquisition dilemma to his current business context.  I also embarked on series of empathic dialogues, that included the history of his business, his own personal aspirations and his professional outlook for the future.   It was necessary to unveil his current state of mind in the context of the M&A.  This, I surmised could also be a clear pointer as to why he was finding it tough to take a call and why he needed my “Skilled Help.”

The data that was available at the end of this stage was the following :

Personality Type :  My coachee turned out to be a Highly expressed extraverted personality with a large leaning to be a paternalistically driven and gut feel (intuition) based self made individual.  MBTI – type ENFJ.

Business History :

He came from a lower middle class family with no other earning member. Against all odds he started the Company during the early 1990s.

Grew from a small 12 man team doing mass mailing for a leading bank.

Ø  Slowly diversified into becoming their customer service department for letters.

Ø  Grew to handle more than 10000 letters a month.

Ø  By 2003, more units of various multinational banks became his clients.

Ø  Today, his company provides a wide range of banking support services including both back end and front end support for divisions such as credit cards processing, retaining credit card customers, loans processing, customer service, outbound telemarketing for loans etc.  

Ø  With a team strength around 1250 they are a reputed provider of backend services to large banks and are housed in a large 50000 sq feet space which they own.

Personal aspirations –

Ø  To create enough wealth in the next 6 to 7 years, in order to be able to satisfy and fulfil the professional and financial aspirations of his loyal core team members, who have been instrumental in his success and growth.

Ø  To leave behind  a good professionally managed and financially successful conglomerate of companies, for his sons to take over and run independently from the year 2016 onwards (he planned to retire from a full time CEO position)

Ø  To go more “Rural” and attempt to do more and more services with the help of rural youth, thereby achieving “Cost Effectiveness” on one hand and “Satisfaction of contributing towards Society” on the other.  He already was employing 100 people in a rural setting and was proud about how he felt life in the villages around his rural venture had changed for the better.

Armed with this data, it seemed quite infeasible that he would ever sell his company and retire. But obviously he was seeing some merits in a financial exit. May be this was what needed to be probed in the next few coaching sessions.

Stage 2 :  Reconciling the data, the Business Context and the acquisition question through unveiling the real story.

During the coaching sessions, I needed to establish the real issue that was keeping him from selling the Company and then help him evolve a way forward to resolving the same. Some key probes had to be administered and these had to connect the current acquisition question to his context and his aspirations.  It needed two coaching sessions to establish a large enough empathy and to challenge the coachee into getting him to opine on the issues presented below.  The probes were however framed differently and were based on conflicts/feelings that he had raised all through this stage.  The Key Dilemma was then narrowed down to :

1. Was the current offer good enough in his mind in terms of accelerating the wealth that he aspired to create over the next 6 to 7 years ?  How much money did he want in the bank at the end of his tenure and was the current offer in line ?
2. What legitimate apprehensions were preventing him from saying an outright “yes” to being acquired ?
3. Was he feeling that, by selling out he would have too much time on his hands and nothing useful to do given his high energy levels ?  Basically did he feel it was too early to retire ?  This fear was natural given his personality type.  This was his real dilemma.
4. Was it a serious issue that by selling out, he would be perceived as ditching his loyal employees without giving them a fair share of the pie ? Was he concerned that his sons may fritter away his wealth because they had gotten it too early ? His strong paternalistic trait had to be reconciled.
5. More importantly – what were key parameters when he would consider to say a YES! to cash out and when would he say NO!  

Stage 3 : Moving from Reconciliation to Action

Point e above was the final trigger that moved the Coachee into action. He started thinking aloud that unless he came out with a clear set of parameters on “why and when” he would say Yes to acquisition, he would continue on an endless mental debate and feel very stressful.  

What ensued from these was an unfolding of a wonderful 4 point framework that the coachee articulated. The highlights are as follows :

   The acquirer had to be a large multinational with an ability to offer substantial growth to the current senior and middle management team. The Company would not be sold to another family business or an unknown brand just because the acquisition price was good.

b.      The acquirer had to be culturally conscious of the loyalty and hard work that the team had put in and should not plan to indiscriminately cut costs and bring down headcount for at least 3 years.

c.      The valuation must be in the region of USD 10 million or higher.

d.      The acquisition should not prevent the Owner (Coachee) from pursuing business outside of the current customers and should in no way be a bottleneck to the globalization and rural service aspirations.

The coachee re-iterated firmly that this 4 point framework would be his acid test framework for any potential acquisition in the future.

Alternate Interventions :

For the coachee to arrive at this framework, the following alternate interventions were deployed through 3 sessions of Stage 3:

a.   

1. The Coachee had to read selected Chapters of the Harvard Business Essentials of Strategic Alliances.  This was to help the Coachee understand the motivations of an acquirer and their expectations.
2. A Series of conference calls with Investment banking experts.  This was to give the Coachee a sense of what kinds of valuations to expect from an acquirer.  It also gave him a perspective on whether he could cash out at a later date, should circumstances change.
3. A series of meetings with Corporate lawyers on how M&A agreements are structured. This was to give the coachee a clear idea of certain negotiable and non-negotiable expectations which acquirers set as conditions for the owners pre and post the acquisition.

And Finally :

It was more than 5 months, when the coachee suddenly called me. He told me “Hey Coach ! I rejected 2 acquisition proposals based on the 4 point framework, but here I have one that fulfils the top 3 criteria well. However, they are willing to pay me more money if I compromise on the 4^th criterion for the next 3 years. I have decided to go with the deal “.  I asked him if he was happy, satisfied and had no conflicts. He said “Yes” and I replied “Congratulations!!”.   Silently, I thanked my Coaching guide for constantly re-affirming to me that what really works is a structured non-prescriptive coaching process. 

-N.Raghunandan

One of our clients, a large conglomerate, is known for its mature leadership practices. While every organisation aims to grow their leadership from within the system, our client walked the talk and set processes in place to not only develop their people but ensure that majority of the senior leader requirements are fulfilled from inside the system.

Being aware and empathetic to the variety of challenges their new leaders faced, they partnered with us from the year 2015 for a project involving transition coaching for a new set of leaders. This cohort included CEOs, Business Heads and SBU Heads. Since then, we have completed over 80 engagements with them. In 2019-20, having worked with them for almost 5 years, we saw the scope to study that elusive aspect in many leader development programmes – evidence of effectiveness!

We decided to work with the client to launch a longitudinal study to gauge the efficacy of coaching. The study covered 46 Transition Engagements. The study participants were executives who underwent coaching, their managers/Sponsors during the engagement, CHRO responsible for the business and a representative set of Coaches who coached these executives.

What did the study reveal?

Transition coaching has been found to work 90% of the time.

Specifically, the survey data demonstrated that executives achieved ‘Extremely effective’ to ‘Very good’ outcomes. 52% of Coachees consistently outperformed in their job for the survey period and for the same period 11% of Coachees significantly outperformed in their job. Finally, 97% of the executives coached were retained in the organisation.

The qualitative feedback we received from stakeholders showed the depth of the work that had been carried out:

Sponsor feedback on the goal of strategic thinking:

“Coach used a project approach to improve Coachee’s strategic thinking. Coachee has to deliver 30% sales growth and reduction in inventory by a few days. Coachee worked with Coach and improved the sales growth to 90%”.

Coachee experience on being coached for improved interpersonal skills:

“When you move from functional role to Unit’s leadership role overnight, some of your peers become your subordinates. Managing and aligning them requires different set of tact. Managing managers effectively was the biggest take away from the program”.

Sponsor feedback on Coachee transitioning into a new function:

“Coachee was promoted from manufacturing head to Unit head and carried his bias from manufacturing into the new role. The coaching engagement helped to correct this and instill appropriate Leadership behaviour”

This longitudinal study was led by an independent coach. The sources of information for this study and the suggestions for improvement were provided by Coaches, Coachees (Executives), Sponsors and the HR team.  Transition Leaders and Coaches having diverse professional backgrounds added to the depth of talent and experience available to review in this study. Available transition coaching related documents included goals, status reports, tracking sheets, case studies, coaching closure documents, process documents and published success stories.

While coaching is a helping relationship between the Coach and Coachee, transition coaching is a structured support mechanism for Coachees transitioning into new roles. The new leaders were supported not only through focused coaching but also through specific internal business support from the organisation.

Some of the coachees were new to the business while others were completely new to the group. Others were looking at significantly expanded roles. The challenges these leaders faced, while being uniquely nuanced, also had many common aspects.

In coaching engagements, while the actual coaching content and objectives vary widely, focusing on specific outcomes is key. In the study we found that the outcomes related to transition and performance included the coachee’s thinking becoming more strategic, building a network both inside and outside the organisation and the coachee being more effective in managing the stakeholder’s expectations. Those outcomes that related to self-development revealed that the coachees were now more aware of the impact they had on others while also strengthening the perception of them as a senior leader.

Alignment with the new team and the stakeholders of the new ecosystem were needs that came up in more than one segment. Coaches also worked towards team integration and helped new leaders calibrate style and approach through a process of feedforward.

Culture was the other big area that Coaches worked on helping leaders understand. They did this through various interventions including having internal mentors who shared historical and cultural perspectives. Preparing for change and improving strategic thinking was done through enabling new skills which facilitated these aspects. Other leadership skills that were worked on included delegation, time management and effective communication.

Putting it all together, the pathway for the transition was clearly defined with support from the Coach as well as the organisation. Each of these transitions were critical and have had far reaching impact across multiple stakeholders – the individuals themselves, the immediate team, peers, subordinates, customers, and business.

We were curious about the factors that actually contributed to the success of this engagement. Our study revealed that Sponsors/stakeholders’ involvement is crucial to the success of any coaching engagement. Sponsors were either involved in the engagement or aware of the progress of the engagement. Coaches were satisfied with the level of input they received from the sponsor before starting the engagement. Coachee benefit greatly from receiving encouragement and support from their immediate managers. 86% of Coachee expressed that their Sponsors helped in context setting.

The second factor that played a critical role in the success of this engagement was the Coachee’s ability to select their Coaches.  Chemistry is important in building an effective coaching relationship. The Coachee was partly involved in the selection of Coaches for their engagement. Coachees were provided with information about the Coaches including biographies, education, coaching credentials, functional expertise, industry experience and other background information.

Consistent coaching process – Great effort was taken to ensure that the coaching process and practices are consistent across the engagements and the partner organization constantly monitored and reviewed all processes and practices.

Calibre of the coaches engaged was another aspect that could have made or broken this engagement. The coaches engaged  in this transition coaching programme were a highly select and formally trained group. They have a keen understanding of the business and culture of the client. Although this study did not compare the effectiveness of the different types of coaches or the forms of coaching, we believe that only by employing coaches of a certain calibre, can the degree of effectiveness can be demonstrated.

The final differentiator was the ability of the Coachee to receive, accept and work on the 360-degree feedback. Interviewed Coachees expressed that trust and chemistry with the Coach made them receive their feedback constructively and view it from the angle of “How can I leverage this information for my benefit?”.

When the impact for the Coachee was “Transformational”, we observed that detailed discussions had taken place between the Coach and Coachee about the Coachee’s self-limiting beliefs.

This Transition coaching engagement was a collaborative effort with the talent management team of the organisation as well as the sponsors and managers of the leaders.  With the results observed over the years, it is now like a rite of passage for new leadership in the organisation to undergo transition coaching with the help of a Coach. We are proud to be associated with an organisation that understands that leaders do struggle and like all of us, can do with a little bit of help.

Manju joined the SheLeads programme with her first baby arriving soon! She came across as a confident and mature leader who was curious to explore the programme’s offerings and see what she could take back from it.

At that point, she was heading a department and had some memorable and successful projects under her belt. What gave her a sense of purpose was the idea of creating tangible and lasting assets, that make a real difference while being socially impactful.

In SheLeads, one of the first shifts that happens in our participants is when we ask them about their dreams for the future. Many realize they have not thought about it at all and were just focusing on surviving each day. Manju was different. She aspired to move to the executive level, heading the entire division.

In the individual coaching sessions that are an integral part of the programme, Manju started to realize that her aspirational goal was in fact, something that she was quite capable of achieving. As conversations with her coach went deeper, and beliefs and assumptions were unpacked, she realized that nothing was holding her back but herself.

Once that moment of epiphany happened, she moved from an ‘either-or’ mindset – especially when it came to her impending motherhood, to an abundance, ‘both-and’ mindset where she decided she was not going to give up her career aspirations just because she was having a baby!

She had help at home, a supportive spouse and a role model working mother. She realized that on one hand, it was easy to rationalize why she could choose not to do many things. But on the other, when she cleared what she called ‘the cobwebs’ in her mind, she saw no reason why she could not become the head of her function. She wanted both – motherhood and a career…and more!

As Manju participated in the workshops which explored both interpersonal and intrapersonal factors that affect one’s decision-making process, she arrived at the action plans she needed to achieve her goal. She decided that she needed to improve her visibility inside the organisation as her role currently required her to deal only with external stake holders and her boss.

She therefore identified key internal stakeholders she’d like to start developing a relationship with, as they were crucial to her being seen as a potential candidate for the executive level. Manju also chose to work on domain strengthening skills that would be needed to take on the next level. She planned it in such a way that this goal could be met during her maternity break!

She made rapid progress when she successfully helped another department collect pending dues from an institution, building her credibility with others in the organisation. She started getting routinely called in and consulted on matters that were not part of her portfolio earlier. She was looked upon as a solutioning partner, even for other departments in the organisation.

As Manju worked on her aspirations and dreams, she discovered her many strengths and began to leverage them. Situations that she would have earlier accepted as something she had no control over, now spurred her on to try new things and move out of her comfort zone. Her reward was finding opportunities that were fulfilling both personally and professionally.

At the end of the programme, she had this to say. “I am very confident that no matter what life throws at me, I can find the strength in me to cope. I am extremely comfortable with ambiguity now, something I wasn’t at all, earlier”

It’s been two years since Manju attended the SheLeads Programme. The fact that sustainability measures put into every coaching engagement actually work is apparent when today, Manju has exited her comfort zone and taken up a completely new role. A person who struggled to deal with ambiguity is now enjoying embracing it.

She is a woman in control of her destiny, baby and all!

In the inaugural session of the SheLeads programme, Gitanjali came across as a serious, reserved, composed young lady. Starting her career as an individual contributor in a role that needed strong negotiation skills, she grew to lead a six-member team across two countries. She came to this programme looking for some inputs that would help her be a better leader. She had not bargained for the depth of change that was ahead.

Gitanjali was someone who revelled in ensuring her customers got the solutions they were looking for. While this made her a great negotiator with third parties, those skills seemed to make a strange disappearance when she needed to stand up to people inside her own ecosystem! This especially happened in her interactions with senior or older colleagues.

Our sessions on intra and interpersonal skills as well as the module on stakeholder management proved to be a game changer for Gitanjali. Supported by coaching sessions, she understood how her upbringing that focused on being ‘respectful to elders’, affected the way she interacted with certain members on her team.

If someone was older and more knowledgeable, she found it hard to give them direction as a leader. It did not feel right to her and she often paid the price but still could not get herself to call them out. Her conversations with her coach helped her make this connection and she also realized that ‘respect to elders’ extended to being respectful of authority as well.

With this new awareness, Gitanjali built up the confidence to call out one of her team members who was ignoring an SOP. He was older and more experienced and she had feared upsetting their equation. While she was nervous and uncomfortable, she mustered up the courage to initiate the difficult conversation. She quickly realized that the senior gentleman seemed unaware of the impact he was having on the department. She explained to him how his way of operating affected her ability to manage the team. Much to her surprise, he understood her point and was happy to comply.

Gitanjali came away from that conversation with two lessons. First, that senior colleagues were willing to listen to her and actually appreciated her inputs. Second, she realized the importance of communicating the ‘why’ of her decisions.

As Gitanjali regained her confidence through this new perspective, she was able to find joy in her day again. She started connecting with colleagues not just at work but also outside of it. She enjoyed this new bonding and how calm it made her feel.

It took a lot of strength and work throughout the four months of the programme for Gitanjali to challenge her long held belief. She went from a tentative leader to one with purpose and focus; from a serious introvert to somebody who took joy in reaching out to others. Her Coach describes her deep transformation quite poetically – ‘A flower had unfolded its petals and smiled’

https://www.cfi.co.in/a-women-leader-development-program

There are occasions when the timing of a person’s entry into the SheLeads programme is quite serendipitous.

Tara was one such individual who came across as a timid and tentative participant. The first coaching session that focused on Appreciative Inquiry, saw her breaking down while speaking to her coach. This is something that rarely happens in the very first conversation. For Tara though, it was one where for the very first time, she felt truly listened to without an iota of judgement. This connect seemed to be exactly what she needed at that point in her life.

In the company that she had been with for over a decade, she was an award-winning leader who handled a broad portfolio including talent acquisition, talent management and other HR practices. The difficult situation that defined her life at that moment was that she had just separated from her spouse and was also mother to a young daughter.

She had requested to be moved to a new location to put some distance between herself and her old life so she could have some space to think things through.  She wanted to patch things up with her husband and she felt the distance would help.

So here she was, in a new place, a new set of people to work with and a new family unit consisting of her mother, her daughter and herself. Nobody in her new ecosystem was aware of her background and she wanted to keep it that way. She feared the judgement that this information would invariably evoke.  While she also had to put on a brave front for her mother and her daughter, in reality, Tara had never felt more lonely or scared of what the future held for all of them.

When she entered the SheLeads programme, the strength-based psychometric instrument and the Appreciative Discovery Dialogue helped Tara understand all her strengths while also exploring ways in which she could leverage them. The intra-personal inputs in the life skills portion of the programme, helped her identify many of the beliefs that formed the basis of her outlook on life.

Through the coaching sessions, she was able to challenge each of these beliefs and arrive at new perspectives.

One of the most important shifts she made revolved around trying to patch things up with her husband. Every overture of hers seemed to meet with disastrous results. Her coach helped her stop and take a long hard look at the relationship. She began to realize that relationships can flourish only with mutual trust and respect. This helped her to let go and rediscover her own self-respect.

Tara’s other overarching belief was that people would judge her based on her marital situation.  This belief extended to colleagues at work and she had refrained from sharing this information, even with her new boss.

As she challenged this belief along with her coach, she was also exposed to inputs on strengthening stakeholder management in the life skills workshop. Putting the two together, Tara came to the conclusion that people respected her for who she was and not what she was.

Once she made peace with herself and understood all that she had going for her, she realized that what other people thought no longer mattered. A great weight shifted off her shoulders and she felt free again!

With this new found courage, Tara went on a journey of exercising her independence. She invested in a car. She filed her IT returns by herself. Both of which she earlier depended on her husband to do. She had a heart-to-heart with her manager and was happily surprised by the empathetic response she received. She voiced out her need to learn and strengthen her knowledge to support her growth in the organisation. She was promptly put into various projects and interacted with different groups.

The internal transformation had resulted in an external transformation as well and there was no stopping Tara. She accepted and valued her redefined family unit and took every opportunity to strengthen her relationship with her daughter and mother. As part of the program’s sustainability measures, she chose both of them as well as her manager and a friend to be her accountability partners – people who would keep her motivated to stay the course she had set out on. She also knew her coach was always there for her, just a phone call away.

During the pandemic, when her boss quit, Tara was asked to take over as the CHRO of the organisation.

Troubled Tara had turned triumphant.

Note: This client story is representative of only the essence of all the work that actually happens in the programme. For more information on SheLeads : https://www.cfi.co.in/a-women-leader-development-program/

Harish was a successful, experienced delivery head in an IT services company who moved to the next level when his boss left for a different assignment. For the first time, Harish was handling a P&L level leadership role and this involved him taking on two completely new elements – managing finances of his business and leading business development. Harish was a pro when it came to tech skills and domain related knowledge. 

He was naturally apprehensive about these new responsibilities but being ambitious, was keen to take up the new role and prove himself. He had a good start when he realized that although his seniors were now peers and erstwhile peers were reports, they all accepted him quickly, thanks to the credibility he had built in the organisation. 

His challenge lay in another area. Easily able to earn the customer’s trust with his technical knowledge, he usually came into the picture only after the contract was in place. But in this role, inspite of his good interpersonal skills, he found himself at sea while making a pitch to a new customer or even managing the sales team. Within a few months of him taking over, the sales numbers began to display a worrying slide. 

This induced a new level of stress for Harish who was accustomed to success! As a measure to battle these falling numbers, Harish told his team to identify potential customers and rushed from meeting to meeting, trying to convert their needs into business for the organisation. These customers who were meeting him for the first time looked lost as they listened to his deep dive into the technical aspects of the project. Almost as lost as his sales team did when he spoke to them at their meetings. 

His boss could see that Harish needed some help with transitioning out of his old role and into the new one. He suggested coaching and Harish was more than open to it. CFI was approached. Our coach, after discussions with HR and the boss, during the course of the coaching assignment, helped Harish work with his strengths and prioritize his challenges. Picking up on the importance of the business development function for Harish, a brainstorming session ensued on how he could make a beginning to learn the sales role. 

The idea that he could accompany the sales executives at senior level meetings, allow them to lead the conversation and add value by suggesting technical solutions to the customers, really appealed to him. He understood how to leverage his strength better and gain new business for the company. Another area identified in line with Harish’s strengths was using his technical knowledge and project execution experience to identify and remove roadblocks from all existing projects under his charge.

 This was very much up Harish’s Street. His focus in this area resulted in smoother and faster execution of projects as also faster invoicing and less disputes with customers leading to faster payments. This not only lifted the sentiment of the sales team; it resulted in one of the lowest receivables (DSO) for Harish’s business. Further, the coach made Harish see that his action had resulted in lowering the working capital requirements for his business. 

This is a positive contribution to the company and of equal importance as revenue generation. The coach encouraged Harish to report this in his business reviews along with the DSO numbers. This fact was received favourably by the Management. The finance head congratulated Harish about his lead in the matter. This did wonders to Harish’s confidence which had nosedived in an earlier review where Harish had fumbled when he had just taken up the role. Higher customer satisfaction also had some positive rub off on the sales numbers. Satisfied customers were now willing to receive new business proposals from Harish. 

Harish became more comfortable in the world of finance as he attended a programme on Finance for non-finance managers, in addition to doing relevant reading suggested by the coach. He was also encouraged to reach out to the Finance team for support. They were more than willing! Harish slowly gained enough confidence to discuss with the coach his own ideas on how to reconfigure the pricing so that it was less cumbersome to customers and more profitable to the company. 

The coach helped him put his thoughts together and present it to the management. As the weeks passed and the coach gathered feedback from various stakeholders, it became clear that Harish needed help with a few more things – executive presence and the fact that he needed to be less aggressive with his reports. 

Harish, who was quite taken aback by the feedback from his reports immediately started being more mindful of his interactions with them. While he personally hated wearing a tie and felt small talk was a waste of time, the coach helped him get a new perspective on his executive presence. He was guided to see how others in positions of influence were likely to form impressions about him based on his appearance and how initial impressions thus formed may take time to alter. 

Soon the coach found Harish focusing on his listening, improving his presentation skills and even making changes in his choice of clothes. As things started coming together, his confidence in himself grew and he started to feel much more in control. 

The coach knew his job was done when Harish made changes to the way his team operated and did not feel the need to wait for his boss’s approval whom he merely informed. Harish had transitioned from a technology leader into a business leader.

At XLRI, Fr McGrath’s Basic Managerial Skills or BMS was the most popular course – completely experiential, creatively designed and facilitated by the senior batch.

It taught us in the very first few months that becoming a good manager was very important.

Cut back to 2026.

As someone who has been leading a coaching led leader development company, I must admit to a huge fallacy about leader development.

L&D professionals, Talent managers, Leadership development firms, consultants and coaches tend to call everything they do leadership development. Developing someone to be or become an effective manager somehow does not seem glamorous.

While we do a lot of work to develop leaders, I must admit that a lot is also to help leaders develop not leadership but basic managerial abilities.

Unfortunately, a very large number of professionals make a very poor transition from being an individual contributor to a manager.

At the heart of that poor transition is their inability to manage all forms of boundaries – task boundaries, time boundaries and relationship boundaries.

They are unable to say what they will do and what others will do and therefore they can’t delegate. They are unable to set clear expectations or priorities. They fail to give feedback, be honest, draw the line, and define an adult to adult relationship.

But they do grow into leadership roles and at that stage these missed developmental milestones become troublesome and development is to solve problems.

No wonder, survey after survey will tell us that manager scores are poor.

While real leader development does take place and it must carry on, we must recognise the real issues and use responsible semantics.

Years ago, when managers had more time and tenure in the relationship and worked face to face, some handholding, some mentoring, some guidance, some skill development, some role modelling took place. With hierarchy collapsing and a lot of work becoming remote and managers becoming virtual managers, I think we have descended on what appears to be a managerial crisis.

I think it will serve us well to go back to the basics and invest significantly on making people good managers before we start to make them great leaders.

What this will translate into is investment in manager development early in the employees careers (unmindful of fears that they will learn and leave), designing learning solutions that are appropriate for that level and then continuing to reinforce the lessons all through the life of the manager and leader.

Developing good managers is as important as developing great leaders.

Youtube link: https://youtu.be/o2QDrofXJ3g

One dimension of our personal and professional lives, which does not receive the attention it deserves is decisions made when people hit the “low road”.

There are three kinds of low road decisions I would like to explore: emotional low road decisions, AI low road decisions and digital low road decisions.

Let’s start with emotional low road decisions.

Be it the decision to attend a party in the wrong island with the wrong people, the decision to invade a country, the decision to invite investors to fund your business, the decision to get into a relationship, to break up from a relationship, many people take emotional low road decisions.

“Emotional low road decisions” are decisions without impulse-control, out of anger, with inadequate emotional regulation and self-regulation, based on overconfidence, overestimation of one’s abilities, underestimation of consequences, distorted perception of reality, poor empathy, moral licensing, a sense of infallibility and so on.

All of these are rich in emotional data. Unfortunately, many do not access this emotional data or pay attention to it. The inability to be aware of, access and use emotional data reflect poor emotional intelligence. (Which is different from being emotional. One is to be hijacked by emotions and the other is to be informed by emotions.)

Let us now look at another rapidly evolving global development: the “AI low road”.

Blindly following AI is in no way different from being blindly led by one’s emotions.

Because, when you blindly follow AI, you are stopping to apply your own thinking, not testing hard realities, listen to your contextual and native intelligence, ascribe more to AI and its abilities than it deserves. To surrender to “AI said so” is a low road too.

Finally, as we discuss the subject of mental health in the life of millennials and gen zs today, it can often be traced back what I would like to call emotion led decisions made from the “digital low road”.

One dimension of this digital low road is succumbing to the algorithmic influence or believing what you see or what is amplified or what bombards you and deciding on that basis.

The other dimension of the “digital low road” is decisions made from the pressure of social comparison (likes, comments, and perceived popularity that shapes choices, often subconsciously)

Then there are decisions made from the fear of missing out rather than thoughtful choices.

This low road can run contrary to the popular belief that millennials and gen Zs have a mind of their own. It takes a lot of emotional intelligence to be reflective, question things, discern the intrinsic value and of course not be addicted to the overload of information and stimulation.

For these reasons, it is my belief that decision making will emerge as the most critical dimension of life skills in the decades ahead.

Youtube: https://youtu.be/zOgyf5L5RSo

Why is it that a new leader brought into an organization with such great promise slowly appears to be looking not so promising after the first couple of years? This subject needs much attention.

I am sure you have been involved in brining leaders into organizations with significant expectations that they will bring in transformation, change, solve some of the vexed problems, lead the organization into hyper growth.

The organization ends up ascribing a lot of wisdom, competence, authority and stature to that person. Even more if that person came from a large “haloed global corporation.”

Thanks to all this and some very specific skills that this person brings to the table, the first couple of years are outstanding. The leader is able to quickly able to solve some of the vexed problems, bring an expertise that the organization desperately lacked, perhaps deal with some low-hanging fruits and give relief that this much awaited person has finally arrived and filled a gap. The first couple of years are very promising. Many things get done.

Around the third-year things slowly seem to plateau. People are now beginning to ask why the leader is not solving some of the larger problems appropriate to his pay and grade that they assumed he or she would solve. They ask why the leader has not yet built processes, built or retained and grown a team.

Peers begin question the price that has been paid for the early success, the relationships that have been frayed, the people not taken along. The Board goes back to the original hiring mandate and asks if the larger objectives were fulfilled or not and often finds they were not.

By the third year the leader also begins to silently realize that he or she has run out of steam.

Why does this happen?

Central to this year three problem is the excessive reliance on the leader’s individual abilities and playbooks used in another game.

While these may have provided some early relief, it was assumed that the leader would respect and enrich the culture and not blame it build a stronger team and not replace everyone partner and not compete with peers institutionalise processes and strengthen the eco-system

It is also assumed that the leader would not stop learning and acquiring new abilities to solve new and unforeseen problems that the organization is going to face.

What will it take for a leader to do all this?

It will call for a balance between action and reflection. Reflection about how I need to evolve and grow, what are the new ways in which I need to operate having delivered the early success in solving some vexed problems, how I prepare myself for a solid sustainable future.  It will also call for humility and openness to feedback.

If such a leader does not get help, he or she can leave (hence the three year itch) or fall by the wayside.

Youtube: https://youtu.be/EI9XI1POcGE

Lets talk about leadership and boundaries.

One of the distinguishing characteristics of effective leaders is their ability to manage their boundaries. This helps them focus, direct their energy and devote their mind space to the most critical matters. These leaders are mindful of what they take on, what burdens they choose to carry and what they sign up for.

To understand this better, let us talk nine reasons why leaders struggle with their boundaries and why it can make them quite ineffective.

1. the need to be always available, always accessible, easily interrupted, letting people consume their time at any time.

2. having a difficulty to say no, feel awkward about disappointing. Not wanting to let others down or delay or even conveying that they cannot do it

3. finding it hard to draw boundaries between what is professional and what is being very familiar. When people get too familiar, then it becomes hard to establish norms, say what is right or wrong, give authentic direct feedback because relationships seem to somehow come in and interfere.

4. making it easy for people to delegate upwards and taking on what the team should be doing and then become a bottleneck.

5. over committing to projects not knowing that they do not have the bandwidth, they do not have the resources, it is not possible to do it. Worse, when they make commitments on behalf of their team, they underestimate what it will take to do a good job and end up actually disappointing everybody.

6. when one is constantly absorbing others stress and disappointments. Maybe wanting to reduce discomfort among others and  take on so much that at the end of many interactions they feel drained.

7. the inability to digitally distance oneself and instead always be on, always having to respond instantly. Anxiously waiting for what is coming one’s way, what one needs to say and how quickly one needs to get back.

8. neglecting self-care and knowing that one is exhausted, one is on the verge of being burnt out, that one needs to really find time for oneself to recuperate.

9. to believe that one’s worth depends on doing for others, taking care of others, that one is wanted all the time, that making sacrifices is important.

All of these nine things can drain leaders and also make them ineffective.

Do men and women struggle with managing boundaries equally?

Men and women struggle with boundaries. Perhaps centuries of social expectations and conditioning make it harder for women to manage some of the emotional boundaries of giving care, being available than men.

With every passing generation when women are able to more clearly draw boundaries, it is not easy for people around to accept it.

All things said, managing boundaries is so important for a leader to be effective

I would like to know what you think.

Youtube link: https://youtu.be/Xi4GwVYjc-c

I want to talk about what constitutes the soul of an organization and why it matters.

CFI has just completed 20 years of existence and we have begun thinking about our next 20 years – what 2046-47 will look like and the fact that it will call for people beyond the founder to get involved in taking the institution there.

The central question I have been asking myself in this context is this: what is the one thing that we want to retain?

the unequivocal answer is “the soul of the organization”.

So what is the soul of an organization? It is easy to distinguish it from the body of an organization. The body of an organization is its strategy, its revenue, growth, the metrics, the processes, the efficiency and the scale.

The soul on the other hand is something which is dynamic, which gets slowly identified, which evolves, which can become deeper, stronger or diluted and weaker over time.

The soul is about the founding purpose. Our identity as seen by us and others. What do we stand for, how do we take important decisions when we have a dilemma? What we place greater premium on? What is the everyday experience of the organization through the eyes of employees, through the community we are part of, our customers, our employees the larger industry. All of this together constitutes the soul, the everyday experience of what we stand for, what is important to us, the human experience.

History is full of examples of organizations which got carried away by the body and lost the soul. A telling example is Howard Schultz and Starbucks. He returned to the company twice, I think around 2008 and 2022.

On both these occasions, it was beyond financial performance and stability. It was to regain the soul of the organization – to be that third place, make the baristas the pride of the organisation for the great coffee they make and serve and the connection with the employees.

My all-time favorite is this book called Small Giants written by Bo Burlingham. He chronicled in the year 2005, 14 companies which chose to be great instead of becoming big.

And becoming big is to get private equity, to go public, to scale, to achieve large numbers and so on. But these companies chose to be great, the best in what they did. And he gives reasons why they chose this greatness and how they sustained it, how they remain private and true to their soul.

I went back and looked at this list today 20 years later and I was delighted to see that there are at least about 8 of those 14 organizations which seem to continue to remain true to their original purpose after 30, 40, 50, even 60 years. They have retained their soul.

Personally for me, it is the soul that is worth striving to retain, cherish and strengthen.

What is your encounter with organisations that have retained or lost their soul?

Youtube link: https://youtu.be/_3kE0WzQdKc