Executive Coaching Case Studies

The Case of the Riches-to-Rags-to-Riches Client

Emily was a high-ranking executive in a large association in Midwestern United States. She was respected, liked, and secure enough, but she had what the association’s CEO called “a couple rough edges.” Emily’s boss encouraged her to work with an executive coach. After checking credentials and chemistry, Emily began a series of successful coaching sessions with Tom Pierce. A year later, her world changed abruptly.

In a faltering economy, several major funding sources reduced their membership and sponsorship budgets. The association’s leadership team tried valiantly to solve the dilemma with non-dues-revenue band-aids, but they didn’t stick.

Radical surgery was required; the association was reorganized; Emily’s position was eliminated. Her sessions with Tom shifted into a different gear—from executive coaching focused on her specific workplace issues…to career coaching focused on her unspecific future.

It took several months, but Emily moved up the ladder and down the map. She is now the executive director of a smaller association in the Southwest, where she’s enjoying being a bigger fish in a smaller (and warmer) pond. Emily’s return to work may be the case in point, but her happy ending is not the point of this Case…

Lesson learned: Rather than waiting until her cozy career turned into an unforeseen crisis, Emily wisely followed her boss’s advice. She engaged Tom’s executive-coaching services to help her develop excellence when the work environment was relatively calm.

When disaster struck (alternate translation: when opportunity struck), client and coach were each prepared to accelerate the rate of change:

Because Emily applied what she learned in her coaching sessions, she matured as a manager in her current job. She was a more competitive candidate when she needed to search for a new job.

Because Tom had months, rather than minutes, to get to know what made Emily tick—her strengths, her motivation, her goals—he was already up to speed. He quickly converted their monthly coaching conversations into daily career-strategy sessions.

If you’ve been contemplating working with a coach—or if your boss has hinted that you should find a competent and compatible coach—remember Emily’s riches-to-rags-to-riches experience. Tom had the experience and empathy to modify his coaching approach at each stage of Emily’s transition:

Riches: Focusing on job skills and interactions with colleagues and customers in her current job

Rags: Focusing on attitude, motivation, job-loss communication strategy, resume writing, and interviewing technique in her search for a new opportunity

Riches: Focusing on optimal ways to succeed in her new work environment

Whatever surprise interrupts your job-for-life assumption, you’ll be better able to cope with the present—and your coach will be better able to help design your future—if you begin developing the right executive-coaching relationship now.