The following is a guest post with permission from Frank Bresser Consulting:

By ‘The Global Business Guide’ (www.bresser-consulting.com/businessguide.html), we have been able to define the systematic and strategic design, implementation and improvement of coaching programmes in companies as a distinct discipline and presented 7 management tools for the effective planning and realisation of coaching programmes. Having received the Global HR Excellence Award  2011 at the World HRD Congress this year is a great motivation for us, as it shows us that we are obviously hitting an important point.

The set of management tools, being developed over many years, constitute an integrated, sophisticated toolbox consisting of the following elements/frameworks:
1.    Coaching success factors
2.    Coaching value chain
3.    Coaching capacity building
4.    Coaching change dynamics
5.    Coaching growth and maintenance
6.    Coaching guidance and support
7.    Coaching integration

In this post, we very shortly introduce Management Tool 1 – the ‘coaching success factors framework’. It gives an overview of the most important aspects to take into account when planning, executing and optimizing coaching initiatives. It covers the 10 key success factors for coaching programmes as well as the three underlying factors.
The 10 Key Success Factors are:
1. Develop an organisation-specific understanding of coaching.
2. Adopt a systematic approach.
3. Choose an adequate level of organisational penetration of coaching.
4. Involve the top.
5. Promote coaching as a positive developmental tool.
6. Create an optimal win-win value for all stakeholders.
7. Achieve full consistency of coaching with business strategy.
8. Ensure complete transparency of the whole coaching concept.
9. Evaluate effectively and carefully.
10. Ensure high integrity and quality at all levels.
The 3 Underlying Factors have impact on the application of all key success factors and thus form some kind of their underlying base:
A. Consider the cultural dimension.
B. See the use of coaching as a continuous learning process.
C. Build coaching programme implementation and improvement intelligence.

For more detailed information, please read the ‘Global Business Guide’ (www.bresser-consulting.com/businessguide.html).

Announcing the NEXT LEADING COACHES’ MASTERMIND CALL!

(Registration link on Members Only Page)

Would you like to deepen the impact that you have on your clients but feel like you already spend countless hours on your business or get lost in the day-to-day minutia of your business?

Then I have great news for you!

Kate & Melinda (of The Coaches Console) will be revealing step-by-step how to create, integrate and deliver exquisite client support that impacts your bottom line, even if you are already a successful master coach.

It’s happening on April 28th at noon Eastern (9am Pacific) and is called:

“Exquisite Client Support: Extending the Ripple Effect of your Coaching to Increase The Longevity of Current Clients, Build Referrals and Create Raving Fans!”

Here’s what you’ll learn in this content-rich call…

• How to provide exquisite support before, during, after AND in-between the coaching session (without spending MORE time).

• How to avoid a trap that coaches fall into that only creates more marketing work for them in the future.

• The #1 reason clients will hire you, rehire you and refer you!

• The distinction between Good Support vs. High-level Support vs. Exquisite Support (and why you better know the difference if you want a thriving business)

• How to gain back 55 minutes each day; 27½ hours each month and 2 months a year (imagine how many more clients you could work with if you had that kind of extra time)

• 4 specific strategies you can implement immediately to integrate this level of service in your business

About the Leading Coaches for this Mastermind Call:

Kate Steinbacher, PCC: is a consummate entrepreneur and collaborator, an agent for fun and change as well as a business coach, a speaker and a prolific writer of self-development articles. Kate has been a corporate HR manager for a fortune 100 company as well as Cruise Director on board luxury cruise ships where she managed business teams and acted as  a speaker and emcee for American and International groups. Since 2001, Kate has been an active Business and Personal coach.

Kate has owned, operated and marketed 4 successful small businesses.  Currently she is principal in The Coaching Advantage and Co-Founder of The Coaches Console, along with her business partner, Melinda Cohan.

Change and action have always been allies for Kate’s success.  She is passionate about people and business and fostering positivism and possibility along with individual and corporate greatness through the use of professional coaching skills.  Part of Kate’s driving force is her passion to get the world coached and her sense of fun.

Melinda Cohan: is a woman of spirit and vision who believes that spirit and business go hand in hand or as she would say, heart in heart, to create great opportunities for people and the world we inhabit. She began her career as a creative interior design professional and manager. Her ability to create systems and organize business and personal spaces to reflect the heart and soul of the owner served her customers well. Melinda discovered bringing subtle amounts of organization to an environment could positively impact the people inhabiting the space.

She then realized the same effect could be achieved by organizing one’s efforts around a central purpose, identifying goals and objectives to drive a person’s daily activities. Melinda excels in her ability to listen and draw a client into meaningful conversations about their desired outcomes and coaching seemed like a natural means to use that talent. Melinda has been a successful coach and consultant ever since her discovery.

As Visionary, President and co-founder of The Coaches Console^, Melinda has been able to combine spirit and business in a unique manner that allows her to share her knowledge with other coaches to forward their success as well as the coaching industry as a whole.

ALL REGISTRATION LINKS AND DETAILS CAN BE FOUND ON THE MEMBERS’ PAGE — if you haven’t joined, it’s free to do so!

Case Study:  Working in a Large Public Sector Organisation in Scotland

Contributed by Andrew Boddice

Executive Summary
We took on a short 12-week assignment with this Public Sector Organisation in January 2010. The quality of our input resulted in our working with them for virtually 12 months ending in January 2011.

The scope of our work was to act as ‘business managers’ in support of a very specialist, highly effective, very busy team of five people, looking at areas of efficiency gain, effectiveness, project management, strategy delivery, process, back-office systems and administration alignment, and business apportionment.

During our time in this Public Sector Organisation we had the opportunity to observe how the Directorate and Divisional organisation operated as a whole during a period allocated as one of major restructuring and reshaping to meet significant budget cuts between 2011 and 2014/15.

We took the opportunity to observe leadership and management styles, their effectiveness and how the multiple teams and individuals responded to the workload and restructuring. Our observations refer to the Division.

Officials are Civil or Public Servants

Download full report as a pdf here:  Case Study Public Sector Organisation

The online world is unregulated and anyone with a keyboard can write stuff about you. If someone with a vendetta chooses to write lies and fabricate stories about you online, what do you do?  In the post below, you’ll get some specific actions and a reality check in case you’re ever faced with an online attack.  This is one of the prime reasons I always urge people to engage in social media…have a presence on Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter so that  you are in control of what you say online about yourself, what you post in your profile, and what you want as your representation in the online world.  Google searches love social media sites, and you will benefit from the search engine optimization of these mega-sites.  Nowadays, this strategic practice of being aware and in charge of what’s being said about you online is called online reputation management.

Below is a blog post written by Alex Wu that gives fantastic advice about what to do if someone attacks you online.  It would have been great to have this information 3 years ago when a deranged new client began viciously attacking me online with outrageous and inflammatory falsehoods; it might have saved me the $20K worth of legal fees I spent to have the various hosting sites remove the defamatory and damaging material that person posted! Alex’s post is practical, sound, and valuable advice that I strongly urge you to heed now so that if you ever find yourself under attack you’ll know what to do and spare yourself tremendous heartache and financial impact.

What To Do When Critics Attack

by Alex Wu

As you become increasingly successful in your business, you will likely become a target of criticism and attack. People you don’t even know may leave nasty comments on your blog, send you highly critical emails, or even post article-length personal attacks directed at you on their blogs.

You’ve worked hard building your success from the ground up. After all that you’ve been through, being the target of attacks and criticism feels like a slap in the face.

Why are You Being Attacked?

Your success could be making other people feel insecure. It challenges their beliefs about money and financial abundance, and forces them to confront their fears and dissatisfaction with their own personal situations.

Some people will accept that they have unfulfilled potential and rise to the challenge of creating their own success. They may become your followers and potential friends. Other people turn around and run the other way, preferring to stay in denial and keep their heads buried in the sand. But a third group will go on the offensive, and try to pick apart your success in an attempt to discredit you and your work. A small handful may publicly criticize or attack you.

Unfortunately, this small handful, which may be only one or two individuals, is a loud, dedicated bunch. Their goal is be to intimidate you, cause you and your business to fail, or otherwise make your life miserable. And worse, the more time and attention you give them, the more you egg them on to cause you even more grief. What should you do when all you want is to be left alone and to keep building your business in peace and harmony?

If you’ve been doing honest, legitimate work this whole time and you haven’t been misrepresenting yourself or trying to rip anyone off, the battle is going to be much easier because you have solid ground to stand on.

Don’t Panic!

When you first become aware of an attack against you, you may feel threatened, and that if you don’t take immediate action, your whole business is in jeopardy. But the only thing in jeopardy at this moment is your ego. Stay calm. The world isn’t over yet. In many cases, you don’t need to take any action at all.

Commit to your continued success in your business. Recognize the attacks for what they are – the work of people who have nothing better to do than to carry out a vendetta against you. It comes with the territory of being a successful businessperson. Everyone who’s accomplished anything big or important has had their share of outspoken critics. Your best revenge is continued and growing success.

Don’t fan the flames. Attacks will escalate in proportion to how much energy and attention you give them. I will reply once to a critic – at most. Generally, it’s not possible to convince someone who’s got an agenda against you, and trying to do so is a waste of your valuable time. If you’ve been exchanging long strings of emails or blog comments with a critic who becomes nastier with every exchange, it’s time to back off. You’re rewarding their efforts and demonstrating that they’re important enough to make you concerned.

Reduce access points for your attackers. Temporarily moderate your blog comments, blacklist your attackers’ IP addresses, and stop opening their emails. You’re not obligated to play their game on their terms.

Be willing to stand your ground. The vast majority of your attackers, no matter how loud or nasty they are, have a lot more bark than bite. They may utter threats, but it’s extremely rare that they follow through (although you should report threats against your physical safety to the authorities). In cases where attackers win, it’s usually by intimidating their victims to the point that they simply give in.

Establish your reputation with facts. Depending on the nature of the attacks, and how successful your attackers are in getting attention, it may be necessary for you to set the record straight publicly. Publish hard evidence supporting your legitimacy. Address their criticisms with evidence and facts that show the opposite. Point to your positive contributions, and demonstrate how you conduct business in a conscientious and responsible manner. Stay upbeat, and don’t directly address or name your attackers, as that will draw more attention to them. Your goal is to reassure your followers and reaffirm that you believe in the work that you do.

Your customers and followers believe in you. They’re on your side for a reason – you’ve built goodwill and rapport with them through your work. They’re not likely to be swayed by someone shouting baseless criticism against you. By running a clean, legitimate business and maintaining good relationships with your followers, you’re in good shape.

Remember, your attackers are relying on you to self-destruct. They generally don’t have the power to take down your website or shut down your physical place of business. Nor are they likely to convince your hundreds or thousands of customers and followers to leave you. They’re hoping you’ll concede defeat by intimidating and discouraging you. Now wouldn’t that be a case of a flea taking down an elephant by causing it to trip?

What Should You Do When Faced with Critics?

One of the best things to do is to simply shrug and move on. You win by surviving and continuing to shine. You lose when others convince you to put out your own light out.

Think about your many customers and followers who rely not only on your products or services, but who are also inspired by your advice and your example. The world needs more people who buck the trend of the ordinary and achieve fantastic success running businesses they love.

It’s not easy being the target of attacks. But you, your customers and your business are worth fighting for.

Alex Wu helps people re-discover their unique talents and gifts so they can enjoy a more fulfilling career, earn more money, and build loving, supportive relationships. Definitely check out and subscribe to his blog at www.IntuitiveWu.com.

Leading coaches Charles E. Smith, PhD., and Suzi Pomerantz posted an article called Success in Today’s Economy Requires Executives to Take Responsibility for Two Worlds and we’d love your input! The basic premise is that particularly in companies or agencies implementing technology-based projects, leaders must recognize and attend to the duality of the two worlds required for business success in today’s complex market: the world of technology, machines, objects and design, and the simultaneous world of people’s feelings, relationships, and that which animates their spirit, engages them at the level of inspired contribution, and moves them to cooperate.

What do you see to be the key distinctions a coach might work with technical leaders on to attain this two-world view?  We’ve started a list here, please add your thoughts in the comments below!

1.  Human beings require genuine human connection and a sense of belonging.

2.  People need to feel important, valued, special, respected, appreciated, and useful.

3.  True leadership requires the ability to identify the unique motivators and leadership needs of each individual member of your team, staff, or organization.

4.  Leadership influence is not about charisma, extroversion, or being liked, but about understanding and serving the needs of both the individuals you lead and the greater organizational or societal objectives.

5.  People contribute greater value than is asked of them when they trust and respect the leader’s intentions, character, integrity, and honor.

6.  Leaders can be taught what to see and what to listen for in order to attend to the world of people while managing the technical integrity of the project.

Conventional wisdom says that change is hard. Experiential wisdom proves otherwise. In fact, clients don’t even need to change old patterns to achieve new results. They just need to choose a more useful pattern from their vast behavioral repertoire.

When they do, they achieve what our speaker calls a positive Return on Experience (ROX)™.

Join us on May 6th as Leading Coach Carol Goldsmith, The Discovery Coach, shares this powerful peak performance coaching tool. Details can be found on the Members Only page!  (Not a member of the Leading Coaches’ Center? Click here to join free!)

The Return on Experience (ROX) model has helped clients on four continents break through a range of long-standing issues—from procrastination to fear of public speaking—in a matter of minutes. Leading Coaches Center members get to experience the ROX model before the release of Carol’s new book.

You will discover:

• How success leaves clues in the body
• The 6 types of successes anyone can tap
• Three Magic Questions that unleash the power of experience
• How to turn tacit experiences into tangible strategies for success

JOIN US TOMORROW!

Would you like clear, grounded, focused,
inspiring and immediately-applicable support
in building your coaching business?

Participate in the Thriving Coaches F*R*E*E
community roundtables to grow a strong,
profitable coaching business which beautifully
supports you and your clients in freeing yourselves
from the self-imprisonment of out-dated beliefs
that no longer serve you!

Don’t miss our next roundtable:
========================================================

ROUNDTABLE DETAILS

Date: Tuesday, April 20, 2010
Time:  1 to 1:45 pm ET (Noon CT, 11am MT, 10am PT)

Topic:

SOCIAL MEDIA BEST PRACTICES FOR COACHES

Join us to learn what social media can and can’t do
for our coaching businesses, how to leverage the tools
and how to not waste time in various technological
black holes.

Join Ann Strong, instigator and founder of Thriving
Coaches, as she interviews guest expert, Suzi Pomerantz,
CEO and author. (http://www.suzipomerantz.com)

Submit your burning question about social media
(http://www.annstrong.com/roundtable-questions/)
and join us live on April 20 to hear your question
answered or listen to the recording if you’re unable
to join us live . . .

Cost: GIFT (except for any long-distance charges)

Call-in Number: 1-712-429-0700
Access Code: 385236#

========================================================

LISTEN TO PREVIOUS ROUNDTABLES IMMEDIATELY

If you would like to listen to previous calls, you
may listen immediately by visiting:
http://annstrong.com/call-archive

========================================================

I am excited and honored to champion Thriving Coaches
during our f*r*e*e Tuesday roundtables!

With love and enthusiasm,
Ann Strong

Questions?
Visit http://annstrong.com

P.S.  Would you please help us spread the word?
This is an open and free community.  Feel free to share
this email with other coaches in your training program
or professional organization who might like to
participate in Thriving Coaches!

Distraction creates OVERWHELM.

It’s a pandemic these days how many of us feel continual overwhelm.

I see it in the executives I coach, I see it in leaders everywhere, and I see it in school children.

But I’m getting ahead of myself.

Focused, Engaged, Present

I recently spent time coaching a team of scientists leading a large scale project for NIH and we uncovered an unlikely conversation.  I asked them to distinguish between what they mean when they say “focused” versus “engaged” versus “being present” at a meeting or with the teams they lead. I was surprised to learn that in their particular frame of reference “being present” meant nothing more than a body in attendance – physically there.  They defined “focused” as thinking about how the conversation applies to you and “engaged” as thinking about how the conversation applies to the purpose of the meeting/team and others.

Intrigued, I brought this conversation to several Leading Coach colleagues, and we determined that for us, “being present” had a different meaning, and that it’s useful to begin with a baseline understanding of your clients’ distinctions around terms we often use very casually.  My scientist clients were initially unwilling to accept the concept of disarming their always discerning, evaluative, analytical mind in favor of any other kind of being or listening.

Most Leading Coaches, I surmise, would distinguish “Being Present” as fully attending to someone, empathetic, with suspension of your assessing, judging evaluations.  No attention on your own thoughts/processing. No analysis. No judgment. It is active in that when you are present in the conversation you are really seeking to understand.  Probing questioning looking for clarity.  Proactive listening.  Listening for the deeper layers so you can take the conversation to another level.  Right?  What am I missing? Be sure to login and add your comments below this post, I really want to hear what you have to say about this!

Being Present is the Antidote to Overwhelm

Here’s my premise:

“Being Present” is the antidote to DISTRACTION, which is the culprit that creates overwhelm in the first place. Overwhelm and distraction act as a virtual mobius strip…bending and melding into one another in a seamless circle of motion where one becomes the other and vice versa.  Think about it:  you are working on a project for a client presentation and you are doing a bit of research online. You are focused on creating your Powerpoint deck or webinar slides and suddenly an email catches your eye that requires you to quickly check something online and respond.  Then, before you know it you’re 20 minutes into emails and YIKES! you remember that you’re supposed to be working on this presentation.  You return to your task at hand now overwhelmed by how much is left to do.   Or maybe you’re focused on reviewing a series of deliverables from an employee, analyzing their work product and you’re paying attention to their work on all cylinders when someone pops his head into your office for a quick question or joke.  You’ve now lost your train of attention, and when you return to your previous state of focused flow, you’ve lost 20 minutes of productivity time. Ay! Distractions are what cause overwhelm.  And life in the Age of Social Media is fraught with distractions.  We can’t even read something online without being tempted to go down various rabbit holes by clicking on extraneous distractions that are seemingly connected to what we came to the internet to do in the first place.

So what’s the distinction between Focus and Being Present?

Focus is an active act requiring effort.  You command your brain to attend on all fronts to the task or person at hand.

Being Present is an inactive act requiring letting go.  You release distractions and just BE.  As human beings we can’t exactly eliminate distractions, so that’s not the goal here. We can, however avoid distractions by actively BEING present.

The secret is the early detection of distractions.

If you can detect a potential onslaught of distractions prior to their causing overwhelm, you can intervene at the point of loss of focus.  When you or a client is experiencing overwhelm, there are two things to do:  1. avoid distractions and 2. get present.