[excerpts from Businessworld, 25 October 2010]

The GurusBut who are these people who make the CEOs what they are or what they want to be -- confident, assured, poised? Meet the CEO coaches.

They are impartial observers who push the CEOs to exploit their potential. They don’t pass judge-ments; only point out strengths and weaknesses. They help others understand how things can be done differently. Ask them what they do and their most common reply is: “Hold up the mirror to the CEO.”

Their guiding principle is: “Ask, don’t tell.” They help the CEOs understand problems rather than give solutions. By asking open-ended questions they facilitate the process of self-discovery and self-mo-tivation....

To Be Or Not To Be Coached“Though a new phenomena by that name now, CEO coaching has existed in India for the past 30-40 years,” says [Gopal] Shrikanth. Earlier, there were strategic advisors who were essentially man-agement gurus and expat professors who, hav-

Meet The CEO COACHESCi�us, Al�us, For�us -- that’s what India’s business chiefs

need, and that’s what CEO trainers give by Shalini S. Sharma

In Depth management

TRAINERS’TAKES

Three peculiar habits of CEOs

Star�ng a learning programme for senior execu�ves with the words: “You all know training does not work, however...” and then walking off

Speaking 90 percent of the �me in a mee�ng

Pretending to be a benevolent Gandhian while being a real-life Shylock

Christopher Doyle

MD, IndiaDynamic Results44-year-old Doyle is cer�fied to be a coachHe is based in Gurgaon“A good coach will help the CEO achieve insights and bring about measurable and quan�fiable change while achieving specific goals”

25 OCTOBER 2010 BUSINESSWORLD

ing spent their formative years in India, would combine a trip to India once or twice a year with some pro-fessional linkup with their former batchmates....One of the reasons behind ask-ing for external help is age. CEOs today are no longer old men who have spent decades in the indus-try and learnt through experience. Instead, they are young, mostly in early-to-mid 40s, have all the right degrees and management jargon to spew, full of energy and positive

CHARACTER SKETCH

Experts on traits of Indian CEOs

• High energy and confidence

• Fondness for travel and mee�ng people

• Narcissis�c

• Vision, passion and high stamina

• Lonely. Cannot share everything with board members or their teams and few have mentors. Do not share all professional issues with families. But most are able to overcome nega�ve emo�ons with posi�ve energy

• Limited risk-taking ability. They agonise a lot about the fall in ethical standards in India and also feel guilty about their inability to make a difference to major social issues such as poverty

• Surround themselves with business heads who are unlikely to challenge their views; engage high-profile consultants who are willing to rubber-stamp their pre-conceived no�ons

• Have quiet confidence; are competent but unassuming

• Slow at taking decisions compared to counterparts in other countries; need a lot of data to arrive at a conclusion

• Comfortable seeking advice at the tac�cal, implementa�on level, but not at strategy and leadership levels

CROSS-CULTURAL CHALLENGES: A CASE STUDYAn MNC had three redundant project teams around the world. Finance advisors recommended that the teams be merged. At that �me, Dynamic Results (DR) was doing other work for the company. Overhearing the discussion, they asked if any cultural assessment was done as the teams were based in different parts of the world. The company’s response was: “This is not what we hired you for. We can handle this.”

Two years later, DR got a call from the same company saying the merger was not working. When DR started work with them, it became apparent that there were direct cross-cultural challenges. One leader was a woman who refused to acknowledge or discuss any emo�onal issue, focusing only on science. The next was an openly gay person, while the third was a devout Muslim who did not respect non-Muslims or homosexuals.

Christopher Doyle and his team looked at only the cultural perspec�ve; they did not look at opera�onal issues -- the three leaders were experts in running the projects. Doyle worked with them for 18 months to overcome the differences. The goal was to help the three come up with an opera�ng agreement -- one that they themselves would follow. This would make it easier for them to opt in or leave the organisa�on a�er assessing themselves against the criteria they had set. The outcome was that one of them could not meet the criteria and le� the organisa�on. One criterion, for instance, which they had all agreed to was: assess your partners based on performance and not personal lifestyle. Leader 2 could not adhere to this func�onally, and le� the company. Eventually, the two remaining leaders matrixed out into different teams within the same company.

When DR had started, the three leaders did not like each other. In the end, a�er self-assessment, two were able to adjust to each other, while the one who could not, le�.

attitude, but often lack the sheer gravitas needed to make the cut. Moreover, expatriates posted in India as well as Indians dealing with foreign bosses now need to understand a lot of cross-cultural nuances....

One-Man ArmySince coaching is all about the rapport that the coach shares with the CEO, most coaches work with miniscule, boutique teams and are largely a one-man army... CEO coaches are high-flyers who often visit a city or a country just for a half-day ses-sion with a client. The rates charged are therefore on a per-hour basis and normal sessions rarely go beyond one hour. At the CEO level, the rates range

between Rs 50,000 and Rs 2.4 lakh per hour with expats and global coaches commanding a fee which is on the higher side. The duration of the training and length of the sessions also vary from level to level. At the CEO level the engagements are usually for a year and there are one-hour sessions once a month....Be it a face-to-face meeting, a telephone call or a Skype session, an increasing number of CEOs are looking for a friend, philosopher and guide, in short, the CEO coach.

With inputs from Gauri Kamathbweditor@abp.in

(Handled by Christopher Doyle of Dynamic Results)

25 OCTOBER 2010 BUSINESSWORLD