Response
Executive coaching is well defined in the post as the one-to-one development of a leader
by imparting some skills. However, there is a need to distinguish executive coaching from
mentorship, because the two are being practiced in organizations, and clarifying the difference
between the two can help the student choose the right examples and models in history that can help
conceptualize his/her study. According to Koortzen & Oosthuizen (2010), executive coaching is a
structured action learning process that is anchored in the organizational development strategies,
while mentorship is informal and based on proximity between the mentor and the leader being
mentored. This implies that while mentorship is an informal arrangement between a leader and the
mentor who he/she is close to (physically or in terms of social relationship) the leader, executive
coaching is more formal and is spearheaded by the organization so as to address some
organizational challenges and develop the staff. For ease of understanding and studying executive
coaching, it is also important to appreciate the fact that executive coaching may differ from general
coaching, in terms of the approach and objectives. This realization should guide the choice of
historical examples that the student chooses from the Bible to illustrate his/her topic.
The post has limited the objective of executive coaching to the improvement of
performance. However, the most important objectives for executive coaching are to facilitate
change and address organizational challenges (Klopper & Coller-Peter, 2018). According to
Klopper & Coller-Peter (2018), executive coaching serves to facilitate acceptance of change in an
organization because it imparts in leaders skills they need to implement the change, thus reducing
stress and resistance from the leaders. Therefore, executive coaching has a specific focus on
transforming the organization, rather than just imparting skills that maintain the status quo.
The strategic executive model can be adopted for studying executive coaching. As noted
by Koortzen & Oosthuizen (2010), the strategic executive model provides a structured
methodology for carrying out executive coaching. This model postulates that executive couching
begins with creating an environment for honest communication, assessing the abilities of leaders
and identifying needs that need to be developed, planning how couching will proceed and
resources that are needed, active learning, and evaluation giving of feedbacks (Koortzen &
Oosthuizen, 2010). Going with this model of coaching, it can be said that the examples given from
the bible about history for couching do not qualify as executive coaching.
References
Klopper, S., & Coller-Peter, S. (2018). Business coaching processes that facilitate the successful
implementation of business improvement projects. International Journal of Evidence-
Based Coaching and Mentoring,16(2), 20-31.
Koortzen, P., & Oosthuizen, K. (2010). A competence executive coaching model. SA Journal of
Industrial Psychology, 36(1), 1-11.
