Becoming an Exceptional Executive Coach

Introduction

Our Journeys

We five authors came to executive coaching in ways similar to those who participate in our coach training courses—from organizational psychology, consulting, organization development, career counseling, and the personal helping professions. At the time we began to coach there was no formal practice of executive coaching. The need for individualized, just-in-time executive development emerged in the 1980s, in the form of requests for help from our human resources contacts. Taking a cue from A Chorus Line, a musical of that era, we responded with, “We can do that!” With very little definition or guidance, we originally provided those individual development services under various headings, such as developmental counseling, ...