I have been approached by number of consulting organisations offering personal coach while other groups have offered to hook me up with mentor. Is there added value for me in doing this and how do I choose between coach and mentor? I have six years’ senior management experience and am member of my organisation’s executive management team.
Courses can be effective but often the learning is not transferred into the workplace. People learn most effectively from new, hands-on experience. If they are then teamed up with an independent person who can act as mirror and provide effective feedback this adds significant value to the process. That’s because it increases the amount of information people have on their own performance. That is what coaches and mentors do and they can definitely add significant value provided they have the appropriate coaching or mentoring experience themselves. It is also surprising how valuable it is to try to explain to an outsider what you are doing and why.
The terms coach and mentor overlap but coach tends to focus on helping the person train for something specific, while mentor has more of supportive and advisory role. You might, for example, contract coach to help you build your leadership ability. The coach would need to have special experience in leadership and would need to know how to observe effective leadership and what the practical development stages are.
Alternatively person may have been with their organisation for some time, feel they have topped out in their current situation and be trying to work out what their next career step should be. This is where mentor can be helpful as they will act in supportive way and listen to the person being mentored. They are then able to help the person sift through the issues and options and help them decide on future action. In this situation the mentor would need good listening skills and have the broad experience that enables them to understand the other person’s situation.
If you want to improve your performance or make difficult decision it is well worth your while considering obtaining coach or mentor. You will often find that coach can also be mentor and vice versa. The critical issue is for you to define what your need is first and that will help the person you are seeking understand if they can add value.
I own small manufacturing business which has 60 people working for it. I have full-time chartered accountant who is very good at her job and contributes strongly to both the strategic and operational areas of the company.
My problem is that I don’t have financial background and often feel discussions with my accountant are led by her rather than me. I am more or less okay with her advice and leadership in the finance area but as the owner and overall leader of the company I feel I lack the ability to model effective leadership in the financial area. I worry that one day my accountant could unwittingly lead the business down track that I would want to avoid because I failed to effectively challenge their thinking. Can you advise how I can take stronger lead with my accountant?
The relationship between the leader of an organisation and their accountant is definitely critical one and there needs to be level of mutual respect if it is to work effectively. That is, you need to feel that your accountant has the skills and knowledge to manage the detailed financial systems and they need to feel that you are asking the right questions and are taking on board the information they provide within the context of the whole business.
A few years ago I met business accounting professor from Harvard Business School. Giving lecture on “financial skills for chief executives” he shared piece of information that he said would immediately move chief executive into the role of “financial expert”.
He said the key role of good chief executive was to be able to ask the right questions. He advised the audience to sit down and compare the profit and loss and balance sheet of the current and previous business year for their organisation – then to highlight major differences between the two years and ask the accountant the reason.
This is very wise advice and works extremely well because it focuses the questions on the key financial and business issues and at the same time enables the accountant to help the chief executive – without the chief executive losing control.
The professor’s advice works at both the annual and the monthly level and is also extremely simple and practical.
Your ability to manage the business and work effectively with your accountant will also be strengthened significantly if you have basic understanding of accounting principles. You don’t need to become financial expert but with little work you can easily gain good understanding of how double-entry bookkeeping works and what the main accounts are able to tell you. This basic financial knowledge should be part of any management competency model. Look out for good “finance for managers” course which will cover the basics of preparation, analysis and interpretation of financial statements. good two-day course will set you right.
• Kevin Gaunt, FNZIM, FAIM, is CEO of NZIM Auckland and has been senior executive with, and consultant to, some of New Zealand’s largest companies.
