Coaching: Executive & Communications

Executive Coaching

Preparing Leaders to Lead

Coaching is a process of enabling others to succeed. Coaching builds upon an individual's personal goals, desire for improvement, and impetus to succeed within the organization. Executive coaching leverages self-improvement with the need to fulfill the organizational mission.

John Baldoni specializes in helping his clients achieve and demonstrate leadership presence, which he defines as "earned authority." Those with leadership presence demonstrate a strong capacity to project confidence, communicate with conviction, instill trust, and most importantly, lead by example. Leadership presence is the outward manifestation of a leader's behavior; it combines a leader's earned authority with a follower's reason to believe. Leadership presence is vital to an individual's ability to influence and lead peers and bosses.

John bases his coaching practice on performance improvement. He works with the coachee to help him/her achieve the next level of growth and effectiveness. John's approach involves three key principles:

Assess Where You Stand

• Conduct a leadership assessment
• Identify strengths upon which to build
• Focus on opportunities for improvement

Develop a Plan of Action

• Focus on improvement one step at a time
• Align coaching goals with organizational intentions
• Utilize communications to drive leadership process

Provide Frequent Feedback

• Adopt the leader mindset
• Follow up on successes
• Assess for improvement

Coaching helps leaders achieve intended results by understanding themselves more fully so they can meet the needs of their organization more capably.

Coaching Others

John also teaches managers to coach others. Management today involves coaching people as a means of develop their skills to achieve individual and organizational goals. Specifically, John utilizes the Action Coaching Model that shows managers how to:

• Plan for a coaching session
• Uncover the motivational tick factor
• Converse as you coach
• Gain agreement
• Follow up

The Action Coaching model builds on employee initiative and instills organizational discipline in order to achieve inspired results.

Many of the lessons John teaches are drawn from his fifth book, Great Motivation Secrets of Great Leaders (McGraw-Hill 2005), which explores how leaders create opportunities for people to succeed for themselves and their organizations.

Speech Coaching & Presentation Skills Workshop

Establishing credibility is essential to effective public speaking. Presenters do this by developing, delivering and sustaining the messages through their words and their actions. Authenticity is central to the public speaking process. Speaking in public is the presenter’s opportunity to engage the hearts and minds of the audience.

John helps executives improve their presentation skills, interpersonal communications, leadership presence, and leadership messages. Participants learn to establish presence, stick to the message, handle objections, and plan key messages for key audiences.

John Baldoni teaches presenters a three step process of engagement.

Engage Your Mind

• Adopt the leader mindset
• Develop the 30sec. leadership message
• Create the strong opening
• Provide the call to action

Engage Your Voice

• Pace yourself
• Modulate your delivery
• Employ the pause

Engage Your Body

• Make eye contact
• Put your body into gear
• Move for emphasis
• Project for power

The net result is an engaged audience. Once you have their attention and their interest you can connect with them in three ways by:

• Projecting your leadership POV
• Telling purposeful stories
• Giving reasons to believe

Using video playback and role play in his coaching, John helps managers learn to become more effective communicators. John also teaches a presentation skills workshop.

Media Coaching

John also provides media coaching. By blending leadership messages with presentation skills, John can help individuals connect authentically with the media in ways that make the message and the message giver memorable. Specifically, John can teach managers how to:

• Prepare for an interview
• Deliver the leadership message
• Handle tough questions
• Stay on message
• Close on a positive note

Many of the lessons John teaches are drawn from his book, Great Communication Secrets of Great Leaders (McGraw Hill, 2003), which uses story and practice to demonstrate how leaders can develop, deliver, and sustain their leadership messages.

[Click here for a free copy of “Preparing to Deliver the Leadership Message.”]