Category Archives: Executive Coaching

Embracing Vertical Development to lead in the Exponential Age

The premise of Azeem Azhar’s new book Exponential: How Accelerating Technology Is Leaving Us Behind and What to Do About It is that whilst technology is developing at an increasing, exponential rate, human society can only ever adapt at a slower, linear pace. In the Exponential Age there’s an ‘exponential gap’ between the power of new technology and humans’ ability to keep up. What does this mean for leaders building modern technology businesses? Could your business grow at a faster pace than you can? Can this ‘exponential leadership gap’ be filled? By embracing Vertical Development, I believe it can.

It’s hard for humans to fathom exponential change, but it’s not impossible. We live in a complex universe, but our adaptive nature means we’re still surviving and thriving millions of years after we first appeared here on planet earth. Closer to home, my work brings me into daily contact with the leaders of the future: individuals and teams on a mission to bring new models of business, work and leadership to a more diverse world. I’ve noticed big shifts in some leaders as they embark on this journey of business and personal growth. Through Vertical Development they increase their capacity to make sense of the ever-increasing amount of complexity they experience as they scale, helping them navigate the exponential leadership gap effectively.

What gradually happens is not just a linear accretion of more and more that one can look at or think about, but a qualitative shift in the very shape of the window or lens through which one looks at the world.

Robert Kegan, Harvard developmental psychologist

We’ll explore what Vertical Development is and it can help you drive rapid growth of your business, whilst at the same time keeping pace with it. We’ll consider:

  • What exponential growth is and how it impacts the rapid growth of modern technology businesses, including people and teams.
  • Leadership and the linear accretion of knowledge – how traditional horizontal approaches to leadership, which focus on understanding the job to be done and the capabilities required to do it, fall short.
  • Leadership and the exponential accumulation of capacity – how Vertical Development – sensemaking, perspective taking, self-relating and opposable thinking – can help you make sense of the complexity that surrounds you and construct meaning within that complexity.

I hope these new perspectives on leading high-growth technology businesses open up a new way for you to think about your own Vertical Development. One of the main things you’ll discover is that your growth as a leader has the potential to be as exponential as the growth of your business.

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How Cynefin can help you become a better leader in a complex world

There’s no shortage of “how to” advice, playbooks, formulas and even secrets and guarantees for success (at least that’s what the gurus will have you believe). This can work well in complicated situations. But high growth technology businesses are not complicated, they’re complex. That requires a different approach to leadership, explored here through the lens of the Cynefin sensemaking tool.

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Stop telling entrepreneurs what to do. Start helping them think

Everyone has an opinion, advice is everywhere. It’s what to do with it that’s hard. If we really want to help entrepreneurs grow into the best CEOs, then we should stop telling them what to do and start helping them think. Because, in a VUCA world, it won’t necessarily be the entrepreneurs who have more information who will be leading the most successful businesses of the future, it will be those who develop their ability to think and act in more complex ways.

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How can leadership team coaching help your tech business?

In his 2017 TED Talk Want to get great at something? Get a coach, surgeon, author and CEO Atul Gawande tells the story of the Harvard and Yale American-rules football teams: “In 1875 Harvard and Yale played their first game. Yale hired a coach Harvard did not. The results, over the next three decades Harvard won just four times. Harvard hired a coach”. Every high performing sports team has a coach, why doesn’t every leadership team?

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How Women Rise: Break the 12 Habits Holding You Back – Summary

In How Women Rise: Break the 12 Habits Holding You Back (Amazon UK, US) authors Sally Helgesen and Marshall Goldsmith identify 12 habits that commonly hold women leaders back as they endeavour to advance to the next stage in their careers. This article provides a summary of those 12 habits, plus a list of powerful questions posed to you by myself and Lynn White, Principal Partner at WDI Consulting. We hope this summary, and our questions, will help you to explore your own habits and unleash your full leadership potential, and the potential of your team and organisation.

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A leader’s guide to decision making under uncertainty

Uncertainty is normal for leaders of any business, but the Coronavirus pandemic has taken this to another level. Asked by clients for advice on how to navigate this crisis, I’ve pulled together thoughts and key resources into this decision making guide. It draws upon evidence from behavioural and decision making psychology, the latest leadership thinking, and my own experience working at Her Majesty’s Treasury during the Great Financial Crisis and navigating the uncertainty of cancer.

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Why entrepreneurs need a coach, mentor & therapist

Like any high-performing individual, leaders need to wrap a professional support team around them if they are to give themselves the best chance of success. That team must be trustworthy, objective, and acting always in the leader’s best interests. This post unpacks the difference between a coach, mentor and therapist and explains why, together, they can make up a such a cohesive support team.

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How Vertical Development helps new leaders transform

Executives need good education and advice – “guidance or recommendations offered with regard to prudent future action” – if they are to stand any chance of building a successful business. There are many core skills that must be acquired, and there is much to be learned from those who have done it before. But to develop truly effective leaders we need to move beyond providing them with more information – telling them what to do and how to do it – to helping them improve how they think, make decisions, and make sense of the world. This is the distinction between horizontal development, which focuses on what you know, and Vertical Development, which concerns how you think.

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Leading on the job: advice for new leaders

Not long ago you were part of a small team of people with a big idea that you thought could change the world. Now you are responsible for a rapidly growing team who are looking at you for direction. Your burden of responsibility has increased dramatically and you need to learn to lead quickly. Having coached a lot of new leaders in this situation, I’ve turned that experience into five pieces of advice for new leaders.

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Improve your leadership self-awareness with these 4 questions

Self-awareness is the “capacity for introspection and the ability to recognize oneself as an individual separate from the environment and other individuals. Self-awareness is how an individual consciously knows and understands their own character, feelings, motives, and desires”. Back in 2003, psychologists acknowledged that self-awareness was “arguably the most fundamental issue in psychology, from both a developmental and an evolutionary perspective.” More recently, the critical importance of self-awareness as a key trait of effective leaders has become recognised.

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Trillion Dollar Coach – Summary

Trillion Dollar Coach: The Leadership Handbook of Silicon Valley’s Bill Campbell (Amazon UK, US) is a book about a man who helped build some of America’s greatest companies, including Apple and Google. A former college football player and coach, Bill didn’t enter the business world until he was thirty nine. Moving quickly though through executive roles, he went on to coach the likes of Steve Jobs, Larry Page, Eric Schmidt, Ben Horowitz and Bill Gurley, to name just a few. He passed away in 2016, leaving a legacy of growing companies, successful people and an enormous amount of respect. The book is essential reading for any manager or leader operating in a fast-moving, high growth business.

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A collection of the best articles for new leaders

Many of my executive coaching clients are new leaders in startup and high growth technology businesses. They often find themselves thrust into a new leadership role without much previous experience or training to prepare them. The spotlight and responsibility of first-time leadership can be daunting but it is an incredible place to learn. As part of my executive and startup specific founder services, I curate a reading list of the most insightful leadership articles that I have discovered for clients to read and reflect on. From the thought provoking to the practical, here is a continually updated collection of the best articles which will help you grow and succeed in a new leadership role.

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Do these 2 things to get better at coaching your employees

The Coaching Habit: Say Less, Ask More & Change the Way You Lead Forever (Amazon UK, US) is one of the best books I’ve read for managers and leaders who want to use a coach approach with their employees but don’t have the time or inclination for formal training. It’s short on theory but long on practical tools and techniques that are a shot to the heart of great coaching.

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Victor Frankl on finding meaning & happiness

Man’s Search for Meaning (Amazon UK, US) by Victor Frankl is essential reading for anybody interested in happiness, personal growth, the psychology of suffering and mental health. It chronicles the author’s time as an inmate in the Auschwitz concentration camp during World War II. The early chapters do not make for easy reading but the book opens up into one of the deepest and most eloquent explorations of finding meaning and man’s search for meaning and happiness.

Striving to find a meaning in one’s life is the primary motivational force in man… This meaning is unique and specific in that it must and can only be fulfilled by him alone; only then does it achieve a significance which will satisfy his own will to meaning.

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What is the difference between coaching & mentoring?

The words coaching and mentoring are often used interchangeably, though there are in fact important differences. In his book Coaching for Performance (Amazon UK, US), the late Sir John Whitmore, explains what the difference between coaching and mentoring is. Whitmore is the founder of the coaching movement in the UK. The book is widely considered to be the industry gold standard for performance based coaching.

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