Leadership Coaching

What makes a leader? If you are coaching someone to become one, chances are you would need this book.

The book contains researches and experiences from others, and the book tells you to identify types of leaders, and how to coach one. Granted, some leaders are born, most of would have to be made.

Unfortunately for us, this is not a book for the masses. I am not a coach, and all I see are research results and a guide for coaches to recognize or help clients achieve leadership status. A specifically tailored to coaches book, and although it is written in English, it means nothing if you cannot use it to full potential.

After reading this, I have found what kind of a leader I would like to be. Of course if I really wanted to, I could patiently try to use the tools given to me and self- coach to be someone I aspire to be. Well, let's just say that it is easier to hire a coach than talking myself into becoming one.

It is well written, the contents grouped in chapters that are good sizes of information. It makes use of many visual aids, like all good guide books do. The guide is no- nonsense but also non- formal, it was still an enjoyable read if you want to have a go at it.

This book is filled with useful models that can be easily incorporated in to the workplace it also has excellent insights and advice from professionals in the field of leadership coaching, the books tag line is working with leaders to develop elite performance. The book is helpfully broken down in to 20 different sections written by 20 different experts in this area. They cover topics such as coaching for authentic leadership, the integrated leadership model, coaching for emotionally intelligent and inspiring leadership, an Asian perspective on leadership coaching: Sun Tzu and The Art of War, coaching for Icarus leadership: helping leaders who can potentially derail, coaching political leaders, coaching using leadership myths and stories: an African perspective and coaching for team leadership: using the Belbin ‘team roles’ model to name a few. The book combines well-known models such as Porter’s strategy model (1985) and Goleman’s model of leadership styles (2000) with less well-known approaches as different styles work well for different characters and personalities, one size really does not fit all in terms of leadership and coaching styles. The main point that the book portrays is that whilst these model are useful, the most important thing is to remember that coaching is fundamentally about facilitating learning and that most adults feel their most vulnerable when they are in the position of leaner. The book is written very well, the subject areas are easy to follow and it really does have some excellent points to consider.