Effectiveness of Executive Coaching

Is executive coaching effective? Does it help leaders achieve personal and organizational goals? Does it have a good ROI?

If you've considered executive coaching for yourself or someone in your organization, these are questions you may have considered. As executive coaching becomes a more frequent business practice, it has become a focus of study for the academic community as well. Researchers Simmy Grover and Adrian Furnham from University College London recently conducted a meta-analysis in which they reviewed 52 studies on the effectiveness of executive coaching. 

In their review, Grover and Furnham looked at coaching results for not only the individual coaching client but also how executive coaching impacted the organization. For the individual, executive coaching has been found to result in increased self-efficacy, goal attainment, resilience, well-being, and openness to new behaviors and lower levels of stress. Some studies have also indicated increased career, work, and job satisfaction. 

Organizations also benefit when leaders receive executive coaching. According to several of the studies reviewed by Grover and Furnham, subordinates particularly benefit when their supervisors receive coaching. Subordinates experience increased job satisfaction, work engagement, and organizational commitment, thereby reducing turnover costs.

So, yes, executive coaching is effective and it does help leaders achieve personal and organizational goals. It can also provide a favorable return on investment through the increased self-efficacy and goal attainment of the leader and increase satisfaction and engagement of employees.