Who Pays for Your Executive Coaching?
Following the article in the Sunday Times on August 27, 2006 “Call my life coach, not a spin doctor” the question of who pays for coaching comes under the spotlight.
The question that could be asked is: “When is an expenditure a business expense and when is it a personal expense?”
This can be looked at from two points of view: the individual’s or the organisation’s. If we take a look at some of the other expenses incurred by individual’s within organisations, it may enlighten us on this matter.
Clothes: we dress for work yet it’s not a claimable expense. There are those who spend more and those who spend less on their wardrobe, and this is a personal decision based on the individual’s taste, needs, aesthetics, the amount of feel-good factor associated with external appearance and so on.
Executive coaching is about the individual, behind every role is a person and it is the essence of that human being that makes the role function in one particular manner or another. You can never separate the personality, the approach, the methodologies, the beliefs or the values of the person who is behind the role.
This implies that executive coaching is primarily for the inidividual and secondarily for the benefit of the organisation.
Executive coaching is also very personal; if companies enforce executive coaching onto their employees it totally defeats the object of the role of coaching in an organisation. Broadly speaking the focus of executive coaching is to enable the individual to increase awareness, create a safe place for a sounding board, create change and empower them to achieve results with both current and new resources.
Where do we draw the line between an organisational and a personal expense for the benefit of personal improvement that will impact the organisation we work for as well as other aspects of our lives? This is an arbitrary decision, and could be seen as a company benefit, along with pensions, gym membership and private medical insurance, which also implies you would be constricted to the gym or the medical insurance scheme the company signs up to, which is not necessarily the best or most convenient for you!
The basic advantage of paying for your own executive coaching is that you get to choose the best and most appropriate solution for you. If your organisation supports you and lets you put that in as an expense then enjoy the benefit. Regardless, and without a doubt, you will enjoy and gain from the executive coaching experience.
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