Anish Rakheja, popularly known as Coach Anish, is the Founder of Krescon Coaches. He has industry experience of over three decades — wherein he has guided and mentored many business leaders and professionals in their journey of creating a legacy that truly matters. An IIT-Roorkee graduate, Anish has completed his MBA from the National Institute Industrial Engineering National Institute of Industrial Engineering. Following this, he worked for more than 17+ years with globally-renowned corporates like HCL Technologies and IBM.
“It is not whether you get knocked down; it’s whether you get up!”
This insightful quote by the renowned American soccer coach Vince Lombardi accurately sums up what coaching is all about and the powerful difference that a coach can make in our lives. A coach is like a “speaking mirror” — who challenges us to hear and face things that we usually are reluctant to acknowledge ourselves, thereby gently but firmly directing us to reaching our fullest potential and unleashing our inner excellence. No matter what age, background or profession we may belong to, coaching can nudge us towards the easiest path towards having a meaningful and impactful existence and creating a Legacy for ourselves.
In the aftermath of the pandemic, not only has the ed-tech or digital/online education space, but also the coaching sector at large has received a tremendous boost and growth momentum. According to a study conducted by International Coaching Federation, the estimated global revenue from coaching has crossed over US$2.84 billion. With coaching rapidly becoming the ‘new norm’ for the professional and business arena in the post-pandemic world, we are witnessing a lot of new trends emerging in the coaching industry in India and worldwide.
Below-mentioned are some of the notable trends that are expected to continue disrupting the coaching ecosystem in the current year and beyond:
Legacy Coaching Services Gaining Prominence
While organizations may not remember for long a person and his/her position, power or the performance, but we all always remember Legends! And becoming a Legend is only possible when one embarks on and continues the process of a meaningful Legacy Creation throughout his/her life, work and career. This is exactly where the role of Legacy Coaches or Legacy Coaching at large comes in as a crucial factor. With the help of Legacy Coaching, one can not only achieve dazzling heights of success for himself/herself, but also take meaningful and empowering actions on the front of contributing towards the betterment of others and the humanity.
With many individuals, including entrepreneurs, business leaders and professionals, now realizing the significance of creating a lasting impact and eternally meaningful contributions to the society, they are increasingly seeking the help of Legacy Coaches in order to derive optimal guidance and opportunities to discover and uncover their Identity and Purpose and to reach the Pinnacle of Leadership – which in turn acts enables a seamless Legacy Creation journey for them.
Family Business Coaching Helping the Business Families to Thrive Amid Uncertainties
Business Families are the backbone of the nation’s economy and are today contributing toa significant percentage of our GDP. Unfortunately though, it is a fact most of the Family Businesses shut down before they would even reach the 3rd generation! As a matter of fact, various studies show that only around 1/10th of all Family Businesses make it past the 2nd generation; and with the pandemic-led adversities noticed in the recent times, those numbers were only bound to decline further. But on the positive note, this is exactly where Family Business Coaching came in as a saviour.
Family Business Coaches usually offer personalized services to Business Families, helping them with various aspects vis-à-vis enabling them to survive, thrive and preserve and sustain their Legacies and also helping Family Businesses to become more resilient and immune to stagnation in today’s fast-changing VUCA world, while adopting a structured methodology and framework for doing so. Additionally, Family Business Coaching can also be a great enabler in helping them to effectively manage the next generation’s ambitions, skills, expectations, roles and responsibilities etc., thus paving the way to optimal succession planning so as to ensure the Family Business’ Legacy lives on through the future generations, and that too without having to experience any kind of any inter or intra generation conflict or rivalry.
Coaching Becoming Relevant for Leadership Pipeline Development& Leadership Transition
In the corporate world, developing and nurturing a strategic leadership pipeline is often viewed as matter of utmost importance and priority, and rightly so. Be it in the public sector or private, organizations that strive for impeccable and unstoppable growth, success and excellence cannot and do not take their leadership transition activity lightly. Because whenever a leader or senior manager in an organization steps down from his/her role, someone else has to step in to carry ahead the baton of his/her leadership and Legacy in business; or else, chaos and confusion is likely to prevail and cause downfall or even threaten the existence of the organization. And this is exactly why it makes sense to develop and maintain a long term, strong and robust leadership pipeline within the organization throughout.
But given that leadership pipeline development within an organization is easier said than done, this is where coaches can be of immense help and value. Coaches who specialize in Leadership Coaching work with and train a pre-identified pool of potential (would-be) leaders on various aspects of strategic operations, leadership skills, conflict management and team handling skills and so on. Having the constant guidance from such coaches enable a person to be prepared, ready and well-equipped for easily transitioning to the leadership role, as and when required. Not only can coaching be an empowering tool in terms of handholding and helping leaders and senior professionals for transitioning-in (stepping into a new role in an organization), but it is also being used increasingly today to provide essential emotional and social support for those leaders who are, or soon will be on the verge of, transitioning-out (moving out or retiring from an organization).
Co-Boarding with Coaches Rising in Popularity
Co-boarding is another key trend that is gaining huge popularity off late for leadership transition in medium and big-sized organizations; it essentially refers to a service wherein an executive search firm usually partners with a career coach or business coach to enable seamless transition of a new joinee in a senior leadership role in an organization (for appointing whom the executive search firm has head-hunted, interviewed and finalized the candidate). Following the person stepping into his/her new role, he is immediately assigned a coach who can help him, guide him and does everything possible to enable him to settle down quickly and effectively. And this novel process is what is known as co-boarding with coaches.
Given that a coach, being an independent 3rd party has no hidden agenda, vested interest, or any reason whatsoever to judge in any manner, the executive or leader who has just started his stint in the company can share and discuss his problems or challenges openly and freely with the coach – who always provides a completely safe zone to the coachee for confiding their innermost feelings and enables him/her eventually to come up with solutions and forward-looking approach to efficiently do his/her work. This also takes away the concerned leader/executive’s dilemma to every time go internally to the HR department or the founder/business owner whenever he/she is facing an issue with regards to the transition. In the near future, more and more executive search firms will continue to collaborate with seasoned coaches to add value to their firms’ credibility as well to the external stakeholders.