Why your career plans need leadership coaching with the ICAS Executive Coaching Programme

The ICAS Executive Coaching Programme is exclusively for C-Suite and Senior Executives and is also open to non-members.

You should expect high energy and vibrant discussions and conversations. The full programme includes four confidential group sessions held over a 6 month period, plus three one-to-one personal coaching sessions.

Participants are invited to share thoughts, challenges, and aspirations as well as offer questions, options or potential solutions in a mutually supportive peer environment.

As the sessions are enshrined in confidentiality, such conversations are designed and intended to accelerate learning, development and growth. Sessions will engage in shared learning with peers from different organisations, develop your leadership capacity, and identify actions relative to you as an individual.

The programme is limited to twelve places per cohort.

This programme facilitates four online group discussions between those in mid to senior leadership roles, such as C-Suite executives and partners, and aims to develop senior staff by concentrating on issues that are critical to their performance.

The Group Coaching Sessions offer participants:

• time to think and reflect
• a supportive environment for personal growth
• an opportunity to share professional challenges and aspirations
• the reassurance that we all face similar issues and concerns
• a chance to build life-long bonds with an intimate network of like-minded professionals
• collective learning and development on the three core session subjects covering Leadership, Emotional Intelligence and Building Resilience

The interleaved 1:1 Executive Coaching Sessions offer participants the opportunity to:

• develop their learning and understanding on any or all of the subjects covered in the group sessions
• hold conversations of a very personal nature in a confidential safe-space
• “invest in themselves”
• take the conversation to a much deeper, professionally intimate level
• explore personal and professional issues of a sensitive nature
• share challenges and aspirations with a non-judgemental confidant
• design plans and develop strategies for personal and professional success
• overcome hurdles and accelerate career progression

What will I be required to do in advance of the first session?

There is no requirement for you to do anything before the first online session.

How will the programme sessions work in practice?

The programme is largely based on the Action Learning Sets Model whereby groups (or sets) of 8 participants are invited to meet together in a confidential safe space, on a regular basis, to explore ways of understanding and solving their role challenges and aspirations. In similar programmes facilitated by Leading Figures in the past, topics have varied from, for example, general staff issues, culture and diversity to communication, driving change and how best to manage relationships with the board and other key stakeholders.

Sessions are structured insofar as 'air time' is given to those individuals who wish to share a challenge or aspiration while other members actively listen and then ask questions of the presenting participant(s). This has the effect of helping the presenters better understand and resolve their own issues.

The purpose is not to solve the other participants' problems but to help them find their own answers through effective questioning, reflection and, when appropriate, the suggestion of options. Issues raised should be of a general leadership/organisational/business nature and not require any technical or specialist knowledge from other participants.

All participants are charged with the responsibility of taking action and learning from the current session's discussions and encouraged to report back at the next session so that there is continuity and progress between meetings. Participants often report that they gain significant value from listening to the way their peers faced and dealt with difficult issues.

How much does the programme cost and what does it include?

The cost of the ICAS Executive Coaching Programme is £870 + VAT (£1,044) paid in advance and in full. The programme includes four x 2 hour virtual group sessions plus three 1-1 virtual coaching sessions held over a 6 month period.

What do you mean by a transferable 1-1 Coaching Session?

The programme includes three 1-1 coaching sessions with one of the Leading Figures Partners/facilitators - either Russell Borland or Thomas Chalmers. However in the event that you already have a coach or do not wish to avail yourself of the sessions you may choose to transfer the 1-1 coaching session to a friend or colleague.

How many participants are there per group and what if the programme is oversubscribed?

ICAS Executive Coaching groups are limited to 5-12 participants. Multiple groups may be formed to accommodate applicants up to a maximum of four groups (24-32 participants). Numbers and names beyond this limit will be placed on a waiting list.

What else does the programme offer?

Sessions include the opportunity for Leading Figures to share academic research as well as learning and development tools, insights and information on a variety of topics that may arise as being of interest to all participants such as: The promotions criteria that take leaders to the top; The latest research on High Performing Teams; Leadership styles and approaches; The distinction between Growth versus Fixed Mindsets; Emotional intelligence (and how a lack of Emotional Intelligence is the primary reason for career derailment amongst top executives); Interpersonal skills; Building resilience; Communication; and Assertiveness.

Between sessions participants will be encouraged to meet each other for 1-1 or group conversations.