Kirralea Walkerden
Leadership Coach, Culture Consultant, Facilitator
What is Executive Coaching?
Executive coaching – or leadership coaching – is a structured, one-on-one development partnership that helps leaders think more clearly, communicate more effectively, navigate complexity with confidence, and create the kind of culture they want their team to experience.
Unlike training, where you receive knowledge, or consulting, where someone provides solutions, or mentoring, where someone shares their experience – coaching develops your thinking. Your coach isn’t there to tell you what to do. They’re there to create the space to think differently, challenge assumptions, explore blind spots, and translate insight into practical action.
Executive coaching typically involves:
- Regular one-on-one sessions (usually fortnightly or monthly)
- A structured framework tailored to your goals and real leadership challenges
- A confidential space to work through what's actually going on
- Accountability between sessions to ensure insight becomes action
- Ongoing reflection on behaviours, patterns, conversations, and relationships
The topics aren't prescribed. Leaders bring what matters most - a difficult conversation they've been avoiding, a team dynamic that's affecting performance, a decision they can't get clarity on, or a pattern they keep repeating without quite knowing why.
How Do I Know if I Need Executive Coaching?
Most leaders reach a point where technical skill alone isn’t enough.
You’ve been promoted because you’re good at what you do. You understand the business. You get results. But somewhere between your last role and this one, the job changed – and no one told you the rules had changed with it.
Now you’re navigating difficult conversations, balancing competing priorities, leading people through change, managing performance, and making decisions that affect the culture your team experiences every day.
And you’re doing most of it alone.
That’s the moment most leaders start asking: Is this what executive coaching is for?
The short answer is yes. But the longer answer is more interesting – because executive coaching isn’t about fixing something that’s broken. It’s about developing something that’s already there.
Signs You Might Need an Executive Coach
Leaders don’t usually seek coaching because they’re failing. More often, they seek it because something feels off – or because they’ve hit a ceiling they can’t quite see their way past.
Some of the most common signs:
- You're solving your team's problems instead of developing their capability to solve them
- Difficult conversations get delayed, softened, or avoided - and the same issues keep resurfacing
- You're having the same conversations repeatedly, but nothing is actually changing
- You feel isolated. There's no one around you who can give you honest feedback or challenge your thinking
- You feel like you were promoted into leadership, but never really developed for it
- You're carrying conversations that your team should be having with each other
- You're operating reactively - always firefighting, rarely thinking about what matters most
- There's a gap between the leader you want to be and the leader you're showing up as right now
None of these are signs of failure. They're signs of awareness - and awareness is exactly where coaching begins.
What Does an Executive Coach Do?
A good executive coach does four things well:
What to Expect from Executive Coaching
Executive coaching isn’t a quick fix. It’s a process. And like any meaningful process, the results build over time.
Most leaders work with a coach over six to twelve months. This gives enough time to identify the patterns that are limiting their impact, develop new approaches, test them in real situations, and build the habits that create lasting change.
In the early sessions, the work is exploratory. You’ll get clear on your goals, identify the specific challenges you want to address, and establish a realistic picture of where you are now. From there, sessions become more targeted – working through real leadership situations, developing new ways of thinking and responding, and building accountability structures that keep you moving forward.
Real leadership growth doesn't happen because someone gives you a better answer. It happens because you begin asking better questions, making different decisions, and responding differently in the moments that matter most.
Common Outcomes Leaders Report from Executive Coaching:
- Greater confidence in high-stakes conversations and complex decisions
- Stronger accountability within their team - without them having to chase everything
- A clearer sense of the leader they want to be, and how their behaviour shapes the culture around them
- Improved team performance as their own leadership behaviour shifts
- More space for strategic thinking - and less time firefighting
Common Outcomes Leaders Report from Executive Coaching:
Executive coaching is an investment – and it should be treated as one.
Coaching fees vary depending on the experience of the coach, the structure of the engagement, and the specific needs of the leader. Most reputable executive coaching engagements in Australia range from a few thousand dollars for a short-term program to significantly more for a longer, more comprehensive engagement.
The more useful question isn’t what coaching costs. It’s what it costs not to invest in it.
Leadership behaviour is contagious. How leaders communicate, respond to conflict, hold people accountable, and lead through change shapes the behaviour of everyone around them. Coaching that improves leadership behaviour doesn’t just benefit the individual leader – it benefits every person they lead, every conversation they have, and every decision they make.
Common Outcomes Leaders Report from Executive Coaching:
For leaders who are ready to do the work, yes.
The research consistently shows that executive coaching has a measurable impact on leadership clarity, team performance, and culture. But the leaders who get the most from coaching aren’t necessarily those with the most pressing problems. They’re the ones who take it seriously – who show up prepared, engage honestly, and are willing to be challenged.
Executive coaching works best when leaders:
- Are open to honest feedback and willing to examine their own behaviours
- Have genuine goals they want to work towards - not just areas they've been told to improve
- Are prepared to act between sessions, not just reflect during them
- Value a confidential relationship built on trust and candour
What Executive Coaching Isn't
Executive Coaching Isn't About Giving Advice
This is probably the most important distinction to understand.
Training gives you knowledge. Consulting gives you solutions. Mentoring gives you experience. Coaching develops your thinking.
That difference matters – because most leadership challenges aren’t solved by more information. They’re solved by thinking differently. By asking better questions. By understanding what’s actually driving the behaviour and making a deliberate choice to respond differently.
Executive coaching creates the conditions for that kind of thinking. It’s not a lecture. It’s not a workshop. It’s a structured, ongoing conversation that builds the clarity, confidence, and self-awareness to lead more intentionally.
(This distinction also underpins the difference between coaching and mentoring – something we explore in depth in our article: Leadership Coaching vs Mentoring: What’s the Difference and Which One Do You Need?)
Executive Coaching Isn't About Fixing Leaders
The best leaders don’t invest in coaching because they’re struggling. They invest because leadership matters.
They understand that every conversation they have, every behaviour they model, and every decision they make shapes the culture around them. They’re not looking for someone to give them the answers. They’re looking for the space to think more clearly, act more intentionally, and lead in a way that creates real impact.
Executive coaching provides that opportunity.
It’s a chance to slow down, think differently, challenge assumptions, and become more deliberate about the leader you want to be.
Because when leaders grow, teams grow.
And when teams grow, cultures change.
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