Executive Team Coaching is an Unnecessary Luxury for Those Rocking the Status Quo

June 13, 2023

As an Executive Team Coach, I have worked with hundreds of individual senior leaders and dozens of campuses over the last several years. Coaching executive teams can be similar to personal performance coaching in many ways — especially when team leaders have the mindset that the team is the unified entity for building reliable systems. 


Healthy leaders are always healthy people first. I have yet to find a healthy leader who wasn’t first a healthy person. Those healthy leaders are the lifeblood of healthy teams. 


Guess what healthy teams build?


You win if you said smart systems.

executive team coaching

Simply put, you can’t build reliable systems with unhealthy teams. 


How many of you are standing upon the unhealthy shoulders of teams who built the dumpster fire of a system you have inherited?


Team members have an interdependent relationship with one another to achieve common priorities, objectives, tasks, and a campus vision. Executive Team Coaching helps these teams see their strengths, obstacles, and potential to accelerate the system’s mission delivery. 


In essence, Executive Team Coaching involves, at its core, systems thinking. 


Often campus leadership teams are composed of leaders who head their own divisions and departments. Hence, I have painfully observed executive team meetings that feel like battlegrounds to fight more for each department's insular desires than the system's holistic needs. 


As renowned author Patrick Lencioni has written in his book The Five Dysfunctions of a Team, for the organization to succeed, the leadership team must be your number one team. The development process of Executive Team Coaching enhances a leadership team’s overall systems thinking beyond their immediate team.


Team Coaching Vs. Team Building

Executive Team Coaching isn’t the same as team building. While team building is essential, Executive Team Coaching is about digging into the tough stuff to create tangible alignment and cohesive teams. Executive Team Coaching includes a blend of coaching, teaching, facilitation, strategic blueprinting, assessment, mediation, and positive psychology. 


Executive Team Coaching sharpens your advantage and drives Higher Performance.


I like to think of the dynamic of a leadership team as if it were a healthy marriage. Team building is like having fun dates and having regular alone time as a couple. This is essential for healthy couples. Still, this isn’t enough if the twosome desires to grow deeper in their commitment to each other and those they serve. Couples who only focus on having fun typically avoid having deeper conversations about their goals, future, setbacks, and where they might be failing to find alignment. 


Executive Team Coaching is where leaders step into the “work” part of the marriage. Conversely, suppose a couple only does the hard work and never has time set aside for activities together. In that case, they can grow tired of “the grind,” which, left accidentally, can erode the relationship. 


We need time to be IN the relationship and work ON the relationship.


Individual Coaching Vs. Executive Team Coaching

Individual coaching is essential to help leaders work on their mindset and personal development. Executive coaching helps leaders become more effective and more influential in their impact. Executive Team Coaching works with the whole team while fully understanding each leader's personal temperaments, wiring, and goals. Executive Team Coaching helps each leader become more effective within the team as the team becomes more effective in building the system. 


To develop as one cohesive system, executive teams must be intentional to work (consistently) across three distinct systems:

  • Your Culture System (Team Communication and Connection)
  • Your Coherence System (Team Alignment and Execution)
  • Your Human System (Team Capacity)


HPG specializes in guiding the executive team across these success systems while fighting for the best good of each leader on the team.


Individual coaching and Executive Team Coaching are essential for every campus's mission delivery and performance. If you were to pick between the two, Executive Team Coaching is the win as it integrates all of the essential elements for Higher Performance. 


  1. 1:1 Performance Coaching: To Drive Individual Success
  2. Team 360 Baseline/Benchmark Assessments: To Assess Team Health
  3. Natural Leadership Profile {NLP}: To Illuminate the Unique Brilliance of Each Leader
  4. A Community of Practice: To Solve Practical Problems
  5. Strategic Planning: To Blueprint Your Success Journey
  6. Non-Proprietary Tools: To Help you Build {YOUR-OS} – Your Operating System for People and System Development
  7. A Scrappy Coach: Who Fights for the Best Good of YOU, Your TEAM, and Your SYSTEM


Who Needs Executive Team Coaching?

Executive Team Coaching helps teams work through complex decisions where there are no (easy) or correct answers. The process helps strengthen:

  • Team Communication
  • Team Connection
  • Team Alignment
  • Team Capacity
  • Team Execution
  • Reliable Systems


Any campus team leveled out in performance or stuck in underperformance would find great value in Executive Team Coaching.


An Intentional Investment

Executive Team Coaching isn’t a one-and-done experience but a developmental process to build Habits of Higher Performance and an irresistible culture to keep your best talent and attract more of the same. 


Who could benefit from Executive Team Coaching?


  • The Campus President’s Cabinet and their Leadership Teams
  • The District Superintendent’s Cabinet and their Leadership Teams
  • The Campus Vice Presidents and their Leadership Teams
  • School Principals and their Building Leadership Teams
  • Executive Directors and their Leadership Teams
  • Agency Leaders and Their Leadership Teams
  • Educational Service Divisions and their Leadership Teams
  • Governing Boards
  • Really…any publicly serving institution


Did this post spur you to consider Executive Team Coaching for your leadership team?


Executive Team Coaching can help sharpen your advantage and drive Higher Team Performance. 


Learn More Here.

P.S. Campus teams, on average, function at less than 60% of their performance potential because they don't invest in team capacity and team potential.


The HPG Team has created a training and coaching practice to help teams win against the gravitational pull of average performance, and we can help YOU!


  1. Check out our suite of leader and team resources 👇🏼
    https://www.higherperformancegroup.com/resources
  2. Set up a call to explore the next steps 👇🏼
    https://www.higherperformancegroup.com/schedule

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