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Have you ever wished you had someone to consult with like you do with a mate, a wife or a husband? Someone you could throw a few ideas around with? Many directors and managers cite executive loneliness as one of the main causes of stress in their working lives. As a director or manager, who can you talk to? We all need a sounding board at least.

For better or worse we have to live with the decisions we make and by throwing a few ideas around we are likely to end up with a fresh new perspective. In our private lives, we usually consult with our partners or friends before making any big decisions that will affect our families or personal lives.

At work it's different. Finding a confidential sounding board can be tricky. You can't talk to your own manager because it's bad form and you could lose face. You can't really talk to people at your level in the organization because they are probably waiting to find your Achilles' heel and go for your jugular. You can't ask the people you supervise because they have the expectation that you have all the answers. You could risk losing their confidence in you. "Or worse, because of their own fears, they downplay or reject the ideas and your enthusiasm and you start to lose confidence in yourself", says executive coach, Susi Woolf.

"Nowadays, there are several organizations executives can join to alleviate some of these issues. However, a very effective, and without doubt, the most confidential way, is to work with an executive coach". Susi has worked with corporate change and training for 10 years. Having been in management herself, Susi acutely felt the need for the testing out of ideas and confidential discussions with an unbiased, trained professional who understood what she was feeling. "Executive coaching offers executives a safe, confidential, non-judgemental context where they can try out new ideas, strategies and skills. From this perspective, managers can build on their existing management skills and improve their leadership skills".

Executive loneliness means that executives are often at a loss when it comes to developing new problem solving strategies or implementing such strategies.

The saboteurs in our organizations add enormously to executive stress. What can we do about them? Often we find that members of the teams we are supervising are just not pulling their weight. They take long lunch hours or always seem to be talking on their mobile phones. Others on the team feel cheated. It's not fair, they say, why do I always have to... when... doesn't?

How do you give negative feedback? How can you let off steam safely? Who do you debrief with?

"Quite often, if we do debrief with our colleagues or friends, we find them giving us their opinion, which we may not agree with." Says Susi " and we may feel they haven't heard us. This is where the trained professional executive coach can be so beneficial. You can be assured that they are in no way judgemental and will help you to develop ways of dealing with issues that are compatible with your values".

To this end, executive coaching is an extremely versatile tool used by executives to develop and improve their leadership skills. Leaders reflect on communication and relationships within their organization so that they can make changes in order to enhance performance, improve team work, a will do attitude, productivity and harmony.

Executives work with the executive coach over a number of sessions to improve their personal performance and importantly their work satisfaction. After all, not many of us do it just for the money. Or do we?

Get into Life magazine July, 2004