The Complete Idiot's Guide to Coaching for Excellence

by Jane Creswell

Book Overview

Growth, profit, and productivity are among the most important goals of business. In a world of intense competition both domestically and abroad, the most effective way for companies to achieve goals... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1592577830
• ISBN13: 9781592577835
• Release Date: October 2008
• Publisher: Alpha Books
• Length: 315 Pages
• Weight: 0.90 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 5.9" x 9.0"
• Age Range: 18 years and up
• Grade Range: Postsecondary and higher

Customer Reviews

Coaching Made Accessible and Affordable for All!

"Respected leading coach Jane Creswell, MCC has written a profound gift to the world of business excellence: The Complete Idiot's Guide to Coaching for Excellence. Her basic premise is that regardless of your industry, position, functional role, or area of expertise, you can learn and integrate coaching into your job for the ultimate, measurable benefit of you and your organization. This thorough how-to resource is a must-have for everyone's bookshelf! She teaches the coach approach, creating a coaching culture, the nuts and bolts for focusing on results and how to do coaching as well as how to be a coach, whom to coach, how to use coaching in specific situations and in different types of organizations both corporate and mission-driven. This book goes beyond the business impact of coaching and makes coaching accessible and affordable for anyone with a desire to motivate and achieve success. I highly recommend it!" ~Suzi Pomerantz, MT., MCC., CEO of Innovative Leadership International LLC and author of Seal the Deal: The Essential Mindsets for Growing Your Professional Services Business.Seal the Deal: The Essential Mindsets for Growing Your Professional Services Business

Excellent primer on coaching skills for coaches and managers

Excellent, well-written book that helps both coaches and business leaders understand the art and techniques of coaching, and their applications to various settings and situations. Highly recommended. [...]

Wise Investment!

Who better to write this book than Jane Creswell? Ms. Creswell proves once again why she is one of the foremost experts in her field. As the title implies, if it is true excellence that you desire in honing your leadership skills, then treat yourself to this outstanding volume. The investment will pay for itself many times over, and the book will become an essential part of your library. The Complete Idiot's Guide to Coaching for Excellence

A Must Read for Anyone Who Wants to Understand Coaching

Jane Creswell has masterfully been able to write a book about coaching that is what it says it is..easy to read, easy to understand, easy to begin implementing. I have been coaching for years and still found such relevance and wisdom in this book. I would highly recommend.

Excellent Introduction to Coaching

Coaching for Excellence by Jane Creswell provides a solid and accessible introduction to the benefits and techniques of coaching. What's impressive about the book is the breadth of topics covered in such a short and easy-to-read guide. Creswell starts with an overview of coaching, what it is (and is not), what it means to coach for excellence, and how it differs from other approaches like mentoring. She then discusses what it means to have or build a coaching culture within an organization. Next are presented the basics of coaching - techniques, who can be a coach, and who to coach. Coaching groups and coaching within a team setting are welcome topics as well. Another excellent feature of the book is that it looks at coaching in a variety of situations. Although Creswell worked for IBM for 17 years and founded the IBM Coaches Network, coaching is definitely applicable in organizations of every size and type - and in several different roles. The book has discussions on coaching for sales, marketing, communications, HR, service providers and support personnel. The specific challenges faced by small businesses, big business, non-profits and government organizations, and even faith-based organizations. As the VP of R & D in a small business myself, I was encouraged to see how coaching might be utilized in our company to improve employee performance (and my own), and provide measureable business results. The mindset behind coaching for excellence is also one that fits well with small businesses and modern organizations: coaching values people, seeks to tap hidden potential, and seeks to bring out the best in others. Fortunately, it is able to deliver on these challenges in a way that is of great benefit both to the organization and to the person being coached. I would have preferred to rate this book 4.5 stars, as it will probably leave the reader with a lot of questions, wanting to know more about coaching and perhaps seek additional training. But it does an excellent job of meeting its goal and providing what you expect from this series of books - introducing and demystifying the discipline of coaching, giving insight into the characteristics needed to be an effective coach, and providing encouragement and some tools for starting right away with coaching peers and employees. The approach provides many examples - readers wanting to see coaching in action and learn by example are likely to enjoy the book, others wanting a in-depth exposition of the principles and methods of coaching will want to read other books in addition. Overall, I think this book will be of broad interest to leaders and team members in a variety of roles and organizations.