Are you working ‘in’ or ‘on’ the firm?

This is just one of the many provocative and thought stimulating questions Steve Mostyn asks in his book 'Why Great Leaders Ask Great Questions'.

For a long time we looked for leader to get answers. According to Steve this is because we confuse authority with leadership. True leadership in business is grounded in knowing ourselves and building a reflective practice to enhance the understanding of ourselves, our organization and our enviroment, with the aim to develop ourselves, our teams, and our business.

In the 40th episode of the Leadership 2.0 podcast, I interview Steve Mostyn, focusing on the question how leaders can develop such a reflective practice.

Steve is a globally recognised leader in senior executive leadership development and an internationally acclaimed thought-leader in leadership training, and the author of the book 'Why great Leaders ask Great Questions'.

During our conversation we discussed the following topics:

• Why Great Leaders ask Great Questions
• How Leaders Reflect
• Skilled Defensiveness
• How Leaders can learn to Reflect
• The impact of reflection on execution
• Experiences and Empowerment
• Should Leaders outsource their Problems?
• Business Reviews as Joint Problem solving sessions (instead of blame games)
• Reflective Leaders grow Reflective Leaders
• Reflection in Executive Programs of the Said Business School

About Steve Mostyn

Steve Mostyn is the author of Why Great Leaders Ask Great Questions: 7 essential reflections for every aspiring leader (John Murray Business). Mostyn is one of the world’s leading designers and directors of senior executive leadership programs and an internationally recognised thought leader in leadership training. He is Associate Fellow at Saïd Business School, University of Oxford; creates and leads the Oxford University Executive Leadership Program; and is Honorary Professor, Adam Smith Business School, University of Glasgow. Mostyn has led many corporate programs for senior leaders including the UN, Standard Chartered Bank, Royal Mail, The Financial Services Authority, and Mercedes F1 Team.

Book 'Why Great Leaders Ask Great Questions'

Oxford Executive Leadership Program Said Business School

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We all have behavioral preferences.

Some of us get energy from being part of a group, others from quiet reflection on their own. When it comes to how we gather data in decision-making processes, some people prefer looking at the facts presented by the current situation, while others rely more on the future possibilities the current situation offers.
The way we make decisions is also different. There are people who prefer to make decisions based on an analytical decision-making process, with their values as 'guard rails', while others are guided primarily by their values.

The founder of Analytical Psychology, Carl Jung, described these in his book 'Psychological Types' as Extraversion versus Introversion, Sensing versus Intuition, and Thinking versus Feeling. This was later popularized by Isabel Briggs Myers and her mother Katharine Cook Briggs in their Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI).

Jung himself, however, was very critical about boxing people into categories. He reportedly complained that his work had been turned into 'nothing but a childish parlour game' and was particularly concerned, for instance, about the reductive application of type theory in the medical profession, where practitioners would slot patients into his system and give them the corresponding advice.

It is important, therefore, to recognize our predispositions as strengths, but not to see them as excuses to neglect the development of our other potential capabilities.

For example, I always preferred to take decisions based on my Intuition. That worked perfectly fine when I was a single contributor, but became increasingly ineffective as I moved to more senior roles. In order to convince my leaders, peers, and staff of my ideas and proposals, I quickly had to learn to collect and use data (Sensing). And guess what - I quickly started to like it, and in due course even built a reputation for being data savvy.

Overcoming this "one-sidedness" — by bringing our psychological dispositions into conscious awareness and balance — is one the essential elements of 'Individuation', a key concept in Jung's work.

Although Jung published 'Psychological Types' more than a century ago, the core notions of psychological types and individuation are still very much in use today.

Think, for instance, about strengths-based management — which primarily focuses on exploiting the strengths of individuals, rather than focusing on their development needs — or encouraging people to develop themselves outside their comfort zone.

In the 39th episode of the Leadership 2.0 podcast, I interviewed author James Johnston about these key notions in the work of Carl Jung.

During our conversation we discussed the following topics:

1. What is Individuation?
2. What happens if Individuation is blocked?
3. Can Individuation be accelerated?
4. Do organizations have a psychological identity?
5. How to prevent an organizational monoculture?
6. The importance of understanding one's Psychological Type
7. Can Psychological Types change over time?
8. The development of the Gifts Compass Inventory (GCI)
9. Practical applications of the GCI

About James Johnston

James (Graham) Johnston is an artist, architect, author, and entrepreneur. He is passionate about innovation to make the world a better place.

Out of that passion, he created the Gifts Compass Inventory (GCI), an online self-assessment founded in C.G. Jung's theory of psychological types. His book, 'Jung's Indispensable Compass: Navigating the Dynamics of Psychological Types', lays out the intellectual foundation for understanding Jung's type model as a compass.
He founded the training company Gifts Compass Inc. to train professionals in the use of the GCI and other instruments. The aim of the work is to engage the types, as Jung did, for the development of a more unique personality.

GCI Website

Book

Core quardrants Daniel Ofman

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Only a decade ago, executive coaching was associated with either very senior business leaders coached by well-known authors and thought leaders, or with leaders who were struggling in their roles and were given a coach as a last resort.

Today, executive coaching has become mainstream — and it has changed significantly.

First, despite the name, it is no longer the prerogative of C-level executives or their direct reports. Many companies now offer coaching to leaders at all levels of the organisation.

Second, it is no longer seen as a remedy for underperformance. Instead, executive coaches are increasingly viewed the way we view coaches in sport: helping already high-performing individuals to become even better.
As an executive coach myself, I support business leaders with a wide range of challenges: transitioning into new roles, defining strategies for their teams and organisations, improving collaboration with their own leaders and teams, and navigating change.

As a result, executive coaching has evolved from a niche activity into a serious industry. And, like any growing industry, this raises questions about developing and maintaining professional standards, pricing, quality and technology.

Stefan Stenzel has been active in the coaching world since the early 2000s and published ‘Die Zukunft des Coaching-Business’ (‘The Future of the Coaching Business’) in 2022.

I recently sat down with him for two conversations to explore the state of the executive coaching business today.
In our first conversation, we focused on ‘The Executive Coaching Business’
and covered the following topics:

• The value of executive coaching
• Measuring the ROI of executive coaching
• The characteristics of a good executive coach
• Assessing the quality of an executive coach
• Does the downward pressure on fees impact the quality of executive coaches?
• The red and blue oceans for executive coaches
• The place for independent coaches in the world of Digital Coaching Platforms (DCPs)
• Face-to-face versus digital coaching
• External coaches versus internal coaches

About Stefan Stenzel

Stefan Stenzel (Dipl.-Psych.) studied Organizational Psychology at Heidelberg and Mannheim with a minor in business administration. He has almost 30 years of experience in PD and OD. Since 2001 he is working at SAP SE in the role of a HR Senior Expert for Learning in the team of Global Leadership Development with varying areas of responsibilities. Based on his initial coaching training in 1998, he is working as an internal coach at SAP since 2002. With short interruptions he is globally responsible for the external coach pool across all management levels and is currently implementing a coachbot to complement the service portfolio. He is Co-founder of DBVC e.V. in 2004. In 2023 he co-founded in this context with, Dr. Uwe Böning. the so-called Think Tank “Future of Coaching” . He is author of various publications on the topic of (the future of) coaching.

Stefan Stenzel Linkedin

Contact Stefan Stenzel: kontakt@coaching-reset.de

Webpage: www.coaching-reset.de

Book: Die Zukunft des Coaching-Business https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-662-64421-8

Disclaimer

The statements and expressed opinions of Stefan Stenzel are his own and do not represent the views, positions, or policies of SAP SE.

Any comments he made are purely personal and should not be interpreted as being endorsed with SAP SE.

For any official information or statements, please refer directly to SAP SE.

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