The world of work

The joy of coaching

Julia Hobsbawm

26 May 2007

An old friend, James Caplin, began coaching in Britain and now runs a highly successful course called ‘I hate presentations’. I told him I wanted to work with someone I hadn’t known for a million years (that is, someone who wasn’t him) who could put everyday issues about strategy, management and priorities into perspective. He recommended Ginger, whom he had met while doing his own coaching training in the US. There are many British coaches to choose from, but I confess to a bias against any of them other than James after one so-called leading light of the profession came to a small breakfast I had organised and afterwards sent me a deeply patronising note of unasked-for congratulation together with the suggestion that, as she was also a colour co-ordination expert, she’d be happy to review my ‘look’ and assist me to dress my best at all times. I grumpily replied that I felt that my monthly spend with Jaeger and Jasper Conran at Debenhams was satisfactory, thank you, and turned instead to Ginger in Dallas, Texas for coaching counsel.

Naturally I don’t fly to the US twice a month; I do ‘phone coach’ instead (very time efficient). Perhaps I prefer having an American coach because there’s an inherent warmth underlying the famous American ‘can do’ attitude to business strategy and management that I particularly like. Ginger combines the strategic ability of a top management consultant with the empathy and ‘quick win’ insight of a good cognitive therapist.

In other words I’m a sucker for what might be termed assisted self-help. I want my business to be both profitable and meaningful to clients and staff alike, and anything that helps me do that is A Good Thing. That the business is now in its second year of trading and exceeding our business plan and my ambitions by some margin is due in part to the work I’m doing with Coach Ginger. But as people tend to say in the acknowledgments to books: ‘Any errors are my own.’

Julia Hobsbawm is chief executive of Editorial Intelligence.