Coaching vs Consulting: The Key Differences and How to Decide What you Need
Executive coaching can help turn a person into a great leader whilst consulting focuses on a specific or prescriptive problem. Often the lines between consulting and executive coaching can become blurred, leading to situations that are sub-optimal and not providing you or your business with what you need.
Executive coaching and consulting both have a very important place in the business playbook; however, they are fundamentally different interventions and designed to meet very different needs.
Understanding the key differences between executive coaching and consulting will be crucial for your business, either by helping you develop your or others leadership ability or by helping you solve a specific or prescriptive problem.
Consulting gives you instructions. Executive Coaching guides to you.
Consultants are experts in their field. Their job is to focus on a specific problem and tell their clients how to resolve it. Consultants will provide the tools to move forward and executive.
Executive coaches guide their clients through the interaction to help them uncover deeper strategies to make decisions, improve personal performance and become better leaders.
A consultant Is usually a subject matter expert who provides advice based on a significant understanding of that subject and all that industry. An executive coach, however, helps clients find their own clarity, develop expertise and they guide them on how to move forward in achieving their goals and grow personally which also benefits the business longer term.
Executive coaching builds capacity. Consulting it’s about solving problems.
An executive coach helps their clients to explore possibilities, whilst consultants help their clients by providing possibilities. The nuance of language, but an executive coach helps their clients to explore the possibilities for themselves that they may not have even seen previously whilst consultants help their clients by identifying possibilities and providing them with options based on their knowledge and experience.
The focus of the consultant is to help the client address a specific or defined problem such as product, sales, reputation, competition, operations etc.
An executive coach on the other hand helps the client to build capability and delivers transferable benefits in the form of better confidence improved communication enhanced problem-solving and decision-making skills.
An executive coach is a peer. A consultant is an authority.
Often the relationship between a client and executive coach is one of a peer; the executive coach is there to help their clients find answers for themselves, as a strategic thinking partner through a thought-provoking and creative process that inspires them to maximise their personal and professional potential.
Consultants on the other hand help their clients from a position of authority. They are often experts in their field and tell the clients what the problem is and what to do.
Both are valuable and both have their place.
Whilst there are differences between coaching and consulting, the results of each intervention is the same. Namely, to help your clients to improve. If the ultimate goal is to help the client improve it’s clear that coaching and consulting are both valuable and have a place in the business playbook.
Tip #1: Hire a consultant when you want to solve a problem. Hire an executive coach when you want to be a better leader and develop your own tools and strategies to understand what to do.
