Executive Coach with Leadership Experience

In my training as a systemic coach I learned a principle that, in the coaching world, has almost the status of an article of faith: the coach is like a blank sheet of paper. He does not bring his own content. He trusts that the client is the expert in their own solution. The coach asks questions, holds space, accompanies the process, but does not advise, does not evaluate, and gives no recommendations.

This is an important principle. And as a basic stance it holds.

But in working with leaders at senior level I have come to see that on its own it is not enough.

The Reality in the Coaching Session

Imagine the following situation: an executive board member tells me in a session that his company is facing a matrix reorganisation in which two reporting lines are to be merged, while at the same time a post-merger integration process is running and the supervisory board is pressing for quarterly results.

If as a coach I had to ask at this point, "What exactly is a matrix organisation?", the session is emotionally over. The question itself is legitimate. But it forces the client to explain his world first, before he can work on his actual concern. That costs time, energy, and, above all, trust.

Because I have stood in exactly such situations myself as SVP, as CDO and as a company founder, in board decisions, in reorganisations, in international matrix structures, I immediately have an image of what my client is talking about. I don't have to ask what a dual reporting line means. I know what a post-merger integration feels like. I know the pressure that comes from a supervisory board.

This immediate understanding creates something that is hard to manufacture: a shared language. And a shared language is the precondition for the client to open up quickly, so we can work on the real themes, instead of spending the session on context explanations.

The Theoretical Tension

In coaching theory there is a real controversy on this question. The systemic school emphasizes: the coach should not bring substantive expertise, because otherwise he risks projecting his own solutions onto the client. That is a legitimate objection. Whoever answers too quickly from their own experience stops listening.

At the same time Edgar Schein, the late MIT professor and one of the most influential thinkers in the field of organisational development, described in his concept of Process Consultation three roles a consultant can take: that of process consultant (helping the client solve his own problem), that of expert (contributing professional knowledge), and that of diagnostician (analysing and giving recommendations).

Schein's central insight: the most effective help does not arise from rigidly clinging to a single role, but from the ability to switch between these roles consciously and transparently, depending on what the moment requires. The key lies in the word consciously. It is not about uncontrolled sliding back and forth between coaching and consulting. It is about performing the switch as a professional decision and making it transparent for the client.

The Concrete Moment of Role Change

In my practice this switch happens regularly. A typical sequence looks like this:

We are working on a concern, systemically, by questioning, accompanying the process. I am in the coaching role. The client develops his own insights, finds his own direction. That is the normal state.

Then comes a moment in which the client asks me directly: "Thomas, how do you assess the situation? What would you do in my place?"

At that point I say explicitly: "May I switch hats here for a moment? I would not answer you now as a coach, but from my experience as a leader."

That sounds like a small gesture. But it is decisive. It marks the role change for both sides. The client knows: what comes now is not a coaching question, but an assessment from experience. And I know: I am now speaking as someone who has lived through similar situations, not as a neutral process companion.

After the excursion we deliberately return to the coaching role. I often then say: "That was my perspective. What does it do to you? What of it fits, what doesn't?" That puts the decision back with the client, where it belongs.

What My Clients Say About It

At the end of a shared coaching journey, typically after three to nine months, I often hear feedback that confirms me in this approach. Clients tell me that this very combination is what made the difference for them: the combination of systemic coaching that helped them find their own solutions, and access to the experience of a person who knows their world from his own observation.

Not one or the other. Both.

This is no coincidence. Senior executives are used to working with excellent counterparts. They have no patience for someone who does not know the terrain. But they also have no need for someone who tells them what to do, there is enough of that in their environment. What they look for is a sparring partner who listens, asks the right questions, accompanies the process, and at the decisive moment can offer a sound assessment because he has been there himself.

What This Does Not Mean

This approach has clear boundaries that I keep deliberately:

I do not give unsolicited advice. The switch into the expert role only happens at the client's invitation, never because I think I know better.

I do not project. My experience at Philips, at Waldmann or at Lichtvision is my experience, not my client's. What worked in my situation does not have to work in his. That is why we always return to coaching mode after the shift in perspective: the client decides what he does with it.

I do not confuse the roles. Coaching and consulting are different disciplines with different rules. The strength does not lie in dissolving the boundaries, but in crossing them consciously and transparently, and returning.

Coaching With Leadership Experience: Not a Contradiction, But Depth

Coaching theory is right: the client is the expert in his solution. My experience has not changed that. What has changed is the depth at which I can work as a coach. Because I speak my clients' language. Because I immediately understand what they are talking about. Because I know the emotional landscapes of leadership at the highest level from my own experience.

Edgar Schein put it this way: the most effective help arises when the helper knows his own stance, including his prejudices, his experiences, and his blind spots. Not by hiding them, but by deploying them consciously.

The blank sheet of paper remains an important ideal. But a sheet that knows the handwriting of 15 years of leadership experience can sometimes have more effect than one that stays empty.

Further reading

• Edgar Schein: Helping (Berrett-Koehler 2009) – Schein's case for a reflective stance in helping relationships.