43 Leadership Coaching Quotes to Empower Long-term Success

Elevate your skills with the following list of leadership coaching quotes from renowed experts. These bite-sized nuggets of wisdom will equip you to navigate challenges, unlock potential, and achieve success!

Great leaders are made, not born. They are committed to honing their skills, learning from experience, and constantly striving to be better. Leadership coaching plays a crucial role in this development journey. Below, we will explore a treasure trove of inspiration embedded within a list of leadership coaching quotes from renowned experts. These insightful sayings will equip you to face challenges with confidence, unlock your team’s full potential, and ultimately, achieve remarkable success!

(by Jonathan M. Pham)

Highlights

• This compilation explores leadership coaching through various quotes that cover core principles, different leadership styles, and the impact coaching has on individuals and organizations.

Quotes on Coaching and Leadership

1. A coach is someone who tells you what you don’t want to hear, who has to see what you don’t want to see, so you can be who you always knew you could be. – Tom Landry

2. Coaching is unlocking a person’s potential to maximize their own performance. It is helping them to learn rather than teaching them. – Sir John Whitmore

3. The goal of coaching is the development of people, not just the improvement of their skills. – Unknown

4. Leadership and learning are indispensable to each other. – John F. Kennedy

5. We spend a lot of time teaching leaders what to do. We don’t spend enough time teaching leaders what to stop. – Peter Drucker

Coaching Leadership Style Quotes

6. The best leaders are those most interested in surrounding themselves with assistants and associates smarter than they are. – John C. Maxwell

7. Leadership is not about being in charge. It is about taking care of those in your charge. – Simon Sinek

8. True leadership lies in guiding others to success. – Bill Owens

9. Management is about arranging and telling. Leadership is about nurturing and enhancing. – Tom Peters

10. Leadership is practiced not so much in words as in attitude and actions. – Harold S.Geneen

Famous Leadership Coaching Quotes

11. A leader is one who knows the way, goes the way, and shows the way. – John C.Maxwell

12. One of the most important actions, things a leader can do, is to lead by example. If you want everyone else to be passionate, committed, dedicated, and motivated, you go first! – Marshall Goldsmith

13. Successful people become great leaders when they learn to shift the focus from themselves to others. – Marshall Goldsmith

14. To handle yourself, use your head; to handle others, use your heart. – Eleanor Roosevelt

15. The quality of a leader is reflected in the standards they set for themselves. – Ray Kroc

Quotes about the Impact of Leadership Coaching

16. Leadership should be born out of the understanding of the needs of those who would be affected by it. – Marian Anderson

17. Coaching works best with high-potential people who are willing to make a concerted effort to change. – Unknown

18. Leaders must be close enough to relate to others, but far enough ahead to motivate them. – John C.Maxwell

19. Serving others prepares you to lead others. – Jim Rohn

20. Leadership is not just about giving energy… it’s unleashing other people’s energy. – Paul Polman

Short Leadership Coaching Quotes

21. A good leader takes a little more than his share of the blame, a little less than his share of the credit. – Arnold H.Glasow

22. Leadership is an action, not a position. – Donald McGannon

23. Everyone needs a coach. – Eric Schmidt

24. Coaching is a profession of love. You can’t coach people unless you love them. – Eddie Robinson

25. Who looks outside, dreams; who looks inside, awakes. – Carl Jung

Inspiring Leadership Coaching Quotes

26. A leader has the vision and conviction that a dream can be achieved. – Ralph Lauren

27. The best coaches never tell their athletes that they are wrong. They just guide them to success. – Unknown

28. To lead people, walk beside them. – Lao Tzu

29. The function of leadership is to produce more leaders, not more followers. – Ralph Nader

30. Leadership is not about titles, positions, or flowcharts. It is about one life influencing another. – John C. Maxwell

Executive Coaching Quotes

31. I absolutely believe that people, unless coached, never reach their maximum capabilities. – Bob Nardelli

32. The best executive is the one who has sense enough to pick good people to do what he wants done. – Theodore Roosevelt

33. The task of the leader is to get his people from where they are to where they have not been. – Henry Kissinger

Read more: Executive Coaching for Sustainable Results

What Makes a Good Leadership Coach Quotes

34. A good coach will make his players see what they can be rather than what they are. – Ara Parseghian

35. A great leader takes people where they don’t necessarily want to go, but ought to be. – Rosalynn Carter

36. Coaching is a service. We serve our clients and have their well-being as the higher priority. – Michael J. Marx

37. The best quality a coach can have is to ask a lot of questions and let the person come up with the answers. – Phil Dixon

38. Coaching is all about making the goals clear and then doing whatever it takes to help people win. – Unknown

Servant Leadership Coaching Quotes

39. We must be silent before we can listen. We must listen before we can learn. We must learn before we can prepare. We must prepare before we can serve. We must serve before we can lead. – Unknown

40. Everybody can be great…because anybody can serve. You only need a heart full of grace. A soul generated by love. – Martin Luther King Jr.

41. Servant leadership is all about making the goals clear and then rolling your sleeves up and doing whatever it takes to help people win. – Unknown

42. The greatest leader is not necessarily the one who does the greatest things. He is the one that gets the people to do the greatest things. – Ronald Reagan

43. The best way to find yourself is to lose yourself in the service of others. – Mahatma Gandhi

FAQs

What are some leadership coaching ideas?

Leadership coaching can address a wide range of areas to help someone become a more effective leader. Here are a few suggestions to get you started:

• Developing core leadership skills:
  • Self-awareness: Explore one’s strengths, weaknesses, and blind spots to shed light on their impact on others.
  • Emotional intelligence: The ability to manage one’s own emotions and be connected with those of others.
  • Communication: Improve one’s communication style to ensure clarity, inspire others, and deliver constructive feedback.
  • Decision-making: Develop a structured approach to decision-making, considering different perspectives and potential consequences.
• Leading and managing:
  • Delegation and empowerment: Coach leaders on how to effectively delegate tasks and empower their team members.
  • Managing change: Equip them with strategies to navigate and lead teams through organizational changes.
  • Building and motivating teams: Build high-performance teams by fostering collaboration, trust, and motivation.
  • Conflict resolution: Provide leaders with tools and techniques to effectively manage and resolve conflict internally.
• Coaching for personal growth:
  • Time management: Develop strategies for improved time management and increased productivity.
  • Work-life balance: Achieve a healthy balance between work and personal life to avoid burnout.
  • Stress management: Techniques to cope with stress more effectively.
  • Goal setting and accountability: Foster one’s ability to set SMART goals and hold themselves/ others accountable.

All in all, effective coaching should be tailored to the specific needs and goals of the individual leader.

What is the leadership coaching process?

The leadership coaching process is a collaborative journey between the coach and the leader, designed to unlock the latter’s full potential. It is a dynamic and iterative one that requires customization based on the coachees’ needs and current states. That said, here’s a breakdown of its typical stages:

• Building rapport & establishing goals: The coach creates a trusting and open environment where the leader feels comfortable sharing honestly. Together, they discuss the latter’s goals for coaching, desired outcomes, and any specific areas they would like to focus on.
• Assessment & understanding: The coach leverages various tools like assessments, 360-degree feedback, or discussions to gain a deeper understanding of the coachee’s strengths, weaknesses, and leadership style. The two might explore the leader’s current challenges and how their current behaviors are impacting their team and organization.
• Goal-setting & action planning: Based on the assessment, the two co-create specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound (SMART) goals for the engagement – as well as an action plan outlining concrete steps the leader will take to visualize their goals.
• Coaching sessions: The leader and coach meet regularly (usually bi-weekly or monthly) for focused catchup sessions. These involve open-ended questions, active listening, and discussions to explore challenges, brainstorm solutions, and develop new skills. The coach may also provide feedback and accountability throughout the process.
• Follow-up & ongoing support: The coach checks in with the leader between sessions to see how they’re progressing towards their goals. Aside from encouragement, adjustments to the initial roadmap may also be made depending on the situation. In certain cases, there might be follow-up assessments to measure progress and figure out areas for further development.

What questions should I ask as an executive coach?

As an executive coach, you will need to ask a variety of questions throughout the coaching engagement to guide your coachee toward their leadership goals. Here are some categories of questions to consider:

• Building rapport & understanding the current situation:
  • Open-ended questions: These encourage the leader to share their experiences, challenges, and aspirations. For example, “What are you currently hoping to achieve in your leadership role?” or “Tell me about a recent leadership situation you found challenging.”
  • Strength identification: Aid them in discovering their strengths – e.g. “What do you find most rewarding about being a leader?” or “Can you describe a situation where you felt you excelled as a leader?”
• Goal-setting & direction:
  • Future-oriented questions: Guide them in envisioning their desired future state. “What does success look like for you in this role?” or “Imagine your ideal team dynamic, how would it function?”
  • SMART goal development: Help them translate aspirations into actionable goals. “What specific areas do you want to focus on developing?” or “How will you measure progress towards your goals?”
• Deep dives & exploration:
  • Reflective questions: Encourage self-awareness and exploration of their leadership impact. “How do you think your leadership style affects your team?” or “Can you describe a time you received feedback on your leadership? How did you react?”
  • Challenge questions: Respectfully challenge assumptions and push them to consider different perspectives. “What might be some potential roadblocks to achieving your goals?” or “Have you considered alternative approaches to this situation?”
• Action & accountability:
  • Action-oriented questions: Move from insights to concrete steps. “What specific actions can you take this week to move towards your goals?” or “Who can you hold yourself accountable to for your commitments?”
  • Solution-focused questions: Empower them to find their own solutions. “What creative solutions can you think of to address this challenge?” or “How can you leverage your strengths to overcome this obstacle?”

Become a Certified Leadership Coach by Learning From ITD World’s Team of Experts

At ITD World, we believe in the transformative power of leadership coaching. Over the years, we’ve witnessed firsthand how effective coaching contributes to unlocking potential, fostering growth, and empowering leaders to achieve extraordinary results. That’s why we have made it a commitment to provide high-quality coaching solutions for leaders of all levels.

One of our signature programs is the Certified Chief Master Coach (CCMC). This ICF-accredited course is designed by renowned leadership experts and provides you with the skills and knowledge to become a masterful coach. It delves into various coaching competencies, including life coaching, executive coaching, strategic business coaching, and more. You’ll gain the tools and techniques to guide leaders through challenges, unlock their potential, and empower them to achieve their goals.

Ready to embark on your leadership coaching journey? Contact ITD World today – and take the first step towards a future of thriving individuals and organizations!

Other resources you might be interested in:

• 60 Coaching Quotes: Words of Wisdom on the Path to Greatness
• 40 Life Coaching Quotes: Wisdom for the Journey
• 110 Leadership Quotes: Daily Doses of Inspiration
• 123 Quotes for Employee Motivation: Inspire Your Team
• 57 Change Management Quotes: Wisdom for Leaders