What Is Coaching and Executive Coaching?

Chapter 1 starts with a historical overview of the origins of coaching, and particularly executive coaching, from the birth of the term ‘coach’ to the most recent developments, which saw executive coaching become an important leadership development practice. Then a discussion of the various definitions of executive coaching is provided, including what is not executive coaching. As part of that discussion, other coaching applications—as identified in the literature—are presented and briefly described. Chapter 1 also presents what a typical executive coaching intervention consists of, including how the initiation of executive coaching happens, what the background of executive coaches is, who the typical coaches are and what the purposes, objectives and overall effects, and potential benefits from an executive coaching intervention are.