Key takeaways
- Hiring a coach is about trust, fit, and alignment as much as it is about credentials.
- Leaders look for coaches who understand both business pressure and human behavior.
- The right coaching relationship feels challenging, grounded, and psychologically safe.
- Coaching works best when leaders are willing to reflect honestly and experiment with change.
- Thoughtful questions before hiring help leaders make a more intentional decision.
Introduction
A few months ago, a CEO sat across from me on our first call and said, "I've talked to four coaches now. They all sound great. I have no idea how to choose." Then he laughed and added, "Which is probably the real problem, right? I can't make a decision."
I hear some version of this often from leaders. And it's a smart place to start.
The coaching industry has grown rapidly, giving leaders more choices than ever. Executive coaches. Leadership coaches. Mindset coaches. Performance coaches. Coaches who promise transformation in six sessions, and coaches who somehow use the word "alignment" seventeen times on one homepage.
It gets confusing fast.
In my work, I've noticed that most people aren't looking for a coach who has all the answers. They're looking for someone they can think honestly with. Someone who can challenge them without ego, support them without creating dependency, and help them lead with more awareness and clarity.
Leadership can feel isolating, especially in fast-moving environments like Metro Manila, where leaders balance growth, pressure, people, and constant change. So choosing the right coach matters.
Not because coaches fix people. We don't. Coaching is more like going to the gym. I can't do your push-ups for you. But the right coaching relationship helps leaders see patterns more clearly, think more intentionally, and lead with greater emotional agility.
There is evidence that backs this up. A 2023 meta-analysis of 37 randomized controlled trials found that workplace and executive coaching produced a statistically significant effect across leadership and personal outcomes (de Haan & Nilsson, 2023). Coaching works. The question is whether a particular coach is the right one for you.
Here are the questions worth asking.
1. What kind of coaching do you actually do?
This matters more than people realize.
"Coaching" has become a broad term, and different coaches work very differently. Some focus on strategy and performance. Others on mindset. Others blend leadership development, emotional intelligence, communication, and behavior change.
One pattern I see often: a leader hires a coach expecting practical development, only to end up in conversations that feel too abstract to address a real workplace problem. Good coaching should feel relevant to your actual leadership context.
Ask:
- What kinds of leaders do you typically work with?
- What challenges do you help clients navigate most often?
- How would you describe your coaching style?
The answers usually tell you a lot.
2. Are you certified or professionally trained?
This question matters, not because certifications automatically make someone a great coach, but because coaching carries great responsibility.
A professionally trained coach understands ethics, confidentiality, behavior change, active listening, emotional regulation, and how to facilitate reflection rather than dispense advice all day. To maintain their credentials, coaches are also required to undergo continuing education, as coaching makes use of evolving psychology and neuroscience
For many leaders and global organizations, the International Coaching Federation (ICF) credential is a useful benchmark because it reflects training and ethical standards. Credentials alone aren't enough; a coach can be highly certified and still not be right for you. But asking about training tells you whether the coach approaches the work professionally and intentionally.
3. How do you balance support and challenge?
This is one of my favorite questions, because it gets to the heart of effective coaching.
Coaching shouldn't feel like constant validation. It also shouldn't feel like being aggressively fixed. The best coaching relationships hold both safety and challenge at once.
I worked with a senior leader who was, by every metric, excellent. Sharp, decisive, respected. A few sessions in, I noticed she answered her own questions before I could finish asking them. So I said, "I notice you fill the silence quickly. What happens if we let it sit?" She went quiet, then admitted that silence made her feel like she was failing at something. That single moment opened up months of work on how she held space for her own team.
That's the balance. Someone who can ask difficult questions without shame. Someone who can name a blind spot compassionately. Someone who can say, "I hear your intention. Can we also look at the impact?" Growth rarely comes through comfort alone, and people don't grow well where they feel constantly judged.
4. What happens in a typical coaching session?
Many leaders hesitate about coaching simply because they don't know what to expect. Which is fair, because it can sound mysterious from the outside.
No, we don't sit in dim lighting asking you to visualize your inner eagle. At least I don't.
A good coach can explain their process clearly. Ask them:
- How are sessions structured?
- What happens between sessions?
- Is coaching reflective, strategic, behavioral, or all three?
- How do you help clients apply insights practically?
Coaching should connect insight to real leadership behavior. Otherwise, it becomes intellectually interesting but operationally useless.
5. How do you measure progress?
Leaders in Metro Manila ask this often, and rightly so. Leadership growth can feel intangible.
But progress tends to show up in concrete ways: clearer decision-making, healthier team dynamics, stronger emotional regulation, better feedback conversations, more self-awareness under pressure. And self-awareness is worth pausing on. Organizational psychologist Tasha Eurich found that while most people believe they're self-aware, only a small fraction actually are (Eurich, 2018). That gap is exactly where good coaching does its work, helping leaders see what they couldn't see on their own.
Some coaches use formal assessments or 360-degree feedback. Others track behavioral shifts and reflective accountability. What matters is observable movement over time. Not perfection. Progress.
6. Have you worked with leaders in similar contexts?
Leadership challenges are shaped by culture, industry, and organizational context. Leaders in Metro Manila are often navigating fast growth, hierarchical dynamics, relational expectations, hybrid teams, family-business complexity, and rising pressure around emotional resilience.
A coach doesn't need identical experience to be effective. But contextual understanding helps, especially in cultures where relational nuance runs deep. In the Filipino context, leadership is rarely just transactional. Relationships, trust, pakikisama, and emotional dynamics all shape how leadership actually works day to day. That complexity belongs in the coaching room.
7. Will this coaching relationship feel honest?
This one is less practical, more intuitive, and it matters enormously.
Sometimes a coach says all the right things, yet something feels performative or oddly polished. Trust that instinct. Good coaching relationships feel grounded and human. You should feel respected, thoughtfully challenged, emotionally safe, and able to speak honestly without managing impressions.
Here's what I remind leaders: coaching is relational work. The relationship itself shapes how well the process works. The de Haan research points to the same thing. The quality of the bond between coach and client is one of the strongest predictors of whether coaching actually helps.
Coaching is not about becoming a different person
One misconception about leadership coaching is that it makes you someone new. It usually doesn't.
Most leadership growth is about becoming more aware of patterns that already exist. The leader who interrupts may deeply value efficiency. The one avoiding conflict may care about harmony. The one overworking may have tied worth to productivity.
Coaching helps leaders see these patterns without shame. Then comes the harder part: deciding whether a pattern still serves the leader, the team, and the organization. That kind of reflection takes courage.
Why are more leaders in Metro Manila turning to coaching
Leaders today are expected to manage complexity, navigate uncertainty, communicate clearly, build trust, lead across generations, and regulate their emotions under pressure. That's a deeply human skill set, and many leaders realize they need space to think rather than only react. Coaching creates that space. Not to escape reality, but to engage with it more intentionally.
Conclusion
Thoughtful questions help leaders decide what kind of support they actually need. The right coaching relationship won't feel performative or overly polished. It'll feel honest, grounded, and growth-oriented.
Coaching isn't someone telling you how to lead perfectly. It's building enough awareness, reflection, and emotional agility that you can lead more intentionally yourself.
So if you're wondering what to ask before hiring a coach, start here: does this coach help me think more clearly, honestly, and courageously about how I lead?
That question usually reveals more than people expect.
References
De Haan, E., & Nilsson, V. O. (2023). What can we know about the effectiveness of coaching? A meta-analysis based only on randomized controlled trials. Academy of Management Learning & Education, 22(4). https://doi.org/10.5465/amle.2022.0107
Eurich, T. (2018, January 4). What self-awareness really is (and how to cultivate it). Harvard Business Review. https://hbr.org/2018/01/what-self-awareness-really-is-and-how-to-cultivate-it
