Why It’s Important for Successful Business Leaders to Continue their Training and Professional Development
31st May , 2018
When you’re highly focused on keeping your business running, participating in continued professional development may seem like a luxury to you. Even though you learn daily just by doing what you do, continuing your education may help you work smarter and gain you and your business a competitive advantage. You may have read, completed courses and benefited from online learning. These are all good, but there is always something more you can learn to develop your thinking skills and strategic frameworks, such as having direct interaction with an experienced and well-matched business coach who has been in your position themselves. This applies to every professional, be it a Company Director, CEO, Business Owner, Executive or Employee. Continual learning develops and enhances abilities and subsequent performance, reduces risk, and makes for a well-rounded business person.
“Education is what remains after one has forgotten what one has learned in school.”
“Learning is not a product of schooling but the lifelong attempt to acquire it.” – Albert Einstein
How Business Coaching Can Help You Learn
At International Business Mentors, we match our business coaches and mentors specifically with business people according to the skills, background, experience and personal fit needed to establish a beneficial relationship. Our business mentors and business coaches bring a wealth of experience that they in turn wish to share with those they mentor.
“Anyone who stops learning is old, whether at twenty or eighty. Anyone who keeps learning stays young.” – Henry Ford
Business coaching can help you solidify your continuing professional development and assist you in learning and developing more in-depth skills and knowledge. This makes it easier to devise business growth strategies that give you a competitive advantage.
“An investment in knowledge always pays the best interest.” – Benjamin Franklin.
“Develop a passion for learning. If you do, you will never cease to grow.” – Anthony J. D’Angelo
The Importance of Keeping Business Skills Fresh
Your continuing education and development must be part of an overall approach to you keeping your business skills and thinking fresh. You may find it difficult to find time to devote to your own ongoing development, but if you don’t, you will be doing yourself and your business a great disfavour. By only focusing on the important and often urgent day-to-day tasks at the expense of investing in your own learning and development, you won’t be able to become a better and more strategic business person in the longer term.
A business coaching or mentoring relationship is one in which a more experienced or more knowledgeable person helps to guide you forward and develop. Your mentor will have different areas of expertise, broad business experience, and a willingness to assist you to succeed. In a learning and development partnership with a business coach or mentor, you’ll be able to benefit from their experience and thinking.
Professional Development for Company Directors and Senior Management
In the case of Company Directors and senior management, the need for training, continual learning and keeping up to date is critical – as recent events in the Australian Banking Royal Commission enquiries have identified. The seriousness of these situations cannot be understated. At International Business Mentors, we routinely mentor and coach directors and senior management in director’s duties. They are encouraged to pursue specific training that may support them with their corporate governance requirements, the commercial challenges that they face, and the implementation of business growth strategies.
Business Owners are constantly under pressure to grow and maintain the business. With the help of a well-matched business mentor or business coach who has relevant background skills and experience, along with confidential support, the business owner’s performance can be greatly enhanced.
CEOs and senior executives are faced with constant challenges in their new or existing roles. The business world is changing at a fast pace, and with widespread strategic innovation, businesses now face more complex and dynamic issues than ever before. A business coach or mentor can offer specific help and support with transitions, relationships, reporting, and leadership issues, as well as acting as a confidential and honest sounding board.
“Leadership and learning are indispensable to each other.” – John F Kennedy
Professional Development for Senior Executives
Senior Executives also have some common and unique issues that can be helped by a business mentor or coach. The right leadership is often the difference between a good and a great organisation. As with any professional skill, leadership and management can be learned and practiced. For example, transition into a new role, relationships leadership, and managerial functions. A business coach or mentor can support, encourage and challenge you with the ultimate aim of increasing performance and development.
How International Business Mentors Can Help
At International Business Mentors, we specifically match mentors with mentees according to what is needed. Experience is everything in this space. After all, you cannot learn from someone who has not experienced the issues you are facing, but you can learn immensely from someone who has.
Continuous learning is one of the keys to success in life regardless of your occupation. Learning, wisdom and success are three things that go together. It would indeed be an arrogance not to take the opportunity to learn from someone else.
Whether you’re facing challenges or just want to improve your own business performance, a business coach can make a huge difference. Those who have engaged a well-matched mentor or coach see it as a game changer.
“The more I live, the more I learn. The more I learn, the more I realise, the less I know.” – Michel Legrand
Our business coaching professionals understand the importance of learning and wish to impart their skills and experiences in a confidential and supportive relationship. Call International Business Mentors today to find out more.