The Training Journal Daily Digest has come up trumps again. Responding to a posting requesting recommendations for some executive coaches I offer to share details of trusted colleagues – it’s not the done thing to recommend oneself on the Digest and still, I’m always delighted to put people in touch with skilled and able coaches. Minutes later, one of my colleagues on the Digest lets me know she’s put my name forward.

Oh! And what’s more, one of my former Hay colleagues lets me know he’s recommended me as a coach to senior leaders in his own business. I experience feelings of great delight at these “seeds sown”. Much of my work comes to me via these kinds of referrals and whether or not these particular seeds turn into coaching assignments, they contribute to an abundance of possibilities and make it more likely that I can contribute my skills to help individuals and organisations to build leadership capability.

But how is coaching faring during the recession? This a question that is visting one of my colleagues today. She writes:

Dorothy, over the past few days, I’ve learnt that several services and colleagues in my three worlds are running into difficulties. It seems as if it is getting ever harder to secure referrals, to find paying clients, or to fill workshops.

Just as a ‘reality check’: have you noticed trends in this direction in your coaching circles? On the one hand, these developments come as no surprise to me. On the other hand, I wonder whether those of us who hold strong positive beliefs can manage to “surf through this era on an entirely different wave”… I hope from my heart that the latter is the case.

In my own practice, one client organisation stopped its executive coaching across the world last year in response to the crisis in the finance sector. Currently, another client is taking a break pending his new budgetary period and has made it clear that he’d prefer to continue our work together. Whilst small businesses like my own tend to experience both ups and downs these examples are clearly related to our current economic climate.

Oh, the paradox! If ever our leaders need coaching it’s now! For the levels of uncertainty that come with our current economic climate are such that “drawing on experience” – even experience of past recessions – is not enough. And yet it’s at this time that organisations are most likely to tighten their belts and reduce their investment in coaching and other development programmes.

I take time to explore a link provided by another colleague to an article about coaching in Personnel Today. Two things stand out. The first is the recommendation to invest in coaching leaders ahead of any other group – after all, in times of change, it’s our leaders who lead the change. I also notice that recent research by the CIPD suggests that coaching is proving to be one of the great survivors of the recession.

I hope so. Of course, coaching makes a significant contribution to my income. Far more than this, coaching has a major role to play in developing leadership capability and this, in turn, makes it more likely that our leaders will create intelligent and highly effective organisations.

I wonder, what do you think?