How organisational leaders can continue to add value after retirement

As business leaders enter their late 50s and 60s, it’s typical for them to think about what they do next. For a few, at very senior levels, there may be opportunities to become non-executive directors. Other may consider starting their own business, or, if they lack the inspiration or energy for that, to become consultants. Some join the expanding army of coaches, but it often doesn’t work out as well as it might.

There are two main reasons for this, from my interactions with retired executives. One is that the coaching market suffers from oversupply – for most of these people, coaching is one small part of a portfolio second career. The other is that coaching – as typically taught – not only undervalues their lifetime learning, but actively discourages them from using their experience to support clients. A third, less frequently expressed, but still cogent reason is that they don’t want to be classified in the same bracket as many of the people they see in the coaching market.

An alternative and more satisfying option, based on experience in Poland and elsewhere, is to become a Professional Mentor. Professional mentors have all the skills of a coach (and sometimes more) but they also bring an ability to use their experience and wisdom in ways coaches usually can’t. For example, they are able to ask more pointed, insight-provoking questions from the perspective of having lived experience; they can have greater empathy for situations business leaders encounter, because they have been there too; they can sometimes be a role model; and they are able to give relevant context that a coach can’t. (There is often confusion between context and advice. Context is relevant information that helps someone with the quality of their thinking; advice is doing the thinking for them.)

In short, professional mentors have the potential to add greater value than all but the most mature coaches. And studies by the Coach Maturity Research group show that these very mature coaches typically merge coaching and mentoring, when working with their clients.

The next Professional Mentor Academy starts this month, as a virtual programme, open to both leaders looking to their next career and to coaches, who want to break out of the restrictions of process-based practice. It leads to accreditation at three levels, depending on how deeply the person wants to delve into the topic and build their skills.

©️David Clutterbuck, 2024