|
Resources
|
|
|
Work Under Pressure: Why Executive Coaching Has Become a Key Lever of Modern Leadership
For several years now, one word has been recurring in every conversation among executives, HR directors, and members of executive committees: tension.
Tension on results. Tension on margins and cash flow. Tension on engagement and meaning. Tension on talent.
According to a recent Gallup study, nearly 60% of employees in Europe report being disengaged. In France, the phenomenon is even more pronounced: work is no longer a given, but a question.
Behind these figures, a reality is emerging: the implicit “contract” between the company and its employees is changing.
For a long time, the equation was simple: security and progression in exchange for engagement and performance.
Today, this balance is being called into question.
The health crisis, societal shifts and technological acceleration have reshuffled the deck. Work is no longer just a place of performance. It is becoming a space where people expect meaning, recognition and a certain work-life balance.
In this context, traditional management models are showing their limits.
For decades, performance relied on relatively stable models:
Today, these models are being challenged.
At Google, the findings of Project Aristotle have shown that a team’s performance does not depend solely on individual skills, but above all on psychological safety.
At Microsoft, the transformation driven by Satya Nadella is based on a simple principle: moving from a “know-it-all” culture to a “learn-it-all” culture.
These examples illustrate a major shift: the role of the manager is no longer limited to steering it is about creating the conditions for engagement.
But this transformation creates unprecedented tensions:
How can performance be maintained in a context of constant uncertainty?
How can teams with diverse expectations be aligned?
How can a vision be embodied when one is oneself in doubt?
Today’s leader is caught in a constant tension between three demands:
Delivering economic results
Sustainably engaging teams
Giving meaning to collective action
This equation is all the more complex as it relies on a dimension that is often underestimated: the leader’s own posture.
As Simon Sinek points out: “People don’t buy what you do; they buy why you do it.”
Within organisations, it is the same: employees do not just follow a strategy they follow an intention, an energy, a coherence.
Yet in a world under pressure, this coherence is being severely tested.
Faced with these tensions, the leader’s primary responsibility is to reaffirm a clear vision.
Take the example of Danone, which for a long time pursued a dual economic and societal ambition under the leadership of Emmanuel Faber. Despite the debates this strategy generated, it illustrated a strong conviction: a company can no longer focus solely on performance it must also embody a purpose.
Vision is not a slogan. It is a direction. A compass in uncertainty.
It answers a fundamental question for teams:
“Why are we doing what we are doing?”
In business coaching approaches, this question is central. It is often the starting point of deeper transformation work.
In an environment where employees are more aware and more demanding, the leader’s exemplarity becomes decisive.
At Patagonia, the consistency between words and actions has become a defining marker of the company’s culture.
When its founder, Yvon Chouinard, decided to transfer ownership of the company to a structure dedicated to environmental protection, he sent a powerful signal : leadership is only credible when it is aligned between purpose and results.
In more traditional organisations, this requirement for exemplarity is expressed daily:
This is often where tensions appear most strongly: when strategic discourse no longer matches the reality experienced by teams.
Long considered secondary, the human dimension has now become central.
As Hubert Joly, a French executive internationally recognised for turning around the American company Best Buy when it was struggling against Amazon, reminds us: “The role of a leader is to unlock the potential of others.”
This requires a profound shift in managerial posture:
In this context, tools such as executive committee seminars, the team coaching model, and corporate transformation coaching approaches are becoming increasingly important.
They make it possible to work on dimensions that are often invisible but decisive:
While current tensions may weaken organisations, they also represent a tremendous opportunity.
An opportunity to:
Some companies have managed to turn these tensions into a lever.
At Airbnb, the Covid-19 crisis led Brian Chesky to make difficult decisions, while communicating with remarkable transparency, as the business was hit head-on: activity nearly came to a halt, massive losses. Brian Chesky had to lay off around 25% of the workforce.
But what stood out was not the decision… it was the way he communicated it. His message to employees, marked by humanity and respect, has become a benchmark in crisis leadership.
This type of posture does not happen by chance. It is developed.
“In the storm, it is not the decision that makes the leader. It is the way it is carried.”
In this demanding context, business coaching is becoming a strategic lever for leaders.
Not as a “comfort” tool, but as a space for clarity and transformation.
It enables leaders in particular to:
For leaders of large organisations, specific programmes such as executive coaching for large companies make it possible to address these challenges in a structured and confidential way.
In the same vein, certain resources explore these issues further, showing that it is possible to reconcile performance requirements with attention to individuals.
Through the podcast “A management approach that combines humanism and performance is possible”, we discover how Florence Bravaccini manages to reconcile team engagement with sustainable performance.
This conviction is also developed in the article “Leaders: the imperative of the human project”, which highlights an often underestimated reality: a strategy only holds if it is built on a strong and assumed human foundation.
These contents converge towards the same idea: sustainable performance cannot be decreed it is built on a clear, embodied and shared human project.
One observation consistently emerges from support programmes: the transformation of the organisation begins with that of the leader.
This is not a formula. It is an operational reality.
A leader who is clearer in their vision, more aligned in their decisions, and more aware of their impact:
Conversely, a leader under unresolved tension often, despite themselves, spreads that tension throughout the organisation.
Current tensions around work and management are not a passing phenomenon.
They reflect a profound transformation in the relationship to work and authority.
In this new context, leadership can no longer be declared—it must be built.
On three essential pillars:
It is under these conditions that leaders will not only navigate current tensions, but turn them into a lever for sustainable transformation.
More than ever, the role of the leader is to be deeply human.
Not at the expense of performance, but in service of it.
Because in an uncertain world, it is no longer strategies alone that make the difference—it is the people who carry them.
And as this strong conviction reminds us:
“A good leader knows their goals.
A great leader knows themselves.”
In this pursuit of alignment, business coaching is no longer a luxury.
It becomes a key step for those who seek to combine impact, meaning and sustainable performance.
Visconti Partners presents its advice, inspiration, and case studies to help you unlock your potential and that of your business.
View all articles
Diriger dans un monde instable est devenu le quotidien des dirigeants. Solitude, responsabilité : comment prendre des décisions justes ?
.png)
In this new episode of VISCONTI TALKS, Eric DEVAULX, partner coach at VISCONTI, receives Clément DAVID, CEO of THEODO Cloud. Clément DAVID, gives us the motivations that led him to start an entrepreneur, his best...
.jpg)
.png)
.png)
