Year-end reports are coming to a close. A major debate arising now is the widening income gap between corporate executives’ total pay and the employees’ median salary. After two years of stagnation and as stock prices recovered, America’s top bosses enjoyed increases of 27-40% in their pay packages while employees’ wages are in stagnation or in decline because of inflation. A British survey produced a more dramatic result with a 40-49% increase for those inside the boardroom, a far cry from the single-digit increase of the ordinary waged employees. Even Australia’s powerful, leading business executives receive annual pay packages that outstrip regular workers – a significantly wide gap when you compare a corporate executive’s $6million compensation with an average Australian’s full-time wage of $69,000.

Why are the Big Bosses Paid Big?

Executives are highly empowered when it comes to business decisions and management strategies. With business planning, productivity, and efficiency in mind, they carry a huge responsibility that affects the entire organisation. That’s why they are also highly compensated, because they take on the performance objectives and goals of the whole business. Through continuous learning, undergoing executive development and training, improving facilitation skills, and developing both soft and hard skills, executives fulfil their responsibilities. For the bosses, achieving excellence doesn’t only mean doing what they are tasked to accomplish, but rather, going beyond the whole organisation’s expected performance targets and leading their employees towards that goal.

Developing Soft and Hard Skills for Well-Rounded Executives

In order for the organisation’s leaders to be on top of their game and keep up with the changes, they have to continually build their skills and competencies. They need to pursue additional educational courses to gain fresh knowledge, stay up to date with recent management developments, and attend training sessions to acquire new skills. Here are some of the hard and soft skills business executives have to develop over time:

• Soft Skills - people skills or interpersonal skills

          ○ They are behavioural competencies or personality-driven skills.
          ○ They refer to a person’s emotional intelligence quotient or EQ, characterising a person’s relationships with other people.
          ○ They relate to personal attributes that help enhance a person’s job performance and career prospects.
          ○ They are a person’s ability to interact effectively with colleagues and customers, with everyone inside and outside the workplace.
          ○ Examples of skills to learn:
                 • Leadership
                 • Team Building
                 • Communication Skills
                 • Vision
                 • Self-Awareness
                 • Managing Change
                 • Conflict Management, Negotiation and Resolution
                 • Creativity
                 • Diversity
                 • Performance Appraisals
                 • Coaching Skills
                 • Strategic Thinking
                 • Influencing Skills
                 • Critical Thinking

• Hard Skills – technical skills, operational skills or position skills

          ○ They are specific and teachable abilities.
          ○ They are tangible and quantifiable.
          ○ They refer to a person’s Intelligence quotient (IQ).
          ○ They have the same rules across organisations.
          ○ They can be learned in school and from books.
          ○ Examples of skills to learn:
                 • Computer or Software Applications
                 • Problem Solving
                 • Strategic Planning
                 • Presentation Skills
                 • Business/Management Skills
                 • Quality or Process Improvement
                 • Time Management
                 • Hiring and Interviewing
                 • Foreign Language
                 • Math, Chemistry, Physics
                 • Accounting
                 • Machinery Operations

Executive Coaching: Helping Executives Develop Professionally and Personally

An effective executive development program involves a coaching professional who prepares activities that are tailored for each executive. At Future Matters, we know how important it is to capitalise on people because they are the organisation’s main competitive advantage. Through proper coaching and providing the right training needs, each executive can achieve their full potential.

Whether it’s an individual or group session, you will receive proper guidance and a tailored coaching to suit what you need. What’s great about these coaching sessions is that they are not only for the development of your career, but also for the development of you as a person. We will help you throughout the training process – from assessing who you are and what you need, to action planning and acting on the plan, and refining what you’ve done.

If you flag facilitation, learning and skill enhancement as important factors in your personal and professional development, then we can help you through all of your training with our range of services. Contact us today and we can discuss which series of coaching activities your organisation needs.