Who’s your coach? I hope your reply isn’t, “I don’t have one.” That would be a tragic error of judgement on your part.

Working without a coach adds a layer of challenge to your growth that, frankly, you don’t need. Can you imagine an athlete who doesn’t have a coach?

I seriously doubt you could find one. Athletes value input from their coaches knowing that it’s a contributor to success.

In sports, the coach is front and centre to helping star players succeed. Prior to stepping onto the pitch or court, athletes spend countless hours working with their coach and trainers to get into peak shape to perform. Their performance will suffer if they don’t spend time with their coach.

So, the obvious choice is to invest time and money to work with the best coach.

Yet, there is a contrast between two types of professionals: professional athletes and professional businessmen and women. I’m shocked that the same obsession athletes have for coaching isn’t adhered to with the other set of professionals.

Unfortunately, many haven’t realised the value of working with a coach. It’s tempting to blame regional business professionals as being arrogant and knowing it all as the reason they don’t work with a coach.

In a tone of disbelief, I’m regularly asked, “Do CEOs really listen to you?” “Of course they do... or they wouldn’t pay for coaching,” is my reply.

But we need to put this in perspective, I don’t coach every leader in the region, so I can only speak for the ones that I work with.

I have a hunch that the reason more leaders don’t work with coaches is because the style of coaching is mismatched with what the professionals are looking for. Frankly, this makes me question how I feel about coaching in general, which is a strange thing to say as a CEO coach.

Let me explain: one of the problems in the coaching industry is that anyone can call themselves a coach: an executive coach, life coach, personal coach, etc. But not everyone means the same thing by it or has the same approach to coaching. So the title coach is very confusing.

The same is true in sports. There are coaches for all sorts of levels of abilities — the pee-wee leagues, junior leagues, high school, university and professional sports — and each level requires a different coaching technique. Not all coaches are equal, the majority don’t know how to coach at the professional level.

Every sports coach is very aware of this and knowing the limitations of his ability would never try to represent himself as being a professional coach when he’s not. Yet in the business world, the term becomes all-encompassing thus bringing about the question, “Is there value in working with a coach?”

Well, there must be as nearly every Fortune 100 CEO has an executive coach and, according to the Ridler Report, three-quarters of the 105 blue-chip organisations it surveyed expect to increase their investment in coaching over the next two years. So there is value if you hire a coach who’s experienced in coaching at the professional level.

I have to believe the difference between athletic coaching and business coaching is in understanding what a coach does. A sports coach isn’t afraid to give feedback and is involved in the direction, instruction and training of the operations of the athlete.

The coach is a teacher. Whereas many people who call themselves executive coaches believe they shouldn’t give any advice; they feel their job is just to ask questions. This is a real flaw that is robbing many executives in the region of realising the value from coaching.

The CEOs I work with want input, they want advice. They want a teacher who brings to the table what they aren’t thinking about. They want a coach who’ll challenge their thinking, not just ask questions.

I really don’t understand how there are two divergent paths: active (sports style) coaching and the facilitative questioning style. All coaching started from the same origin, which was to prepare someone for an exam.

Sports coaches actively participate to prepare their players for success. And a great CEO coach actively prepares the executive for success.

If you want to grow, find a coach who uses the sports style. Just as in the sporting world, it’s essential for business success.

— The writer is a CEO Coach and author of “Leadership Dubai Style”. Contact him at tsw@tommyweir.com