I compiled a series of posts on experiences and lessons from coaching MBA students at Columbia Business School. Click here to read the series. Meanwhile, here’s the introductory text:

Do you want to improve your leadership skills? Does this describe you:

• Highly motivated?
• Limited time?
• Want to know top-5 business school culture (or just learn to lead like someone from one)?

This series will help you.

Columbia Business School provides a service to its students helpful to anyone — it has each MBA candidate take a 360-degree report and gives each a coach to help interpret the results and create a plan to act on it.

I took the program and have been coaching Columbia MBA students through this program for years. Since we have only one hour but the students are so highly motivated, it’s like super-effective lightning coaching. Many students have gotten enough value to tell me things like “this is why I chose business school at Columbia” and “I can’t believe how much I could change outside the classroom.”

Over time I’ve picked up some common threads valuable to everyone looking to improve their leadership or any other business or social skills. These lightning coaching sessions are like microcosms of longer-term coaching, except that their limited time puts the onus on the client to continue on their own. If you’re looking to improve and haven’t yet decided to get a coach or go to business school, this series may work for you. (The success of these one-hour coaching sessions is why I decided to give my first hours free).

This series first describes the 360-degree report, something helpful to understand even if you don’t get to take one, just to know the process and what information you could act on. Then it describes some things you can do to create and start to implement a personal development plan.