As the person-being-coached allows his or her perceptions to evolve, this new self-awareness has great leverage in improving the person’s behavior and this can positively affect corporate performance. That is why the corporation agrees to pay for the personal coaching engagement.

However, when the coach is more concerned about his fiduciary responsibility to the corporate sponsor (who is paying the coaching fees) than the person-being-coached, lapses in trust and confidentiality of coaching relationship can easily occur. Once trust and confidentiality are in question because of ‘offline conversations’ between the coach and the corporate sponsor, the executive and leadership coaching relationship loses its power to positively impact personal and corporate development.

After all, there are no secrets in business.