Mvelase, Mandla. I.2020-03-112020-03-112019Mvelase, Mandla (2019) The perceived effectiveness of executive coaching for leadership development in South African,University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, <http://hdl.handle.net/10539/29106>https://hdl.handle.net/10539/29106Although executive coaching is relatively new to South Africa compared to the western world, it has become quite important as a tool for leadership development and support. Executive coaching is a client-centred, relationshipbased, collaborative, reflective, contracted goal-driven interactive process to facilitate client learning and improvement in leadership development. Management/business leaders have experienced executive coaching as a leadership development tool but they cannot fully determine the efficacy of the different factors that are mostly effective. The study explored the perceived effectiveness of executive coaching as a leadership development tool in South Africa through the lived experience of a sample of management/ business leaders, all of whom have had direct reports been coached. The interview process was inductive in approach to allow the participants to share their lived experiences and their perception of the effectiveness of executive coaching. A significant theme in the findings was that a well-planned executive coaching programme supports continuous personal improvement for leaders and managers. Another key theme was that leadership development is perceived as an imperative intervention in South Africa. The last theme to emanate from the study was that executive coaching is transformational. The research participants had all experienced executive coaching as effective in developing their direct reports. Invariably all the participants had undergone coaching themselves although the study was about people reporting to them. Their context in this study is that they were sponsors of the coaching they were evaluating. Keywords: executive coaching, leadership development, client learning, effectivenes of coachingOnline resource (101 leaves)enExecutives--Training of--South AfricaMentoring in businessThesis