By Bryant Nielson

The ASTD (American Society for Training & Development) reports that over 75% of executives surveyed target personal mentoring as one of the key factors in their business successes. Business Finance Magazine reports that 77% of companies credited mentoring with increasing employee retention and performance.

Both coaching and mentoring require the use of a host of tools and techniques that help the two persons involved sharpen their focus and move more effectively toward their goals. Such tools can be obtained from various resources including books, training programs, conferences, and online courses.

Two of the fastest growing ways to develop employees is with coaching and mentoring. Both coaching and mentoring are becoming industries unto themself, with tens of thousands of people hiring of trainers in the past few years. Who can be a coach/trainer? And why are so many organizations introducing mentoring programs? These are some of the important questions surrounding this relatively new field.

The advantages of coaching, as a developmental process, is that it provides the opportunity for one-on-one training, guiding, instructing, observing, modeling, evaluating performance, and providing corrective action. All of this can be done on the web, in classroom or seminar settings and even by phone.

Coaching occurs through regular sessions as the person is performing and applying the principles and ideas discussed in the coaching sessions, with immediate feedback from the coach.

At work, coaching can be provided by a consultant, a training professional specializing in coaching, or the person’s own supervisor if versed in coaching techniques and equipped with its tools.

In mentoring, the emphasis is not on providing specific performance skills, but on guiding the mentee to move continuously in the right direction toward the goal of reaching higher challenges and accomplishments.

Copyright 2007 Bryant Nielson. All Rights Reserved. Bryant Nielson – Managing Director and National Sales Trainer – assists executives, business owners, and top performing sales executives in taking the leap from the ordinary to extraordinary. Bryant is a trainer, business & leadership coach, and strategic planner for sales organizations.Bryant’s 27 year business career has been based on his results-oriented style of empowering. Subscribe to his monthly ezine – Lengthen Your Stride! ™ – and learn the legendary secrets of top business achievers at: http://www.BryantNielson.com Article Source: http://EzineArt