Kate’s Story: Learning the Alchemy of Coaching

Kate Jennings, PCC (United Kingdom) is an executive coach for Kate Jennings Coaching based in Stamford, just north of Cambridge. Kate works with a range of organisations in the UK and throughout Europe helping their leaders excel through developing leadership skills and behaviours.

Kate come into coaching through counseling. Through her post-grad therapy qualification about 25 years ago, she decided she didn’t actually want to work as a therapist. “I’ve always been fascinated by how people tick, what makes us ‑ us, what we can do to bring out the best in ourselves,” she explains.

In 2007, Kate was invited to join the Level 7 Diploma in Executive Coaching that’s run by the Institute of Leadership and Management. This gave Kate a taste of coaching, but it was her last role where she saw coaching as the combination of business and the people/psychology that she really enjoyed during her counseling training.

After working for a coach for many years, she wanted broaden her reach and was looking for more credibility for her clients. “Coaching is unregulated. So, I was looking for an accreditation and I knew because of my supervisor and the coaching circles I was in that the International Coaching Federation (ICF), was the gold standard. And I wanted to go in at Professional Certified Coach (PCC) status because of the hours that I’d done and the years I’d been working.”

While looking for a course that would meet her criteria, she stumbled upon a LinkedIn post from another coach who had obtained their PCC and thanked Tracy and Coach Advancement for their support through the process. After doing her own research, Kate was attracted to Tracy’s programmes due to her strong links with ICF. “I figured she would have a really good understanding how ICF worked and would be able to give the right support for me to go through that credentialing process.”

Having already done some coaching training and having quite a bit of experience, she didn’t want to do basic coach training. Art and Alchemy seemed like the natural next step and she liked that it was rooted in the ICF Core Competencies. “That was a big draw for me. I recognized I needed to be really familiar and practice skills in using them.” she explained.

Aside from being based in the competencies, it addresses “that sort of ethereal kind of alchemy bit that creates the partnership that enables the person to move forward. I think it made me realize how much I needed to know.”

“There was a lot of learning… And we did a lot of practice. It’s very, very skills based, and that’s what I also liked about it. Quite a lot of the other programs don’t give so much time for developing the skills. Given that coaching is a practical skill, we would spend chunks of time every day coaching each other. I think I am now a better coach because of all of that.”

During the course, she realized that she was undercharging for her coaching services. Since the Art and Alchemy course, Kate has increased her rates and has been seeing more recommendations from her clients to work with their colleagues and teams. Both of these factors have allowed her to pay off the course earlier than anticipated.

Now, as a Coach Advancement Alumni, Kate has become involved with the Coaching with Conscience Coaching for You initiative with Mind. She says,“It’s good to be able to give something back to senior leaders within Mind.”

Kate also keeps in regular contact with many of coaches from her training cohort. “There was a real benefit when a number of us were preparing for our credentialing exam and we worked together for that. And given that we each had slightly different approaches, that was really beneficial. And there was the moral support as well,” she explains.

“When you work for yourself, you’re very much on your own.” Kate appreciates having built a small coaching community to reach out to for ideas and connection. “We all coach in different ways, and we have different styles, and that’s the richness of it. It was the richness on the program, and it’s been the richness following it as well.”

Kate is looking forward to Coach Advancement’s Diploma in Team Coaching. “I work with a lot with teams and I suspect I’m at a similar stage with teams than I was with individual coaching before I did the Art and Alchemy course.”

If you’re like Kate and already have some coach experience and training under your belt, the ACC to PCC pathway is for you! This is a stand-alone offering of our Art and Alchemy of Coaching course to get you the coach training hours and experience necessary to apply for your PCC credential.