Coach Development

Many years ago, I studied Transcendental Meditation, and the teacher shared a story which I have always remembered, and which really helped me to understand the concept of accessing a greater level of depth in my meditation practice. Years later, this story has also served well many times as a way to describe working at a deeper level with our coaching clients. The story goes… If you imagine your mind to be like a house, when you first begin to meditate, it’s like a process of spring cleaning your house – you can quite quickly notice and are aware of ...

Grief can look many different ways. In our culture we tend to reserve grief for when someone dies, but it goes far beyond that. Grief is nuanced and, if we allow it, we can touch on it in the endings that are present every day. We grieve when we lose or change jobs, when a beloved pet dies, a relationship ends, family estrangement or difficulties, your children growing and going to school or leaving home. Sometimes even allowing something good can bring grief with it, you may move home, leaving behind your old home, change jobs, leaving behind people, teams, ...

The current ICF Core Competency model was produced as a result of a two year long job analysis exploring the knowledge, skills, tasks and activities needed for any practitioner to operate skilfully as a professional coach. Amongst many other things, this extensive research gave rise to the identification of five key themes which were considered of significant importance for inclusion in the final body of work. One of those key themes was the ‘expansion of the coaching agreement’ described and defined as having three distinct levels: Agreement for Coaching Relationship. Agreement for Overall Coaching Plan and Goals. Agreement for Session ...

Within the coaching community, we often hear the term ‘lifelong learner’ as being something that we, as practitioners of coaching, are encouraged, and even expected, to embrace. From an International Coaching Federation (ICF) perspective, this idea of lifelong learning is marked and highlighted in several ways: We have the credentials of Associate Certified Coach (ACC), Professional Certified Coach (PCC) and Master Certified Coach (MCC) as a way of noting various stages on that journey. We have a credentialing system that requires us to renew our credential every three years, with Continuing Professional Development (CPD) being part of that renewal process. ...

We all know that a New Year typically means new goals, new resolutions, new habits, new… We also know that much of this ‘new’ stuff stops after about 3-5 weeks and then it’s either forgotten about or we feel bad because we failed, yet again. As an alternative approach, here are a few thoughts and ideas that you could be useful for both you and your clients in thinking about and engaging with a new year in a different way… Hoorah for the old! Do we always need to start something new? We can get so obsessed with doing and ...

In the past three years, I have written three articles which are related to beginnings, endings, celebrations and acknowledgements. New Starts — New Beginnings (December 2019) Celebrate What is Right with Your World (December 2020) Acknowledge and Celebrate (September 2022) I would encourage you to review these articles if this is a topic that intrigues you, especially with the New Year on the horizon! This year, I want to look at the importance of endings, celebrations and new beginnings. First, let’s see what ICF Core Competencies we might reference. There are several sub-competencies that speak to this: 3.11 Partners with ...

One of the things that I love about being in the profession of coaching, is generally how very kind, generous and compassionate coaches usually are. My overriding experience is that coaches are simply really good people! One of the ways some of these characteristics show up is in the many different projects and initiatives that coaches participate in on a pro bono or reduced fee basis. I can honestly say that, in my professional world,  I have never come across so much volunteering and giving back as I have within the coaching community. Here I'll be sharing and acknowledging some ...