Coaching

Coaching is partnering with clients in a thought-provoking and creative process that inspires them to maximize their personal and professional potential. Coaching is a client-driven process.

The International Coaching Federation defines coaching as partnering with clients in a thought-provoking and creative process that inspires them to maximize their personal and professional potential. The process of coaching often unlocks previously untapped sources of imagination, productivity and leadership.

The coach’s responsibility is to:

The coaching process helps clients improve their outlook on work and life, while improving their leadership skills and unlocking their potential.

What you will experience during coaching

Empathetic listening that allows you ample time and space to share your thoughts and feelings without interruption.

Non-judgmental acknowledgement and support to your feelings and perceptions.

The use of metaphors and visualizations that help you access your wisdom beyond the rational mind.

Redirecting you to your own inner resources and strengths, and reconnect with times when you successfully handled similar challenges.

Development of your self-leadership muscle – the ability to find your own answers.

Be treated as an equal partner, with you in charge of the focus and direction of the dialogue and be the owner of the insights and action steps that emerge.

Support in translating your insights into action and accountability structures, reinforcing your insights and articulating your way forward.

Channel the energy of your insights into meaningful change in your work and life.

What is the coaching journey like?

People come to coaching when there is something in their work-life that is not how they would like it to be. It shows up as a challenge, a discomfort, or an obstacle, or a variety of other expressions. With coaching you can expect to start overcoming this state and start growing in the desired direction. This process typically involves:

Articulating a vision of your desired future self
Clarifying what is in the way, or what needs to change for it to materialise
Acknowledging that the source of that change is within you
Identifying what is it in you that needs to change or what is it that you need to do
Identifying one or two priority areas as the focus of coaching
Discovering your own inner resources to make sustained desired change happen, and finding the motivation to keep going
Taking action and looking at your situation from a new perspective, getting at ease with your self
Ultimately, becoming self-sufficient to continue working on these areas of self-growth on your own

What outcomes can you expect out of coaching?

Effective coaching can contribute to make you feel excited, motivated and inspired to learn, change and try new things in life, and leading you toward sustained, desired change. Effective coaching can keep you excited, motivated and inspired to learn, change and try new things in life. It can result in you finding, articulating or reaffirming your personal vision, dreams and passion; a change in your behaviour, thoughts or feelings to move closer to your goals; and improving the quality of your relationships. And by doing so, it helps you be at your best and perform at your peak.

How is coaching different from mentoring, therapy, consulting or training?

Therapy deals with healing pain, dysfunction and conflict within an individual or in relationships with a focus on resolving difficulties arising from the past, improving overall psychological functioning, and dealing with the present in more emotionally healthy ways.

Coaching is based on client-initiated change, is future-focused, and emphasizes action, accountability and follow-through.

A consultant is expected to diagnose problems, prescribe and occasionally implement solutions. Coaching is founded on the belief that individuals or teams are capable of generating their own solutions, with the coach supplying supportive, discovery-based approaches and frameworks.

A mentor provides guidance and perspective based on their own experience. The coaching process does not include advising or counselling.

Training is led by, and is based on, objectives set out by the trainer and it assumes a linear learning path along a curriculum. In the coaching process, the objectives are set by the client, and the coach does not dominate the conversation.

What coaching is not

Here are a few examples of what does not happen in a coaching session, and what to expect instead.

🚫 The coach telling you what your priorities or goals should be based on your current life situation.

✅ The coach helps you weigh everything that’s on your mind, and let you determine what’s most important for you to work on.

🚫 You telling the coach your problem and then coach giving you advice or solutions.

✅ You talk about your problem, and the coach partners with you in the process where you come up with the solutions and insights that are your own. Fundamental to coaching is the belief that you as a client have your own answers and the process of coaching enables your wisdom to emerge. Advice restricts you to rational thinking and doesn’t fully engage your emotive and sensory parts of the brain. With advice, you would neither have the full ownership of the solution nor the autonomy over your choices. This leads to less accountability and diminished returns from the process of coaching.

🚫 The coach is not there to console you, or make you feel good.

✅ The coach is empathetic to your situation, is supportive of your struggles, and creates a non-judgemental space where you can express your feelings freely.

🚫 Coaching is not a space for you complain about others and feel helpless.

✅ Coaching is a space where you take responsibility to work on what is within your control.

🚫 It is not guaranteed that you will achieve the outcome you had set for yourself at the start, and that it will happen within the time limit you had in mind.

✅ The coach commits to partner with you in every way possible within the framework of coaching for you to get to your objectives. However, the time and effort that may be required for it cannot be predicted by anyone. It is possible that you decide to change your objective mid-way. It is also possible that you realise it is not in your control to solve the problem you were working on. You will get the most out of coaching when you are open to all possibilities.