What is Coaching?
The ICF (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.”
Coaches use active listening and intuitive questions to help you find solutions.
If you have an idea of what you want your life to look like in the future or a goal that you want to achieve, a coach’s job is to listen, encourage and support you to come up with your own solutions to achieving that future or reaching that goal.
The relationship between a coach and client is collaborative, meaning that you are equals in this process and both have an active role.
Coaching VS Therapy – Therapists look to the past to help you understand what is keeping you from solving your challenges or achieving your goals. Coaches use questions and active listening to support you in creating your own plan to achieve your goals.
Coaching VS Mentoring – Mentors pull from their past experiences to tell you how they might solve your challenges or reach your goals. Coaches pull from your experience to help you understand how you’ve solved problems in the past and how that process might work with your current challenge or goal.
Coaching VS Consulting – A consultant uses their experience and expertise to tell you how to solve a problem or achieve your goals. A coach does not give advice or instruction. Instead, they work with you to help you figure out your own advice for solving your problem.
A better example might be, you want to learn how to ride a bike…
A therapist would ask you about your past to figure out what is keeping you from learning to ride the bike.
A mentor would explain to you how they learned to ride a bike and give you suggestions based on their past experiences.
A consultant would get on the bike and show you how to ride it while you take notes.
A coach would encourage you to get on the bike and walk along with you until you are comfortable riding it yourself.
There is a time and a place for every one of these roles in your life. The best time for a coach is when you have a clear idea of what you want to accomplish and the motivation to get it done but may need a little support with the ‘how’.
If you have more questions about what coaching is and isn’t here are some resources that might help:
Coaching Defined: https://youtu.be/c9z1nNr61Hk?feature=shared