Coaching Qualification

I’m pleased to say that I have passed the second stage of the Foundation in Coaching Practice qualification which means I’m 70% of the way to completing the course. Thanks to BV who sent me the hilarious congrats gift set pictured here.

There have been 3 main elements to the coaching course:

1)   Ongoing Coaching Assessment: largely based on 36 hours of client coaching, plus 5 hours of peer coaching and 5 sessions with the coach mentor to demonstrate the ability to learn and adapt. This included a transcript of a coaching session which had to be annotated with a self-assessment of my coaching performance and lessons learned for improvement.

2)   Demonstration of Coaching Practice: a nerve wracking experience where you are observed by two faculty and three of your peers, coaching someone you’ve literally just been introduced to. Fortunately my client was lovely and we established a comfortable rapport quickly and had a productive session.

3)   Final Coaching Portfolio Assessment: bringing together all of the above in a 2,000 word reflective essay on my experiences and learnings throughout the course, notably with the 6 clients I have been coaching and my cohort coaching buddy, plus an up to date Coaching Profile, plus a Coaching Development Plan, plus a Coaching Ethics Statement.

Whilst I have filled out many lengthy RFPs in my career, this will be the longest essay I have written since finishing my degree in 1989. That involved actually putting ink to paper, the completed version of which was eventually sent out to be typed up by an unfortunate person who had to decipher my terrible handwriting. Hopefully this one will involve less screwed up bits of paper on the floor.

When I was selecting this coaching course last summer, I was keen that this would be a robust qualification where I would genuinely learn new skills and improve my ability to work with clients. This has definitely proved to be the case, although I did underestimate quite how much work there would be outside of the coaching module days and the actual coaching hours. In the long run, this will hopefully be of great benefit to my coaching clients.

While I complete the qualification, I’m offering great value coaching this summer so please contact me if you have an issue that needs resolving and are interested in a solutions focused coaching approach. Please complete the contact form on the website and I will get back to you promptly.