What Is a Life Coach: Who Needs One Anyway?
written by Hadassah
Many people have misconceptions about the coaching profession. Coaching is thought to be a therapy, counseling, or consulting relationship, where the client is the novice and the coach is the expert. Some people attend coaching sessions expecting to receive some advice or professional opinions. Although facets of a coaching session can feel therapeutic, it is none of these.
It’s simply a powerful human interaction, in a partnering agreement, where the client “sets the agenda” for what they want.Ideally, true coaching is a partnership process designed to move people from where they are,to where they want to go.
According to the International Coaching Federation (ICF), coaching is
- a thought-provoking creative process that inspires clients to maximize their personal and professional potential.
- This is accomplished through the coaches ability to listen intently, ask thought provoking questions, design actions through exploration and discovery, and a myriadof other interactions, which the client must agree with and be open to.
For many years, we have known about the careers of those who coach professional athletes and astounding performing artists. Athletes, and those in the performing arts hire coaches to assist with improving their “skill set” and perfecting their art to achieve higher performance goals and championship status. However, it has only been over the past 30 years, that the fairly new profession of the personal and professional coach has emerged.
Much like athletes and performing artists, people are seeking help with life transitions. That’s where life coaching comes in. People want a professional to partner with them in designing their steps to attain what they desire in various life situations. Athough, there are many subspecialities in coaching, such as, financial, relationship, spiritual, and business, just to name a few; life coaching, which is the whole person, client centered approach, is the basic foundation for all coaching (Williams & Menendez, 2015).
The beautiful thing about the coaching relationship, which may differ from other professional relationships, is there is no hierarchy. The client is the expert.
So then, who needs a coach? No one really needs a coach. One must “want” a coach.
- The value of coaching must be realized by the one seeking a professional partnership.
- Those who see value in the coaching relationship realize (like athletes & performing artists) they can reach their goals and fullest potential exponentially quicker with the help of a coach who champions their successes and hold them accountable to their commitments.
Therefore, hiring a coach is a personal investment to achieve results in areas that are important to you. Through partnership, the coach helps you explore what you want, need, and where you want to go. Utilizing the structure of the coaching session, along with methodical techniques which are agreeable and supportive to the client; identified areas of interest are addressed in a fashion that causes desired outcomes to manifest quicker than if the client were addressing them on their own.
Overall, a life coach is a professional who partners with the client to assist them with achieving what they really want. Coaches may use a variety of methods to accomplish this. All approaches must be agreeable to and supportive of the client and their desired goals. Although, there are many sub-specialties in coaching, the foundation of all coaching is life coaching; as life coaching is client centered and addresses the whole person. Having a coach is not a need.
Why hire a coach?
- A client must want a coach.
- When a client see’s the benefit of having a coach, they will invest in themselves by hiring a coach and put in the necessary effort to manifest their desires.
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Lastly, results happen much faster with the support and encouragement of coach than when a client is tackling life transitions alone.
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