Life coaching is a service that focuses on growing and developing competencies in life: be it personal, relational, social or professional.
Many highly renowned companies to the likes of IBM, Nike, Verizon and Coca-Cola Enterprises recognize the effectiveness of coaching and have turned to coaching to increase employee satisfaction and improve output.
The form coaching takes is a conversation: Coachee talks; coach listens, asks questions. The end point? To forward a person’s functionality, capabilities, circumstances and understanding of life.
When a person is willing to be coached, a person forms a partnership with a coach and enters in a creative, thought-provoking process. The coaching process is derived from a set of technologies developed to maximize human effectiveness and fulfill human potential.
So what does it take to be a life coach?
All life coaches with Executive Coach International undergo hours of stringent training and practicum in order to be credentialed by the International Coach Federation (ICF). All practicing life coaches with Executive Coach International are governed by the International Coach Federation Code of Ethics. Click here to find out more about the ICF Code of Ethics.
But it isn’t just the rank, or certificate, or title that a coach holds that makes a coach a great coach.
A great coach is a great many things.
Here are some reflections from Julia, one of our senior coaches with Executive Coach International:
Great coaches first and foremost work constantly on their own lives. They are always up to projects and things which they creatively employ their tools and skills. They take courage to examine old notions as they are aware that courage is like a muscle – it needs constant working. In doing so, great coaches become a vessel for their clients so that their clients can see themselves, and see the world through different eyes and perspectives.
Great coaches have deep empathy and the capacity to hold their clients in their presence. They are precise in their speech and can tell their client what is going on, usually before the client is aware of it. They know when to say, “Do your work!” and when to say, “Tell me where it hurts most”.
Great coaches take ownership of more than just their own lot. When their clients are lost, or are unable to go on, they stand for them, dedicated to standing for people to make a change to become great themselves.
Find more about being a coach here.
Read more about Julia here.