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Name: Pankaj Dixit Date: 14th July, 2012 Student ID: Pankaj Dixit Email: pankaj_dixit@hotmail.com
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Coaching and Counselling What Can We Learn From Each Other Synopsis
Feelings do play a part in the coaching relationship and may involve fears of failure, frustrations, avoidance behaviour, and loss of confidence. These feelings can be dealt with in the course of the coaching, in terms of what motivates the clients behaviour and helps or hinders goal achievement. The clients experience of overcoming impediments to success in the past, and achieving a series of successes, may in itself produce some benefits in terms of heightened self-esteem and a reduction in stress, anxiety, and worry. Certainly these may be viewed as therapeutic benefits even though the intent was not to provide therapy. Both coaching and counselling deal with feelings and beliefs to some degree, but at very different levels. A counsellor usually helps the client work through very painful feelings and negative or selfdefeating beliefs and behaviours. A coach does not get involved with emotional, cognitive, or behavioural problems of clinical intensity (depression, anxiety disorders, personality disorders, addictions, etc.) and must refer the person to a therapist to help deal with these issues. The overlap between the two approaches could depend upon where the client is. For a completely healthy client the overlap could be very large and for a sick and mentally disturbed client the overlap could be little. There is a noticeable trend of coaches training themselves in basic counselling techniques to deal with their clients holistically and similarly professional counsellors are increasingly training themselves in using coaching methods and techniques to motivate their clients towards action. We are in no away suggesting that these two are not specialised fields requiring their own dedicated practitioners. In fact we fully recognise, support and respect the need for special education and certification of each of these two disciplines. We are merely pointing out what we can learn from each other and how can we collaborate for the benefit of the client.
Introduction
In this paper, we argue that even though counselling and coaching are two different disciplines, they both deal with human behaviour and emotions. There are a lot of common techniques and skills between these two disciplines and a practitioner of one will be helped greatly by the knowledge of other discipline. To a large extent these can be seen complimentary to each other. A practitioner of one discipline will be helped greatly by knowing the basics of the other and will be in a better position to know when to refer to the other practice. This paper tries to see the differences from clients perspective and explores if the coaches should be open enough to use some of the techniques of counselling for a healthy client. We also explore if the coaching training should include some of the basic technique used in counselling. Similarly how some of the coaching techniques and training may help the therapists to help their clients. For the purpose of this paper we limit the scope of counselling as non-directive counselling only even when it is referred as therapy. One of the very first lessons in coaching highlights how coaching is different from other disciplines like counselling, consulting, mentoring etc. In this paper we will focus on comparing coaching with counselling especially to highlight the commonality and overlaps.
Let us examine some of the definitions of these two disciplines by the respective organisations/authorities. These definitions reveal how much these two have in common.
What is Counselling
The British Association for Counselling (BAC), now the BACP, may have been the first professional association to adopt a definition of professional counselling. In 1986 it published the following definition: Counselling is the skilled and principled use of relationship to facilitate self- knowledge, emotional acceptance and growth and the optimal development of personal resources. The overall aim is to provide an opportunity to work towards living more satisfyingly and resourcefully. Counselling relationships will vary according to need but may be concerned with developmental issues, addressing and resolving specific problems, making decisions, coping with crisis, developing personal insights and knowledge, working through feelings of inner conflict or improving relationships with others. In 1993, Feltharn and Dryden included the following definition of counselling in their specialized Dictionary of Counselling: Counselling is a principled relationship characterised by the application of one or more psychological theories and a recognised set of communication skills, modified by experience, intuition and other interpersonal factors, to clients intimate concerns, problems or aspirations. Its predominant ethos is one of facilitation rather than of advice-giving or coercion. It may be of very brief or long duration, take place in an organisational or private practice setting and may or may not overlap with practical, medical and other matters of personal welfare. It is both a distinctive activity undertaken by people agreeing to occupy the roles of counsellor and client and it is an emergent profession.... It is a service sought by people in distress or in some degree of confusion who wish to discuss and resolve these in a relationship which is more disciplined and confidential than friendship, and perhaps less stigmatising than helping relationships offered in traditional medical or psychiatric settings. [Source Feitham, C. and Dryden, W. (1993) Dictionary of Counselling. London, : Whurr ] Carl Rogers , often thought of as being the 'father' of counselling, devised the phrase 'personcentred' or 'client-centred' counselling as a description of his approach to therapy with clients. This phrase appears to have been derived from an earlier phrase he used, 'non-directive', which is a phrase still used in Life coaching. In Carl Rogers' approach to counselling, it is believed that the client already has all the skills necessary for them to tackle the issues they present. This latter point is a factor that helps distinguish counselling from 'other forms of therapy which provide an 'expert' to provide a 'cure' or 'treatment' for you.
What is Coaching
Now lets revisit some of the definitions of coaching. The ICFs (International Coach Federations) Description of coaching is as follows, The ICF defines coaching as partnering with clients in a thought-provoking and creative process that inspires them to maximize their personal and professional potential. Coaching honors the client as the expert in his/her life and work and believes that every client is creative, resourceful, and whole. Standing on this foundation, the coach's responsibility is to: [Source: ICF website: www.coachfederation.com ] Also Coaching encourages you to move positively towards achieving your goals by focusing your energy and your potential on positive solutions. (http://www.inspirecoaching.co.uk, 2007) The major strengths of coaching come from the technique of powerful questioning and active listening. While remaining nonjudgmental, the coach asks powerful questions and listens at a deep, intuitive level, guiding the session and process based on the information the client provides. In this way, it is as if the client and the coach are engaged in an intimate dance with the client leading. The coach's role is to support, stretch, and challenge the client toward achieving his or her goals. Coaching recognises the deep human desire to make a contribution to the betterment of humanity. On one hand the coaching relies upon the dynamic between the human desire for differentiation and unique self-expression and the need for integration, connection, and meeting the expectations and demands of the environment on the other. The foundation of coaching is self awareness. The perspective in coaching is to help people discover their unique "best self" and to bring their choices and actions more in line with it. Coaching helps the client to align life goals to his or her value system and examine underlying beliefs. Discover, clarify, and align with what the client wants to achieve; Encourage client self-discovery; Elicit client-generated solutions and strategies; and Hold the client responsible and accountable
The humanistic models of Carl Rogers and Abraham Maslow can be seen as early foundation stones of coaching as it exists today. Transpersonal approach of psychology which originated in 60s dealt with human behaviour in a holistic manner considering body, mind and spirit. It included study and experiences of states of consciousness.
A counsellor might consider referring a client to a coach for a number of reasons. When a client has difficulty following through on the goals set in counselling and the problem is not getting resolved in counselling, a coach can help therapy be more productive. The coach is able to provide more frequent contact with the client, set up more structure in the clients life to help address the therapeutic goals, and improve follow-through. Coaching can also be very helpful when the client needs to learn specific skills such as creating time lines, setting up more structures, and can benefit from the increased accountability that comes from frequent coach-client contacts. When a coach and counsellor are both working with a client they need to maintain regular contact to monitor progress and ongoing problems. They must also work together to keep the boundaries clear, making sure that coaching issues are handled by the coach, and therapy issues by the therapist.
Some counsellors have incorporated limited coaching techniques into their practice to better help their clients. Some example might be to keep lists of issues to be worked on, give written homework assignments, and ask the client to check in during the week to report on progress and followthrough. It is more common for counsellors to go into the coaching realm or use coaching tools. While coaches are not qualified, nor can legally adopt the role of a counsellor, they do use some of the techniques to dig deeper into the feeling level of their clients to help their clients to discover their limiting beliefs which are often hidden deep in their unconscious.
Bibliography
Adler, A. (1998). Understanding human nature (C. Brett, Trans.). Center City, MN: Hazelden
Gladding, S.T. ( 2004). Counseling: A Comprehensive Profession (5th edition). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Merrill/Prentice Hall.
Patrick Williams (2007) : Therapist as Life Coach: Transforming Your Practice (2nd Edition )
Gerard ODonovan & Curly Martin,(2007) The Thirty Minute Life Coach, The Coaching Academy UK Ltd. Whitworth, Kimsy-House, Kimsey-House, & Sandahl,