Expert One on One Coaching

The first use of the term “coach” in connection with an instructor or trainer arose around 1830 in Oxford University slang for a tutor who “carried” a student through an exam.^[4] The word “coaching” thus identified a process used to transport people from where they are to where they want to be. The first use of the term in relation to sports came in 1861.^[4]

Historically the development of coaching has been influenced by many fields of activity, including adult education,^[5] the Human Potential Movement in the 1960s,^[6] large-group awareness training (LGAT) groups^[7] (such as Erhard Seminars Training, founded in 1971), leadership studies, personal development, and various subfields of psychology.^{[8][need quotation to verify]} The University of Sydney offered the world’s first coaching psychology unit of study in January 2000,^[9] and various academic associations and academic journals for coaching psychology were established in subsequent years

Coaching is applied in fields such as sports, performing arts (singers get vocal coaches), acting (drama coaches and dialect coaches), business, education, health care, and relationships (for example, dating coaches).

Coaches use a range of communication skills (such as targeted restatements, listening, questioning, clarifying, etc.) to help clients shift their perspectives and thereby discover different approaches to achieve their goals.^[10] These skills can be used in almost all types of coaching. In this sense, coaching is a form of “meta-profession” that can apply to supporting clients in any human endeavor, ranging from their concerns in health, personal, professional, sport, social, family, political, spiritual dimensions, etc. There may be some overlap between certain types of coaching activities.^[8] Coaching approaches are also influenced by cultural differences.^[11]

Business coaching is a type of human resource development for executives, members of management, teams, and leadership.^[16] It provides positive support, feedback, and advice on an individual or group basis to improve personal effectiveness in the business setting, many a time focusing on behavioral changes through psychometrics or 360-degree feedback. Business coaching is also called executive coaching,^[17] corporate coaching or leadership coaching. Coaches help their clients advance towards specific professional goals. These include career transition, interpersonal and professional communication, performance management, organizational effectiveness, managing career, and personal changes, developing executive presence, enhancing strategic thinking, dealing effectively with conflict, and building an effective team within an organization. An industrial-organizational psychologist may work as an executive coach.

Business coaching is not restricted to external experts or providers. Many organizations expect their senior leaders and middle managers to coach their team members to reach higher levels of performance, increased job satisfaction, personal growth, and career development. Research studies suggest that executive coaching has positive effects both within workplace performance as well as personal areas outside the workplace, with some differences in the impact of internal and external coaches.^[18]

In some countries, there is no certification or licensing required to be a business or executive coach, and membership of a coaching organization is optional. Further, standards and methods of training coaches can vary widely between coaching organizations. Many business coaches refer to themselves as consultants, a broader business relationship than one which exclusively involves coaching.^[19] Research findings from a systematic review indicate that effective coaches are known for having integrity, support for those they coach, communication skills, and credibility.^[16]

In the workplace, leadership coaching has been shown to be effective for increasing employee confidence in expressing their own ideas.^[20] Research findings in a systematic review demonstrate that coaching can help reduce stress in the workplace.^[21]

Life coaching is the process of helping people identify and achieve personal goals through developing skills and attitudes that lead to self-empowerment.^[8][28] Life coaching generally deals with issues such as work–life balance and career changes, and often occurs outside the workplace setting.^[29] Systematic academic psychological engagement with life coaching dates from the 1980s.^[30] Skeptics have criticized life coaching’s focus on self-improvement for its potential for commercializing friendships and other human relationships,^[31] but similar criticisms have also been made of other helping professions such as clinical psychology.^[32][33]