Coaching can be an awkward concept to accurately define, sometimes leading to difficulties discerning effective professional coaching from the 'smoke & mirrors' varieties. Irish Coaching Institute Director Séamus Scanlan gives his clear and detailed explanation...
The last few years has seen a significant increase in interest in professional coaching. The profession is receiving regular attention in the media and, more and more, the public are becoming aware of it as a service offering-be that some variant of business coaching or life coaching.
So what is this mysterious concept and why has it only recently appeared on the scene?
In simple terms, coaching aims to help people to increase their effectiveness - i.e. it aims to help people produce more and consume less in the pursuit of their goals. But more and less of what?
A key starting point is understanding the difference between output and effectiveness. 'Output' is what you produce without any regard for the resources consumed in the process. 'Effectiveness' is about how well you use the resources available to you. You can have someone with, on the face of it, a high level of output - material success for example - but the way in which they are achieving this is unsustainable (perhaps it is adversely effecting their health or the health of others.)
The second key issue to understand is about where the resources consumed are coming from. Gravity exists whether you agree with it or not. In the same way, quality relationships, work and personal, will not reach their full potential unless the inter-dependencies are acknowledged and are considered fair - i.e. not unfairly distributed or inappropriately exploitative. History is littered with occasions where people 'rose up' to confront what they saw as inequitable relationships. Equally, everyday, people are confronting their circumstances with a view to getting a fairer deal - something that 'feels right.' It is as if we humans have an inbuilt compass to drive us towards the most equitable arrangement.
Accessing and understanding that inner compass is the key to effective coaching. This is why training in coaching needs to focus on the personal growth of the trainee coach. Developing the trainee's capacity to discern the inter-dependencies of their own life, and challenging them to refine these, is a big part of the task of effective coach training.
The key to effective coaching then is to help a client accelerate their own natural growth process. This then helps them see themselves, their environment and the opportunities available to them with greater clarity.
One of the by-products of effective coaching therefore is a better developed 'radar' for discerning substance from 'spin'. However, when it comes to discerning effective professional coaching from the 'smoke & mirrors' varieties the consumer is left with somewhat of a chicken & egg situation. Members of the public will naturally be inclined to think that coaches with letters after their name will be safe to invest in and to trust. As in any arena in life, all that glitters is not always gold.
A good coach, operating from a place of mature authenticity, can be a nugget of gold and can offer great value for money. Sometimes, however we have to sift through the 'me-toos' to find such nuggets. All too easily we can be blinded with science or seduced by the allure of 'new horizons', before we can smell the snake-oil.
Séamus Scanlan is a director of the Irish Coach Institute. The ICI can be contacted by phone on 1850 946-946 (win-win) or through the web at www.coach.ie. | 
