Monday 5 June 2017

Coaching: passions and practice.

A few years ago, I attended an introductory workshop in Coaching at my workplace. At the time the aim was to create a coaching community within the University and offer the ILM Level 5 Qualification in Coaching to interested attendees of the workshop. I was very interested but unfortunately the dates clashed with conferences I was presenting at, so I was unable to participate. The following year, the institution stopped running the course; however, I maintained my interest through reading and using techniques where possible and appropriate, for example, in the Action Learning Set I was involved in as part of the Aurora course (a development programme for female leaders in higher education) .

In November last year I participated in a Twitter chat hosted by UKLibchat on the subject which was incredibly popular. This encouraged me to include coaching as part of my performance development review at work as I could see how beneficial it would be both in developing my relationships with staff and in my work with students. Recently, a follow-up refresher workshop was offered at my workplace due to increased interest in the subject so I put my name down straightaway.

Reader, I loved it. The biggest glow I get at work is either when students ‘get it’ when I am helping or teaching them and also when I see people’s reactions at the end of attending one of my mindfulness workshops. While these two things may seem very different, what they both have in common is that they are empowering the person to be and do better. I believe very strongly that coaching does this as well, which is why I think I get that feeling.

Some useful refreshers: