Understanding the Difference Between Coaching and Counselling
/What is the difference between coaching and counselling? Will a coach or counsellor best meet your needs at this time?
Each practitioner brings something unique to their practice. Whether you choose a coach or counsellor, you must find someone you can trust and feel comfortable sharing.
What is a professional coach?
Anyone can start a coaching business with or without training. Find out from any potential coach what their training and experience are. They may have training from a few days to a year or more. Often coaches come into this field as a second or third career, meaning they come into it with significant life experience.
What is the difference between coaching and counselling? Many people only think of coaching in sports. Professional coaching is growing rapidly for both personal and professional use.
Accreditation and Licensing:
If they are a member of the International Coaching Federation, you can have confidence they have met the standards set out by the ICF that, includes best practices and ethics. Here is how ICF defines coaching:
The International Coaching Federation (ICF) defines coaching as “partnering with clients in a thought-provoking and creative process that inspires them to maximize their personal and professional potential.
Methodology:
Rather than giving advice, the coach asks questions from a curious stance that will invite powerful insight into the client. Coaches see their clients as having the answer inside them. As a coach, I see myself as a midwife helping birth the true self in each client.
Are you ready?
What is the difference between coaching and counselling? Is coaching right for you? Are you ready to re-birth your true self?
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Excellent Coaches are:
Excellent coaches know how to take responsibility for their issues. A good coach ensures they stay emotionally, mentally and physically healthy to prevent themselves from transferring their issues to their client.
A good coach listens more than they speak. A good coach is curious and always wants to understand their client better. This requires good listening skills and the ability to ask deep questions.
A good coach can put aside the judgements that block them from understanding the person they are working with. To do this, they stay non-judgemental, and in turn, this helps them provide you with a safe place to learn.
A good coach will help you to access the wisdom already within you.
A good coach will hold you to account by compassionately challenging you to keep doing the hard work.
A reputable coach will inform you if they are not the right person for you and encourage you to see another coach, counsellor, or psychiatrist.
What is the difference between coaching and counselling? A good coach will be open to answering your questions.
Prerequisites for Coaching
To benefit from coaching, you need to have some self-awareness. You will benefit from a coach if you are looking for someone to give you a safe place to explore what is getting in the way of your life so you can be freed up to do what you are meant to do.
What is a professional counsellor?
This group of people includes counsellors trained usually as social workers or psychologists. In most places, you have to be registered through a licensing body. I Canada, it happens through provincial organizations.
Licensing and Accreditation:
You need a minimum of an undergraduate or graduate degree to be licensed as a social worker. Psychologists require a minimum of a graduate degree. Both these types of counsellors are under the supervision of their governing body.
What is the difference between coaching and counselling? Counsellors often have more training, but this is not always true.
Methodology:
Counselling/psychotherapy is the skilled and constructive use of a relationship to facilitate self-awareness, emotional acceptance and growth and strengthen personal skills.
The overall aim is to provide an opportunity for people to work towards living with hope and joy. While the relationship will vary according to need, it may be concerned with childhood issues, addressing and resolving specific problems, making decisions, coping with crises, developing personal insights and knowledge, working through feelings of inner turmoil or improving relationships with others.
Costs:
Most counsellors can be paid through ADP programs offered where you work.
Are you ready?
Be honest with yourself. Are you ready to face your shadow side? If you are not ready to do this now, start with a counsellor and later try a coach.
What is the difference between coaching and counselling? Depending on your own needs, they can be obvious and sometimes subtle.
Excellent Counsellors are:
Excellent counsellors need to have excellent communication skills through active listening—healthy self-awareness of themselves, excellent communication skills ability to ask relevant questions, the ability to observe non-verbal behaviour, patience, empathy and respect for confidentiality.
You will notice that coaches and counsellors need many of the same skills. However, you will notice that coaches are there to help you access the wisdom you already have, while counsellors are equipped to help people who have difficulty accessing their inner world and those who live with mental illness.
What is the difference between coaching and counsellors? Counsellors can only share information shared with them without the client’s consent.
Prerequisites for Counselling:
You need to want to get help. You are tired of how your life is going. You are concerned you have a mental illness. Life is getting unmanageable, and you are ready to address the problems. You also need to be determined and patient because change will happen gradually.
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Some final thoughts:
Ready to get help
When you decide to get help, it is wise to check with more than one person. Coaching might be the way to go if you are doing okay and want to do better.
What is the difference between coaching and counselling? You should seek a counsellor if you have more serious mental health challenges.
Finances
If finances are a concern and you can access a counsellor through your works benefits plan, this may be a good place to start.
Find your match
Trust your intuition. Meet with different coaches or counsellors to find the right person. Ask them how they can support you. Find out how much they charge and ask if they are licensed or accredited.
Give it a chance.
Give your coaching or counselling a chance. In the coaching world, most practitioners agree that you need a minimum of ten hours to start to notice any difference.
If you know someone you trust who has got help in the last few years, see if they have any recommendations for you.
Commit to your work.
In the end, you need to do the work. Your counsellor can not fix you. There is nothing defective about you. Yet old habits and inner talk keep getting in your way.
Begin the journey
Find a professional to begin this journey and stay with it long enough to start seeing a difference in your life.
Good for you on starting this journey. It takes courage to look deeply into yourself with compassion. It takes courage to recognize your imperfections.
What is the difference between coaching and counselling? Sometimes it is just finding the right person you feel safe to be vulnerable with.
When you do the work, sometime your older self will thank you for choosing to make life changes in your life.
Roland Legge—Accredited Professional Burnout Coach for Clergy: Don't let burnout ruin your life. Take the first step today and book your virtual coffee with Roland. You'll get to know me, ask any questions you have, and see if we're a good fit. There's no obligation, no pressure, and no risk. Click here to book your virtual coffee I look forward to meeting you.
