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Toward a Positive Psychology of Executive Coaching
Abstract
Executive Coaching: A Generation ChangeThe Pragmatics: What is Executive Coaching?Toward a New Synthesis: Positive Psychology and CoachingCoaching Techniques and Interventions and their Underlying TheoryHow Small Differences in Perspective can have a Huge ImpactThe Research Conundrum
... This approach seemed to be favored by both practitioners and clients as it promotes growth, optimizes psychological strengths, and shifts the focus away from addressing psychopathology or professional inefficiencies (4,5). From this perspective, it positions personal growth and goal achievement as a function of the identification, awareness, and active utilization of one's signature strengths (6,7). This, in turn, largely removes the stigma attached to the use of psychological services and lowers the threshold for utilization/participation (8). ...
... Despite its rapid adoption in practice, the formalization of positive psychological coaching as a scientific concept, a subdiscipline of positive psychology or a "paradigm" is still in its infancy (10). Even though the concept's origins can be traced back to a chapter by Kauffman and Scoular almost two decades ago (6), the scientific discourse on PPC is still largely centered around its conceptualization (10), the differentiation between other types of coaching approaches (1) or how it differs from counseling, mentoring, and therapy (11,12). A study has shown that at least 24 different definitions of PPC exist in the scientific literature, with less than a 20% overlap in common elements between these definitions (10). ...
... This review aimed to identify academic peer-reviewed, theoretical articles with a focus on positive coaching psychology. Specifically, for inclusion in the present paper, manuscripts needed to be (1) academic peer-reviewed, theoretical articles, books, or book chapters focusing on model-or theory construction, (2) centered around positive coaching psychology, (3) aligned with the theoretical approach of positive psychology but could emerge from any field of application (e.g., sports or business), (4) written in English, (5) published in journals that were ISI, Web of Science and Scopus listed, (6) published between 2000 and June 2019, and (7) needed to mention specific coaching tools/techniques. ...
Positive psychological coaching (PPC) has emerged as a popular “paradigm” for practitioners interested in the professional development of people. A recent review consolidated the literature on PPC and produced a 5-phase positive psychological coaching model aimed at facilitating professional growth. However, little is known about practically operationalizing each phase of the coaching process (i.e., how to facilitate each phase and which underlying tools and techniques could be employed to do so). As such, the purpose of this systematic review was to address this limitation by (a) determining which coaching tools and techniques are proposed within the coaching literature and (b) classifying the identified tools and techniques into the respective phases of PPC model. The investigation used a two-step approach by conducting a systematic literature review (to identify various PPC tools/techniques) followed by an iterative heuristic classification process (to assign these PPC tools/techniques to a known PPC model). The systematic literature review resulted in 24 peer-reviewed publications on positive psychological coaching, providing 117 different coaching tools that could be condensed into 18 overarching coaching techniques. The iterative classification process showed that most techniques and tools are useful in at least two phases. Interestingly, experts still vary in opinion on the timing and application of these specific techniques and tools within the positive psychological coaching process. This study provides researchers and practitioners with practical guidelines to facilitate a positive psychological coaching process.
... It emphasises 'positive subjective experiences, positive individual traits, and positive institutions' to improve quality of life and prevent 'pathologies that arise when life is barren and meaningless' (Seligman & Csikszentmihalyi, 2001, p. 5). Although it acknowledges the existence and importance of negative experiences, the idea is that psychology does not focus solely on peoples' struggles and ailments but views ordinary people as capable, talented individuals and aims to help them to achieve their full potential (Kauffman & Scoular, 2004). The main aim of positive psychology is to foster happiness and the experience of subjective wellbeing in all people (Kun et al., 2017;Seligman, 2002). ...
... The idea that positive psychology could inform coaching practice originated with Carol Kauffman (2006) when she wrote about how coaching can be used from a positive psychological approach to overcome challenges, harness personal resources and achieve goals. She believed that Positive Psychology would form a 'natural home' for coaching, suggesting it is an ideal practice through which the subject, teaching and comprehension of Positive Psychology can be applied (Kauffman & Scoular, 2004;Boniwell & Kauffman, 2018). Biswas-Diener and Dean (2007) coined the term 'Positive Psychological Coaching', focussing on helping an employee to recognise their inner strengths, behave positively and improve their well-being. ...
Strategic HR professionals need to possess certain competencies in order to develop and implement strategic human resource management (SHRM) policies, procedures, practices and strategies in the new normal. The COVID-19 pandemic, the Industrial Revolution 4 and other future challenges highlight a need for SHRM to be reinvented. A qualitative research method within an interpretivist research philosophy was used to allow for an in-depth analysis of secondary data on SHRM in the new normal. Phenomenology was used as the research design. The purpose of this study is to identify the challenges, policies, procedures, practices, strategies and competencies of SHRM in the new normal. Electronic databases were used and 12 relevant articles were included for secondary data analysis. A theoretical framework to reinvent SRHM was developed. SHRM challenges and competencies were identified to ensure the successful development and implementation of SHRM policies, procedures, practices and strategies.KeywordsNew normal Reinventing strategic human resource management Strategic human resource management policies Procedures Practices and strategies Strategic human resource management competencies
... It emphasises 'positive subjective experiences, positive individual traits, and positive institutions' to improve quality of life and prevent 'pathologies that arise when life is barren and meaningless' (Seligman & Csikszentmihalyi, 2001, p. 5). Although it acknowledges the existence and importance of negative experiences, the idea is that psychology does not focus solely on peoples' struggles and ailments but views ordinary people as capable, talented individuals and aims to help them to achieve their full potential (Kauffman & Scoular, 2004). The main aim of positive psychology is to foster happiness and the experience of subjective wellbeing in all people (Kun et al., 2017;Seligman, 2002). ...
... The idea that positive psychology could inform coaching practice originated with Carol Kauffman (2006) when she wrote about how coaching can be used from a positive psychological approach to overcome challenges, harness personal resources and achieve goals. She believed that Positive Psychology would form a 'natural home' for coaching, suggesting it is an ideal practice through which the subject, teaching and comprehension of Positive Psychology can be applied (Kauffman & Scoular, 2004;Boniwell & Kauffman, 2018). Biswas-Diener and Dean (2007) coined the term 'Positive Psychological Coaching', focussing on helping an employee to recognise their inner strengths, behave positively and improve their well-being. ...
Human Resources jobs are becoming more and more challenging as the work dynamics are changing during the Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR). The processes of organisations have improved, and machines have become more complicated, but the basic principles of organisational processes remain the same (Wang et al., Appl Psychol 70(1):16–59, 2021). In contrast, Human Resources is about dealing with people who are constantly changing in terms of behaviour, habits, thinking, or according to their circumstances, albeit personal or professional (Hembrom, HR Future:32–33, 2020). This makes organisational processes more difficult because, while managing and understanding people, their state of mind is more important when communicating with them (Bui, The roles of leaders in virtual working environment, 2020). Talking to people in person, Human Resources managers can view body language, facial expressions of the employee, among others, which is helpful during communication. However, with the COVID-19 pandemic where the workforce is mostly working virtually from home the situation is a bit more complicated. The turn of events in the 4IR during the COVID-19 pandemic has not been very encouraging for organisations and business being slow and layoffs across the world have brought new Human Resources challenges (Richter, Int J Inf Manage 55:102–107, 2020; Rosario, HR Future 2020(10):34–35, 2020). It could be contemplated that it is easier to communicate without paying attention to emotions. However, the impact it has on the employees and their families is immense. Human Resources, known for its empathetic attitude, understanding nature, for offering solace and support to the employees, is now no more than a robot, delivering messages without any feelings by Zoom or WhatsApp, based on a decision taken by the organisation. The aim of this chapter is to conceptualise a new dimension of Human Resources, where a change in strategy is required to manage virtual work in the ‘new normal’. Organisations may never return to the old ways of working. There might be a mix of both office and virtual work. For organisations that prefer to return to the ‘old normal’ and do not allow for more flexible and virtual working practices, there is a very real risk that top talent will go elsewhere (Hubbard, Finweek, p 10. www.fin24.com/finweek, 2020; Waizenegger et al., Eur J Inf Syst 29(4):429–442, 2020).KeywordsFourth Industrial Revolution (4IR)New normalVirtual workRemote workDigital workWorking from homeHuman resources managementCOVID-19
... In terms of client characteristics, 5.32% of articles described that positive psychological coaches "work with well-adjusted individuals" in the sense that "the client is already 'whole' and skilled" (Kauffman and Scoular, 2004). A further 2.13% assumed that "clients have the capacity to develop, " e.g., Noble et al. (2000) described a "coach who believes in the client's ability to cope and change in positive ways, and who can identify, value, and develop the client's 'muscles'." ...
... Clients are encouraged to set goals that are either aligned to their strengths or goals aimed at developing a given strength further (Spence and Grant, 2012;van Zyl and Stander, 2013). The coach must assist the client to access and develop unrecognized attributes, learn from other life experiences and set clear, specific, and tailor-made goals (Kauffman and Scoular, 2004). Here, the coach will actively clarify the purpose of the goals and aid in the development of a mutually agreed upon developmental strategy or plan (Dyess et al., 2017). ...
Despite the popularity of the term Positive Psychological Coaching within the literature, there is no consensus as to how it should be defined (framed) or what the components of a positive coaching “model” should include. The aim of this systematic review was to define positive psychological coaching and to construct a clear demarcated positive psychological coaching model based on the literature. A systematic literature review led to the extraction of 2,252 records. All records were screened using specific inclusion/exclusion criteria, which resulted in the exclusion of records based on duplicates (n = 1,232), titles (n = 895), abstracts (n = 78), and criteria violations (n = 23). Twenty-four academic, peer-reviewed publications on positive psychological coaching were included. Data relating to conceptual definitions and coaching models/phases/frameworks were extracted and processed through thematic content analysis. Our results indicate that positive psychological coaching can be defined as a short to medium term professional, collaborative relationship between a client and coach, aimed at the identification, utilization, optimization, and development of personal strengths and resources in order to enhance positive states, traits and behaviors. Utilizing Socratic goal setting and positive psychological evidence-based approaches to facilitate personal growth, optimal functioning, enhanced wellbeing, and the actualization of people's potential. Further, eight critical components of a positive psychological coaching model were identified and discussed. The definition and coaching process identified in this study will provide coaches with a fundamental positive psychological framework for optimizing people's potential.
... This approach is not unique to executive coaching and is frequently found in such adjacent disciplines as growth-oriented psychotherapy and supportive counseling (e.g., Rogers, 1959), as well as in action research (e.g., Bartunek, Rousseau, Rudolph, & DePalma, 2006), where interventions are flexibly tailored to the clients' needs. However, while in these other fields treatment approaches that express a deficit-conflict view of clients' needs still outnumber collaborative, growth-oriented approaches, the deficit-conflict view and its associated prescriptive stance toward an intervention focus has been recognized as clearly inappropriate for coaching executive leaders (see Kauffman & Scoular, 2004, for a discussion). In essence, acknowledging the need in an unequivocally and comprehensively collaborative approach toward defining the content of coaching for executive clients creates a challenge with "the what" of executive coaching. ...
... Finally, the assimilation framework has roots in the broader developmental context that reflects a nonpathological, growth-focused perspective upon problems and challenges-a perspective that, together with Kauffman and Scoular (2004), we believe to be the only appropriate way of approaching executive coaching. Precisely because of this grounding in the context of individual psychological development in general, the assimilation model has been proven to be sensitive to capturing a broader range of progress than traditional outcome measures with a more narrow focus on problems, symptoms, or behaviors targeted for change. ...
Evaluation research has struggled to keep up with the popularity of coaching, as measures of its effectiveness are challenging to standardize, particularly when coaching executives. Similar to interpersonally based interventions in other fields such as counseling and psychotherapy, coaching takes the form of a fluid, humanistic process, whereas coaching-evaluation standards strive to be consistent with a standardized, scientifically based method. This study describes our experience in facing these program-evaluation challenges while conducting a randomized, quasi-experimental investigation to explore effects of a developmental coaching intervention provided to senior leaders from different organizations within 1 large integrated health-care system. In the context of these challenges, we propose a conceptually new framework to the field of coaching research based on the assimilation model, an empirically grounded theory that originates within psychotherapy research and describes how people overcome issues they find problematic or challenging, whether in clinical or in broader development and growth contexts. We discuss how this framework—with its associated tool: the Assimilation of Problematic Experiences Scale (APES)—offers working solutions to the common and vexing problems faced by research into executive-coaching outcomes, and how it can specifically inform evaluation-planning strategy within studies of coaching effectiveness.
... As previously stated, the SEMEAR project aims to make improvements to the well-being of individuals and communities through coaching. According to Kauffman and Scoular (2004), coaching and positive psychology are natural allies, since they share an explicit concern in valuing the total satisfaction of the human being, and they use a strengths-based approach to improve performance (Kauffman & Scoular, 2004). Coaching consists of a process focused on solutions and results, endowed with a methodological structure that is geared towards achieving goals. ...
... As previously stated, the SEMEAR project aims to make improvements to the well-being of individuals and communities through coaching. According to Kauffman and Scoular (2004), coaching and positive psychology are natural allies, since they share an explicit concern in valuing the total satisfaction of the human being, and they use a strengths-based approach to improve performance (Kauffman & Scoular, 2004). Coaching consists of a process focused on solutions and results, endowed with a methodological structure that is geared towards achieving goals. ...
This capstone presents the SEMEAR project. The SEMEAR project is the main initiative of the Brazilian Coaching Society Foundation. The project aims to stimulate and support flourishing in Brazil through positive coaching programs in three major areas: social, educational, and corporative. A set of interventions designed to enhance well-being, facilitate healthy relationships, promote flow and engagement, stimulate social contribution, as well as other aspects that can help people flourish, will be proposed. The project will explore how to use coaching, positive psychology and philanthropy to develop virtues, promote human flourishing and generate people’s well-being in families, schools, companies and communities through change agents such as coaches, parents, educators and leaders. Therefore, the project plans to engage and prepare 1,000,000 positive coaches who will directly or indirectly impact 50,000,000 people by 2050, contributing to the flourishing of 25% of the Brazilian population.
... Solution-focused coaching is rapidly gaining popularity in the field. This technique does not seek to alleviate long-term underlying problems, but assists people in meeting their goals by helping them develop their skills and resources (Kauffman & Scoular, 2004). By examining the client's core values and life experiences, skills and resources that had previously been unrecognised may be brought to light. ...
... Research findings indeed indicate that solution-focused coaching has the potential to enhance goalsetting and psychological functioning. Studies have found this technique may improve stress management capabilities and enhance goal striving, emotional well-being, hope, self-confidence and job satisfaction (Gyllensten & Palmer, 2006; Kauffman & Scoular, 2004; Seligman, 2002 ). There is some evidence that gains might be maintained over time (Green, Oades & Grant, 2006). ...
Objectives: To examine the effectiveness of a peer coaching intervention on aspects of well-being in students.
Design: A two-factor mixed design was employed.
Method: Two groups of third-year undergraduate psychology students participated in this study. The coaching group (N=32) comprised 24 females and eight males (mean age 25.23, SD=8.07) who were studying coaching psychology. This group was introduced to a model of coaching and practiced skills during lectures/seminars. They subsequently conducted and received five sessions of peer coaching before an examination period. The control group (N=33) comprised 30 females and three males (mean age 24.77, SD=5.57). This group were also third-year students, but were not studying coaching psychology or engaged in peer coaching.
Measures were taken at Time 1 (pre-coaching intervention) and Time 2 (post-coaching intervention). Demographic data was obtained and the General Health Questionnaire (Goldberg, 1992) and the Inventory of Personal Problems (Berkham et al., 1996), were utilised. The topics covered in coaching sessions and the perceived effectiveness of the technique were examined at Time 2.
Results: Levels of psychological distress were high at both data points. Findings highlighted significant differences in outcome variables for both groups between Times 1 and 2. Nonetheless, the increase in psychological distress was significantly lower in the peer coaching group. The most common topics covered in coaching sessions were relationships, health and career issues and 67 per cent of the sample found the intervention to be at least moderately effective.
Conclusions: Findings highlight the potential value of peer coaching in helping students manage their well-being during a potentially stressful period. Follow-up research is ongoing to examine ways of extending this technique in university settings.
... In the context of positive psychology, coaching has been referred to as "the applied arm of positive psychology" (Biswas-Diener, 2010, p.5, see also Kauffman & Scoular, 2004), and the two fields have been described as "natural partners" (Zimbardo & Boniwell, 2004). As a result, it is the authors' view that coaching should be considered when considering best practice in applying the emerging research into the potential of psychedelics for the betterment of well people. ...
A burgeoning evidence base demonstrates the therapeutic potential of psychedelics. Grounded in a review of existing literature and drawing on assumptions from coaching psychology and positive psychology, this paper argues that psychedelic experiences, beyond their potential to treat disease and disorder, hold promising potential to foster growth, learning, and wellbeing for non-clinical populations, and that coaching can offer effective, safe, and ethical support. Through identifying positive psychological themes in research and highlighting shared motivations to seek coaching and psychedelics, this paper builds the case for psychedelics-assisted coaching, offers a framework for practice, and discusses ethical concerns and future research.
... There is no shortage of empirical and practitioner-published papers provided by external professional coaching practitioners that focus on external forms of coaching like executive coaching (Goldsmith, 2009;Grant, 2013;Grant et al., 2009;Kilburg, 1996;Moen & Federici, 2012;Natale & Diamante, 2005;Pandolfi, 2020;Thach & Heinselman, 1999). Many published papers, mostly-and comprehensivelyfocus on (1) coaching outcomes (Athanasopoulou & Dopson, 2018;Jones et al., 2016;Nicolau, 2023;Wasylyshyn, 2007); (2) psychologically informed approaches in external forms of coaching (Cotterill & Passmore, 2018;Kauffman & Scoular, 2004;Lai & Palmer, 2019, Peltier, 2011Ward et al., 2014); and (3) the coach-coachee relationship in executive coaching (Payne et al., 2023;Bluckert, 2005). ...
Internal coaching is growing in popularity across various industries and sectors, either as a standalone resource or in conjunction with external coaching and other relevant programs and initiatives. Despite the growing popularity and reported benefits, there is a substantial dearth of research on the dynamics of "internal coaching" relationships, making it one of the least explored areas in organizational coaching literature. This paper contributes to addressing the research gap by presenting the outcomes of a study that explores the coach-client relationship and captures perspectives from internal coaches, external coaches, managers, and, notably, coachees, also known as coaching clients. Employing a mixed-methods approach, this study is a segment of a larger research project and focuses specifically on a subset of data that is relevant to the objective of this paper. Informed by a comprehensive literature review and insights from scholars and practitioners, including an exploration of the working alliance in therapy, the results of this study underscore the critical significance of confidentiality and trust in internal coaching, and its findings contribute to enhancing our understanding of internal coaching dynamics, offering guidance for the development of more effective internal coaching programs or the improvement of existing strategies.
... Problem-focused coaching approaches originate from more traditional, generally psychotherapy-inspired schools that tend to focus their questioning on the client's problem. Although positive psychology provides a solid theoretical and practical backbone to the science and practice of coaching (Kauffman, 2006;Seligman, 2007), numerous coaching practitioners are rooted in the therapeutic model which concentrates on repairing damage rather than boosting strengths (Kauffman and Scoular, 2004;Kauffman, 2006). Consequently, these coaches tend to use questioning techniques that are aimed to understand (and eliminate) the client's problem (i.e., problem-focused questioning techniques 1 ). ...
Coaching is a systematic and goal-oriented one-on-one intervention by a coach aimed to guide clients in their professional and personal development. Previous research on coaching has demonstrated effects on a number of positive outcomes, including well-being and performance, yet little is known about the processes that underlie these outcomes, such as the type of questions coaches use. Here, we focus on three different types of coaching questions, and aim to uncover their immediate and sustained effects for affect, self-efficacy, and goal-directed outcomes, using a between-subjects experiment. One hundred and eighty-three medical residents and PhD students from various medical centers and healthcare organizations in the Netherlands were recruited to participate in a self-coaching writing exercise, where they followed written instructions rather than interacting with a real coach. All participants were randomly allocated to one of three conditions: either one of two solution-focused coaching conditions (i.e., the success or miracle condition) or a problem-focused coaching condition. Self-report questionnaires were used to measure key outcomes of coaching, that is positive and negative affect, self-efficacy, goal orientation, action planning (i.e., quantity and quality) and goal attainment. Two follow-up measurements assessed if the effects of the self-coaching exercise led to problem-solving actions within an initial follow-up period of 14 days and a subsequent follow-up period of 10 days. Findings showed that participants experienced more positive affect, less negative affect, and higher approach goal orientation after the solution-focused coaching exercise compared to the problem-focused coaching exercise. In all conditions, goal attainment increased as a consequence of the self-coaching intervention. We discuss the implications of our findings for the science and practice of contemporary coaching.
... They will have to impact on different systemic levels, such as the individual, the group, the organisation and the society. Thereby, a perspective needs to be emphasised that fosters collaboration and sustainability and should be based on an inner attitude of optimal functioning from a positive (organisational) psychology perspective (Kauffman & Scoular, 2004). ...
According to the Chinese Admiral Zheng He, the Art of Collaboration is guided by the principle “Know your collaborators, know yourself”. This principle grows in importance when we take the rapid changes in workplaces—the Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR)—in global and local contexts into account. In this chapter, it is argued that not only intra- and interpersonal knowledge is needed to collaborate. It is contended that the Art of Collaboration in the twenty-first century needs a theoretical foundation which takes the strengths as well as the weaknesses of new ways of collaboration into account. These strengths and weaknesses, in addition, must not be limited to cognitive and experienced-based knowledge, but need to be expanded to the exploration of emotions and collaborative behaviour as well. Creativity, therefore, becomes a key factor in the art of collaboration in the Industry 4.0 workspaces. The positive psychology Wave II (PP 2.0) is viewed as providing a valuable foundation to work together creatively, peacefully and effectively across diverse cultural contexts. In this chapter, key factors of creativity and the Art of Collaboration will be reflected on cognitive, affective and behavioural levels. Selected examples will be discussed taking present collaborative challenges on global and local levels into account, such as growing intersections of nationality, culture and gender, the transformation of negative experienced emotions and the importance of collaborative behaviour during the breakthrough of the 4IR. Responses towards these challenges will be discussed. Conclusions and recommendations will be presented for future discourses on creativity and the Art of Collaboration in digital workspaces in the twenty-first century.
... In addition to this, many articles call for further research on executive coaching effectiveness, in particular, with an exploration of what variables may predict greater effectiveness. For example, Kauffman and Scoular (2004) suggest that a key area requiring further research is whether or not some people are more suited to executive coaching than other development methods. ...
... In addition to this, many articles call for further research on executive coaching effectiveness, in particular, with an exploration of what variables may predict greater effectiveness. For example, Kauffman and Scoular (2004) suggest that a key area requiring further research is whether or not some people are more suited to executive coaching than other development methods. ...
Limited research attention has been paid to influences on executive coaching effectiveness. This study explores whether a relationship exists between the Five Factor Model of personality and coachee perceptions of effectiveness of executive coaching. Thirty coachees completed a cross sectional survey measuring personality using scales from the International Personality Item Pool (Goldberg, 1999). There was a significant positive relationship between extraversion and perceived coaching effectiveness. The findings have implications for organisations when considering whether their employees are suited to the development interventions on offer and whether the intervention will subsequently provide a good return on investment. Our study also contributes to the emerging literature on antecedents of coaching effectiveness by examining core aspects of individual differences.
... D'acord amb una enquesta global desenvolupada en 2012 (Newnham-Kanas, Morrow i Irwin), un ampli percentatge de coaches posseïa més coneixements i habilitats vinculats amb els negocis que amb les Ciències del Comportament o la Psicologia. De tota manera, hi ha estudis que afirmen que els coaches sense coneixements psicològics fonamentals poden no ser capaços de reconéixer qüestions de salut mental en els clients i causar-los dany (Berglas, 2002;Kauffman i Scoular, 2004). ...
El coaching i l’entrevista motivacional són dues tècniques d’intervenció que comparteixen la rellevància concedida al canvi i, actualment, el seu apogeu social. Aquest treball exploratori pretén revisar altres possibles punts de connexió entre ambdues modalitats d’actuació. Per a això, s’empra una anàlisi de treballs recents sobre coaching i documents científics sobre l’entrevista motivacional, localitzats a través de la base de dades bibliogràfica Dialnet. La mostra documental també s’ha enriquit amb aportacions d’experts que apliquen o investiguen sobre les dues tècniques. Els resultats del treball ofereixen dades específiques sobre: l’origen del coaching i de l’entrevista motivacional, la seua definició, els fonaments, les influències, els professionals que les apliquen, la metodologia emprada i els seus efectes. Les conclusions del treball assenyalen que les dues modalitats d’intervenció presenten aspectes comuns: van sorgir en un moment molt pròxim, les definicions en mostren trets anàlegs –com ara la importància concedida al diàleg–, comparteixen influències –com la Psicologia Humanista–, tenen modalitats específiques compartides –com l’afrontament de dificultats en l’àmbit personal–, els seus professionals presenten paral·lelismes –quant a coneixements, motivacions, aptituds i actituds–, utilitzen metodologies que presenten simetries –en el tipus de relació que incentiven, en els continguts que es tracten a les sessions, en el tipus d’accions que es plantegen i en l’estructura global dels processos– i coincideixen en alguns dels efectes que provoquen –com és el cas de la promoció de la salut–.
... It appears that authors and researchers tend to describe the contribution of the discipline or field to coaching based on their own training and background. Therefore, researchers who tend to have a psychological background will often cite the psychological foundations of coaching (Grant, 2006;Kauffman& Scoular, 2004;Passmore, 2009), whereas those with a stronger business background will focus on the contextual aspects such as organizational development (Kahn, 2011;Peterson, 2006;Stout-Rostron, 2014). Authors do tend to acknowledge the multi-disciplinary nature but the emphasis varies in terms of their own dominant background, orientation and education. ...
Two schools of thought exist about the purpose and process of coaching. One school of thought holds the strong belief or assumption that the purpose of coaching is to change behaviour through a goal-directed approach. The counterview has the underlying assumption that coaching is a meaning-making process, a shared journey that may or may not result in behavior change. These two approaches have different ontologies (definitions of the nature of reality) and epistemologies (explanations of how we come to know what we know). They are underpinned by worldviews rooted largely in either modernism (goal-resolution focus) or postmodernism (meaning-making). These schools of thought are explained in this paper, after which the paper examines a study that examined the lived experience of coached executives. It concludes that goal-resolution and meaning-making can co-exist. It appears from the study of coached executives who were interviewed through a constructivist grounded theory study that what is actually occurring in coaching is that meaning-making precedes goal-resolution. The implications of this for coaching education are that coaching education could address the ontology and epistemology of knowledge and methodology. This may increase an understanding of the coaches' own worldviews and consequently they would be more mindful of the impact and potential bias of the methodological choices they are making in their coaching practice. This paper begins by sharing the need for theory development with the field of coaching. It contextualizes how the role of reflexivity, with particular reference to reflecting on our worldviews, is needed in research and in our coaching practice. Two articles are reviewed, which reflect different schools of thought about the purpose and definition of the coaching process. One school of thought shares the strong belief or assumption that the purpose of coaching is to change behaviour (Grant, 2012), while the other school of thought has the underlying assumption that coaching is a meaning-making process, a shared journey that may or may not result in behavior change (Stelter, 2016). These two approaches have different ontologies (definitions of the nature of reality) and epistemologies (explanations of how we come to know what we know).
... It appears that authors and researchers tend to describe the contribution of the discipline or field to coaching based on their own training and background. Therefore, researchers who tend to have a psychological background will often cite the psychological foundations of coaching (Grant, 2006;Kauffman& Scoular, 2004;Passmore, 2009), whereas those with a stronger business background will focus on the contextual aspects such as organizational development (Kahn, 2011;Peterson, 2006;Stout-Rostron, 2014). Authors do tend to acknowledge the multi-disciplinary nature but the emphasis varies in terms of their own dominant background, orientation and education. ...
... D'acord amb una enquesta global desenvolupada en 2012 (Newnham-Kanas, Morrow i Irwin), un ampli percentatge de coaches posseïa més coneixements i habilitats vinculats amb els negocis que amb les Ciències del Comportament o la Psicologia. De tota manera, hi ha estudis que afirmen que els coaches sense coneixements psicològics fonamentals poden no ser capaços de reconéixer qüestions de salut mental en els clients i causar-los dany (Berglas, 2002;Kauffman i Scoular, 2004). ...
... These shifts in the coaching market place are evidence of the shift from first generation to second generation coaching that has been described by Kauffman and Scoular (2004). First generation coaches established the profession and brought it to the attention of the business world, ...
The remarkable growth of coaching to date has not, so far, been matched by a similar growth in the research corpus that underpins it. There may be several explanations for this, including the pace of growth relative to the pace of research; coaching’s location at the juxtaposition of business consultancy and applied psychology; and competing imperatives that leave coaches themselves torn between being coaches and being researchers. Drawing from a model of these competing imperatives of research and practice in occupational psychology, this article outlines some of the core issues that coaches might face when thinking about research. It suggests some possible answers to the questions of who, what, where, when and why of coaching research, and concludes by identifying the critical questions that will likely shape the future evolution of coaching.
... Across these coaching approaches and contexts of coaching psychology, coaching has increasingly been researched from a positive psychology research perspective to improve the facilitation of optimal functioning (Kauffman and Scoular 2004 ;Linley 2004 ) as well as health and wellbeing (Mayer 2011 ). It is assumed that the positive psychology paradigm (Lopez and Snyder 2003 ) that is applied in coaching processes increases health and wellbeing in organizations (Mayer 2011 ), learned resourcefulness (Rosenbaum 1990 ), as well as emotional intelligence (Goleman 1995 Coaching processes have been found to be helpful in strengthening health and well-being within individuals and organizations and have been shown to reduce stress (Krause and Mayer 2012 ;Mayer and Boness 2013b ). ...
Coaching in organizations has become a prominent tool to address challenges experienced by individuals and teams. Different approaches in coaching are used, such as individual, team or business coaching. Certain approaches to coaching, such as psychological coaching, aim to increase optimal functioning, wellbeing and mental health for personal growth and development. The effect of psychological coaching in organizations has been empirically researched and discussed in the literature. In today’s organizations, coaching is a well-established domain in theory and practice. However, studies show that transcultural (In this chapter the authors refer to the concept of “transculturality” due to the fact that the coaching framework presented is based on a “transcultural” approach. “Transculturality” refers to a world view which is based on the notion of hybridity and blurring spheres of cultures which are interconnected, mixed and integrative (Welsch W. Kultur aus transkultureller Perspektive. In Treichel D, Mayer C-H (eds) Lehrbuch Kultur. Lehr- und Lernmaterialien zur Vermittlung kultureller Kompetenzen. Münster, Waxmann, pp 149–157, 2011). In transcultural settings, culture is viewed as a dynamic and “active factior” (Welsch W. Transculturality – the puzzling form of cultures today. In Featherstone M, Lash S (eds) Spaces of culture: city, nation, world. Sage, London, pp 194–213, 1999, 2003) that is inclusive and the opposite of exclusive, homogene and fixed.) organizational contexts require particular systemic and transcultural perspectives to adequately address the challenges of individuals, teams and the organizations within their local and global contexts. Yet these systemic and transcultural approaches have hardly been explored in coaching transcultural organizations. The aim of this chapter is to show that systemic thinking and transcultural approaches in coaching psychology can provide a sound theoretical base and practical intervention method for psychological coaching within globalized and transcultural organizational contexts. A new coaching framework is introduced that is based on three phases: the input, the process and the output. Within these phases systemic and transcultural approaches and aspects are discussed, the profile of a coach is presented, and practices and interventions are explored. Recommendations are made for theory and practice.
... on the other hand, such diversity increases the difficulty to develop a standardised coaching definition, focus, result evaluation method and coaches' selection and development scheme (sherman & Freas, 2004). indeed, psychologists have increasingly and more publicly become involved in the coaching industry in 1990s, because the aim of executive or life coaching is to facilitate sustained cognitive, emotional and behavioural change (douglas & MacCauley, 1999). in addition, a number of studies asserted that coaches without fundamental psychology knowledge may not be able to recognise coaching clients' mental health issues and may cause harm to coaching clients (Berglas, 2002;Cavanagh, 2005;Kauffman & scoular, 2004;Naughton, 2002). therefore, to what extent a back-International Coaching Psychology Review l Vol. 9 No. 2 September 2014 121 ground in psychology is an essential requirement for a professional coach is still a point of debate. ...
Objective: Whilst a number of narrative reviews on coaching exist, there is no Systematic Review (SR) yet summarising the evidence base in a transparent way. To this extent, we undertook a SR of Coaching Psychology evidence. Following the initial scoping and consultation phase, this focused on Coaching Psychologists’ attributes, such as the required knowledge, attitudes and behaviours, associated with a conducive coaching relationship and subsequent coaching results. Design: The SR review process stipulates a priori protocol which specifies the review topic, questions/hypotheses, (refined through expert consultation and consultation of any existing reviews in the field, and replicable review methods including data extraction logs). Methods: The initial search elicited 23,611 coaching papers using 58 search terms from eight electronic databases (e.g. PsyINFO). Following initial sifts, 140 studies were screened further using seven inclusion criteria. Study results from the how many included papers were integrated through Narrative Synthesis. Conclusion: This SR highlighted that the coaching relationship is a key focus of coaching research and practice, where a professional psychological training / background is emphasised as an essential requirement to manage coachee’s emotional reactions and the rationales behind their behaviours. The review also highlighted that coaches’ attributes have a significant influence on the effectiveness of coaching process and results. The review concludes with a proposal for an initial Coaching Psychologist Competency Framework to underpin future studies, and noting the short comings of existing frameworks.
... In this regard, CBC has been offered as a coping methodology more than a process toward executive flourishing. This is consistent with much of the executive coaching perspective, in which most coaches still operate from a deficitoriented framework even when working with high level executives (Kauffman & Scouler, 2004). The authors have used CBEC in both helping to manage maladaptive thoughts/behaviors (that may lead to stress, anxiety, or other presenting issues) and in establishing a formal platform to support executive skill building, performance, and personal leadership agendas. ...
Traditional clinical psychological practices have often been adapted for the context of executive coaching. Cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) in particular is the most scientifically supported psychological modality. CBT like other practices has been used in coaching as cognitive behavioral coaching but rarely discussed more explicitly for the executive population. Here, we offer a specific adaptation - cognitive behavioral executive coaching (CBEC) - and suggest that it presents a flexible structure that can meet the multiple agendas that are framed for executive coaching. Additionally, the core features of CBT and CBEC in particular satisfy the major needs of executives in coaching arrangements. We conclude by demonstrating a CBEC process model for coaching the high-performing executive.
... Given that applied positive psychology seeks to put such research into practice (Linley & Joseph, 2004), we argue that coaching provides a unique platform for incorporating userfriendly applications of positive psychological knowledge across multiple domains (e.g., personal, professional, social). Several authors have similarly noted this potential (see for example, Foster & Lloyd, 2007; Kauffman & Scoular, 2004; Linley & Harrington, 2006). In our view coaching has considerable potential in this regard because it is fundamentally concerned with enhancing self-regulation by facilitating the establishment and pursuit of self-concordant goals. ...
Coaching is widely used in the workplace to facilitate goal attainment and behavior change. Where coaching interventions are primarily used to enhance goal attainment, positive psychology interventions are primarily used as a means of enhancing well-being. However, despite the clear synergies between coaching and positive psychology there has been little work done on developing models that integrate these two separate but highly complementary change methodologies. This chapter outlines a range of coaching applications that are frequently used in the workplace and discusses differences between internal and external coaching and distinguishes executive from workplace coaching. Drawing on the concepts of languishing and flourishing, this chapter presents a dimensional model of goal striving and mental health/mental illness with two key dimensions: (1) mental healthillness and (2) intentional goal striving (high or low). A case study of the use of these positive psychology concepts in coaching is used to illustrate key points.
... She then recommended that coaches assign the interventions to clients as a homework task, choosing the most appropriate ones for the client's happiness orientation (Kauffman, 2006). For most practitioners, employing positive psychology interventions and related assessments in the coaching partnership qualifies the relationship as positive psychology coaching (Biswas-Diener & Dean, 2007;Kauffman, 2006;Kauffman & Scoular, 2004). ...
Positive psychology is the study of what makes people flourish, whereas coaching is a professional relationship designed to help people flourish. Coaching practice has been primarily influenced by positive psychology via the coaches’ use of positive psychology interventions, which are evidence-based exercises to enhance flourishing. Researchers, however, designed positive psychology interventions to be self-administered, self-help tools that do not necessarily need a coaching context for delivery. Therefore, the impact of positive psychology on how practitioners coach has been limited because these interventions do not fully tap the potential offered by the interactive nature of the coaching session. What is needed is a framework that would enable the coach to (a) systematically identify positive psychology constructs such as hope, strengths, or positive emotions as they spontaneously emerge in the client’s communication; and (b) amplify them by using specific strategies in the interaction. In effect, solution-focused practice provides this exact framework, because it operationalizes many positive psychology constructs in the conversation, therefore making the coaching session itself a positive psychology intervention.
... Grant and Zackron (2004) argue that life-coaches have diverse backgrounds and experience. Therefore, as long as there is no regulatory approval system and no specific entrance requirements or supervision of the content and quality of the coaching programs (Grant & O'Hara, 2006), there will be major concern regarding the quality, effectiveness and even appropriateness of some of the coaching courses available (Kauffman & Scoular, 2004). ...
The aim of the study is to shed light on the process by which life-coaching has become a thriving industry in Israel. By performing an Internet search followed by website analysis, document analysis and in-depth interviews with key people in the industry, we suggest that there is a distorted notion of life-coaching, both from a professional and an ethical perspective. It appears that the Israeli life-coaching industry is too immature and fragmented to have yet developed a standard. The main findings, as well as the industry's future directions and avenues for future research, are presented and discussed.
... Coaches' dominant-hostile behavior evokes submissive client behavior within the coaching interaction process (H2c). Again, because coaching relationships tend to be only slightly hierarchical and to develop on equal terms (e.g., Kaufman and Scoular 2004), we would expect a similar pattern of coaches' dominance in response to clients' dominance. It is conceivable that confident, enthusiastic and interested client behavior evokes similar coach behavior. ...
Purpose
Despite calls for studying interaction processes in coaching, little is known about the link between coach–client interactions and coaching success. In particular, interpersonal behavior in coaching remains unexplored, although it is considered highly relevant to social relationships and interaction outcomes. This study takes first steps to address this gap.
Design/Methodology/Approach
We examined the dynamics of coaches’ and clients’ interpersonal behavior based on the two basic dimensions affiliation and dominance. Furthermore, we investigated the link between emergent interpersonal behavior patterns and coaching outcomes. To this end, we videotaped and analyzed a total of 11,095 behavioral acts nested in 30 coach–client dyads.
Findings
Sequential analysis showed that reciprocal friendliness patterns were positively linked to working alliance. Coaches’ dominant–friendly interaction behavior particularly activated clients, in terms of showing dominance during the coaching interaction process. Clients’ dominance was linked to their overall goal attainment.
Implications
Our results highlight the importance of interpersonal behavior for coaching success. Specifically, our findings suggest that dominance interaction patterns are context- and relation-specific, offering an explanation for contradicting empirical studies on interpersonal dominance. For coaches, our study implies that high awareness for interpersonal signals can help establish a positive atmosphere and activate clients’ dominance.
Originality/Value
This empirical study uses behavior observation and interaction analysis to understand the interpersonal dynamics during coaching sessions. Our results increase our theoretical understanding of coaching effectiveness by shedding light on the micro-level behavioral dynamics that drive successful coaching processes.
... Hodgetts, 2002). The finding that similarity on the dominance dimension is beneficial to coaching success supports the assumption that clients prefer a 'companion' as coach instead of a rescuer and that successful clients seek to hold an active role in the coaching process (e.g. Kaufman & Scoular, 2004). However, as the measure DS is based on both interpersonal dimensions, our findings also suggest that the consideration of only one interpersonal dimension is not sufficient if we want fully to understand the role of interpersonal dynamics for coaching success. ...
There is growing evidence that coaching is effective. However, little is known about the process variables critical for coaching success. This article investigates the role of the two interpersonal behaviour dimensions affiliation and dominance in the formation of a positive coaching relationship and in coaching success. The interaction of 33 coach–client dyads was videotaped during their first coaching session. The verbal and non-verbal affiliation and dominance behaviour of both actors was analysed with the Discussing Coding System. Findings show that a coach's dominance behaviour in the first session predicts positive ratings by the client concerning goal attainment at the end of the five-session-coaching process. Similarity of coach and client in terms of dominance and affiliation predicts positive ratings by the client on relationship quality and goal attainment. Practical implications and limitations are discussed.
... on the other hand, such diversity increases the difficulty to develop a standardised coaching definition, focus, result evaluation method and coaches' selection and development scheme (sherman & Freas, 2004). indeed, psychologists have increasingly and more publicly become involved in the coaching industry in 1990s, because the aim of executive or life coaching is to facilitate sustained cognitive, emotional and behavioural change (douglas & MacCauley, 1999). in addition, a number of studies asserted that coaches without fundamental psychology knowledge may not be able to recognise coaching clients' mental health issues and may cause harm to coaching clients (Berglas, 2002;Cavanagh, 2005;Kauffman & scoular, 2004;Naughton, 2002). therefore, to what extent a back-International Coaching Psychology Review l Vol. 9 No. 2 September 2014 121 ground in psychology is an essential requirement for a professional coach is still a point of debate. ...
Summary
This paper presents a Systematic Review (Denyer & Tranfield, 2011) of evidence on Coaching Psychology. Particular focus is on effective Coaching Psychologists’ attributes, in other words the required knowledge, personalities, attitudes and demonstrated behaviours to enhance the effectiveness of the coaching relationship and any results.
58 searching terms were identified and used to search 8 major databases; 7 a priori inclusion criteria were used to screen initial search results and 140 papers that meet these were identified for final synthesis. 5 most commonly applied and examined psychological coaching approaches (e.g. Cognitive Behavioural Change Approach etc.); and 8 key factors (e.g. trust and emotional support etc.) that facilitate the effective coaching relationship were identified. In addition, a Coaching Psychologist Competency Framework was outlined that includes required knowledge, personality / attitudes and skills / behaviours.
Introduction
• Research Background
Coaching has taken hold in the organisational and leadership development field in recent years as a development activity of choice. However some challenges have emerged while the application of coaching in practice of continues to expand.
Although a couple of literature reviews on Coaching Psychology (Grant 2001, Whybrow 2008, and Bachkirova, 2008 etc.) have been conducted in order to examine and promote the critical role for psychology in coaching study and practice; there is an on-going debate between psychologists and non-psychologists about whether a psychological background is a core requirement for a professional coach. Also, there no Systematic Review on Coaching Psychology has been conducted, a rigorous literature review method aiming to diminish research bias and to produce more reliable and accurate conclusions by synthesising included studies (Kitchenham, 2007). As the coaching relationship has been identified as the most important factor in the coaching process in recent years (Bachkirova, 2008; de Haan, 2008; and Palmer & McDowall, 2010); the research focus has also been shifted to investigating the effective factors and coaches’ attributes that enhance the coaching process and relationship. In order to identify evidence and knowledge gaps from existing studies, a Systematic Review to synthesise relevant studies through a transparent and systematic process is a critical step before conducting further research.
• What is a Systematic Review?
According to Denyer and Tranfield (2011), Systematic Review is a specific methodology that locates existing studies, selects and evaluates contributions, analyses and synthesises data, and reports the evidence in such a way that shows reasonably clear conclusions to be reached about what is and is not known. It usually starts with a solid protocol which includes the review topic, questions/hypothesis, inclusion criteria and review methods before the review commences. A Systematic Review can be used to test just a single hypothesis, or a series of related hypotheses. The review process usually includes the following phases: scoping and planning the review, searching and screening the relevant studies, and evaluating and synthesising the included studies. (Kitchenham, 2004 and Denyer & Tranfield, 2011). There are many synthesis methods have been applied to Systematic Reviews (such as meta-analysis and Narrative Synthesis etc.), but the applied methods will depend on the nature of the primary studies which are located and judged as relevant to the research questions.
(Petticrew and Roberts, 2006).
Review Design and Process
There were phases in this SR research in line with (ref):
(1) Scoping the studies of the field which aims to ascertain if a Systematic Review is needed and how it fits into the existing research evidences by conducting a pilot literature search of the field: A pilot literature search was carried out through PsyINFO, Business Source Complete and Index to Theses in 2010 to verify there was no SR on coaching before commencement of this study.
(2) Planning the review; such as developing a protocol to define the review topic, questions, inclusive criteria and review methods: 10 coaching experts were invited (either academics or practitioners from international locations to explore their perspectives on the review topic, review questions and methods proposed by the reviewer. Semi-structured interviews were conducted either by phone or face to face.
After analysing and integrating the perspectives and comments from the interviews, the finalised review topic and questions were:
In what way are Coaching Psychologist’s attributes (required knowledge, competences, skills personality and attitudes) associated with the effectiveness of coaching, as measured by a variety of outcome measures?
• How many and what kind of studies which evaluated Coaching Psychologist attributes in a robust and systematic way exist up to the present time?
• What are effective Coaching Psychologist’s attributes (competences, skills, personality and attitudes) in the coaching process?
• What are the most applied psychological interventions impact on coachees’ change as evident from current evaluation methods (including behaviours, performance, satisfaction, attitude and well-being)?
(3) Carrying out the literature search according to the relevance to review topics: 58 searching terms (such as adult learning and coaching and behavioural change and coaching etc.) were identified and were searched through 8 electronic databases (such as PsyINFO and European e-Theses etc.) from the University of Surrey.
(4) Screening the references according to inclusion and exclusion criteria to determine which ones are needed for further reviews: 7 inclusion criteria (for example: if it was an empirical research; if this research was involved any psychological coaching interventions and any concrete evaluation methods etc.) were applied to screen the initial search results (263,611). 140 papers that met the inclusive criteria were identified for final synthesis.
(5) Extracting relevant information from the primary studies on the basis of a standard format; such as bibliographic information, methodology, findings and analysis for evaluating the included studies: The papers were rated based on if they adopted rigorous research and evaluation methods, and if they well defined their coaching interventions in the papers. Each paper had a final score that assisted the reviewer to rank the quality of the papers.
(6) Analysing and synthesising the included studies based on variations in population, intervention, context, study design, outcomes and the degree they are affected by bias: Narrative Synthesis approach was adopted to analyse the final inclusive studies.
Findings
Referring back to the review questions above, the review findings are summarised as followed:
(1) Number of papers: 140 papers that evaluated Coaching Psychologist attributes in a robust and systematic way exist up to the present time in this review. (The review was completed in January 2012.)
(2) Most applied approaches: 5 most applied and examined psychological coaching approaches were identified after synthesising these included studies, they are:
• Behavioural Change Approach- GROW
• Cognitive Behavioural Change Approach
• Solution-Focused Approach
• Positive / Strength Psychology
• Adult Learning
(3) The coaching relationship: 8 factors which enhance the coaching relationship were extracted:
• Emotional support
• Coaches’ personality
• Transparent process
• To meet coachees’ needs
• Understanding
• Communication
• Trust
• Facilitation / Help
(4) Personal attributes: Effective Coaching Psychologist attributes (including required knowledge, personalities/attitudes and behaviours) were summarised and a sketch of a Coaching Psychologist Competency Framework was outlined in this review.
Conclusions
This Systematic Review research presents some initial findings of effective Coaching Psychologist attributes which enhance the coaching process and relationship from existing studies. The review findings are summarised as follows:
(1) 140 studies (1995-2011) that aimed to examine the effectiveness of certain psychological interventions, psychometric assessments, coaching relationship and coaches’ attributes in the coaching process were identified and synthesised from this Systematic Review.
(2) 8 critical factors (e.g. trust and understanding etc.) that enhance the coaching relationship were extracted in this review; these factors could be the focus of further researchers, for example: to investigate and examine what sorts of behavioural indicators demonstrated by the coach will facilitate to build trust with the coachee.
(3) Effective Coaching Psychologist attributes (including required knowledge, most applied psychological intervention, personalities/attitudes and behaviours) are summarised and a preliminary of a Coaching Psychologist Competency Framework arises from this review.
In conclusion, this review indicated that Coaching Psychology has been advancing as most relevant studies included in this review were published in psychological journals. However, there are still some issues need to be further investigated. Firstly, although coaching relationship has been the research focus of Coaching Psychology, more rigorous evidences are required as only 47 papers (of 140 papers) aimed to examine and investigate the factors and coaches’ attributes that facilitate the effective coaching process from the included studies. Second, a draft Coaching Psychologist Competency Framework that includes requirement knowledge, personality/attitudes and behaviours for a professional coach arises from this review, however a further study which aims to explore and examine the precise behavioural indicators through a comprehensive research method (such as exploring the perspectives from coaching experts, clients and relevant stakeholders; and also conducting a validation session) is needed.
... Indeed, psychologists have increasingly and more publicly become involved in the coaching industry in 1990's, because the aim of executive or life coaching is to facilitate sustained cognitive, emotional and behavioural change (Douglas & MacCauley, 1999). In addition, a number of studies asserted that coaches without fundamental psychology knowledge may not be able to recognise coaching clients' mental health issues and may cause harm to coaching clients (Berglas, 2002;Naughton, 2002, Kauffman and Scoular, 2004and Cavanagh, 2005. Therefore, to what extent a background in psychology is an essential requirement for a professional coach is still a point of debate. ...
Objective:
This submission is an extension of a previous paper presented at the 3rd European Coaching Psychology Conference 2011. The current focus is on a Systematic Review of evidence in Coaching Psychology with particular reference to effective Coaching Psychologists’ attributes.
Design:
Transparent Systematic Review methodology synthesised 140 Coaching Psychology studies to examine in what way are Coaching Psychologist’s attributes associated with the effectiveness of coaching. Narrative Synthesis integrated study findings through within-study and cross-study synthesis to summarise the key coaches’ attributes, taking account of variations in study quality and other variations that may affect the generalizability of the results.
Method:
The major phases of this SR research:
• A pilot literature search was carried out to ascertain if a SR is needed and how it fits into existing research evidences.
• 10 coaching experts were invited (either academics or practitioners from international locations) to obtain their perspectives on the review topic, elicit review questions and review methods by semi-structured interviews.
• 58 search terms were identified and used to search 8 electronic databases including PsycINFO, Business Source Complete.
• Initial search results were screened with 7 inclusion criteria such as if this study examined or investigated effective coaches’ attributes. 140 papers that meet a priori standards were included in the final analysis by means of narrative synthesis.
Results:
• The top five most frequently applied and examined psychological coaching approaches were elicited; such as Cognitive Behavioural Coaching model which was examined by ten quantitative studies from the included studies is the most frequently applied psychological coaching approach from this Systematic Review. Eight factors that enhance the coaching relationship were identified including trust and communication.
• Effective Coaching Psychologist attributes (required knowledge, attitudes and behaviours) were summarised in a preliminary framework.
Conclusion:
• More rigorous studies are needed to promote evidence-based coaching study and practice: some coaching methods are widely discussed or applied, however there are no rigorous existing studies (e.g. NLP).
• The preliminary coaching psychologist competency framework which will feed into follow-up experimental studies.
... on the other hand, such diversity increases the difficulty to develop a standardised coaching definition, focus, result evaluation method and coaches' selection and development scheme (sherman & Freas, 2004). indeed, psychologists have increasingly and more publicly become involved in the coaching industry in 1990s, because the aim of executive or life coaching is to facilitate sustained cognitive, emotional and behavioural change (douglas & MacCauley, 1999). in addition, a number of studies asserted that coaches without fundamental psychology knowledge may not be able to recognise coaching clients' mental health issues and may cause harm to coaching clients (Berglas, 2002;Cavanagh, 2005;Kauffman & scoular, 2004;Naughton, 2002). therefore, to what extent a back-International Coaching Psychology Review l Vol. 9 No. 2 September 2014 121 ground in psychology is an essential requirement for a professional coach is still a point of debate. ...
Objectives:
There is a growing breadth of coaching research with 634 published papers between 2001 and 2011. However there is little empirical research evaluating the effectiveness of coaching and there had been few attempts to develop theoretical models of coaching. This is an issue that the growing coaching psychology movement has begun to address (Grant, 2005). It is now timely to integrate the existing evidence base with the first SR of Coaching Psychology, which uses a specified a priori research protocol. Thus, the objectives of this paper are a) to introduce the principles of SR, b) to share the protocol and c) to present the initial findings.
Design:
We utilise the six principles of a SR as set out by Denyer and Tranfield (2009) to guide the research questions and review process.
Method:
We will mainly concentrate on that the planning stage including results from interviews with 10 coaching and coaching psychology experts which were undertaken to refine and review the SR process via qualitative integration, the development of the protocol and the data extraction form used to assess and classify primary studies.
Results
• The interview data outlines the sheer breadth and diversity of viewpoints within coaching psychology, as well as the difficulty of assessing ‘effectiveness’. This process has resulted in research questions such as “To what extent do psychological interventions promote the effectiveness of coaching? What is the respective evidence for the most applied psychological approaches? ”. Preliminary literature search are currently being compiled, such as the total number, places and years of publication and initial quality assessments.
Conclusion:
Many coaching studies are still based on case study methods rather than experimental methods providing a challenge to systematic evaluation. Diverse psychological coaching interventions and outcome measurements pose a challenge for assessing the quality of studies as well, as well as for the more general articulation and definition of the boundaries and hallmarks of coaching psychology.
Objectives
Until now, rather limited empirical research has been conducted as regards managers who coach their employees (Crabb, 2011). The aim of this research was to investigate the managers’ challenging and successful experience when coaching their employees and how these coaching sessions were assessed by their employees.
Design
The overall study investigated 15 middle managers – from a major Danish nationwide company who were trained to coach by two coaching psychologists through theoretical presentations, individual coaching and peer coaching sessions with direct supervision (learning-by-doing: Spaten, 2011b) – when they were coaching their 75 employees through an online survey and semi-structured interviews.
Methods
Four middle managers and employees were interviewed after the intervention. Thematic analysis was chosen and elicited three main themes: (1) coaching skills; (2) professional and personal development; and (3) the coaching relationship and power relation.
Results
The study found that the manager as coach should be highly sensitive and empathetic in building the coaching relationship, should be aware of the power relation, and should draw clear boundaries between their role as leader and their role as coach. The middle managers’ coaching skills were assessed very positively by employees.
Globally, employees are experiencing many challenges to their sense of well-being. The COVID-19 crisis, as well as the enormous technological development we are experiencing, has contributed to employees’ poor mental health. This chapter offers a synopsis of different theoretical frameworks that support our understanding of well-being from a positive psychological perspective. The theoretical frameworks presented include the Conservation of Resources Theory (COR), the PERMA theory and the Job Demands-Resources (JD-R) theory. Some interventions that could be introduced to support employee well-being in the future are also recommended.KeywordsConservation-of-Resources theoryJob Demands-Resources theoryPERMA theoryPositive psychologyTheoretical frameworksWell-being
This paper examines the effectiveness of a peer coaching intervention on aspects of well‐being in students. The study employed a two‐factor mixed design. Two groups of third‐year undergraduate psychology students participated in this study. The coaching group (N = 32) comprised 24 females and eight males (mean age 25.23, SD = 8.07) who were studying coaching psychology. This group was introduced to a model of coaching and practiced skills during lectures and seminars. They subsequently conducted and received five sessions of peer coaching before an examination period. The control group (N = 33) comprised 30 females and three males (mean age 24.77, SD = 5.57). This group was also third‐year students but were not studying coaching psychology or engaged in peer coaching.
Measures were taken at Time 1 (pre‐coaching intervention) and Time 2 (post‐coaching intervention). Demographic data were obtained and the General Health Questionnaire and the Inventory of Personal Problems were utilized. The topics covered in coaching sessions and the perceived effectiveness of the technique were examined at Time 2. The results showed that levels of psychological distress were high at both data points. Findings highlighted significant differences in outcome variables for both groups between Times 1 and 2. Nonetheless, the increase in psychological distress was significantly lower in the peer coaching group. The most common topics covered in coaching sessions were relationships, health, and career issues and 67% of the sample found the intervention to be at least moderately effective. Findings highlight the potential value of peer coaching in helping students manage their well‐being during a potentially stressful period. Follow‐up research is ongoing to examine ways of extending this technique in university settings.
The interest in evidence-based coaching practice has been awakened since the beginning of this millennium; Grant’s literature review on coaching (Grant, 2001) was one of the pioneering studies to highlight the importance of psychological principles in coaching practice. Unlike other similar helping interventions (e.g. counselling and therapy), coaching is recognised as a cross-disciplinary intervention (such as management, psychology, social science, etc.). Therefore it is a big challenge to integrate the best available knowledge for evidence-based coaching practice. Several coaching related professional bodies (e.g. British Psychological Society, European Mentoring and Coaching Council, etc.) started to focus on defining the distinctions between coaching and other similar interventions because this is an essential step to identifying the most fitting principles for evidence-based coaching practice (Briner & Rousseau, 2011). Some special interest groups of coaching psychology were established (e.g. Interest Group Coaching Psychology by the Australian Psychological Society in 2002 and Special Group of Coaching Psychology by the British Psychological Society in 2004) to promote and strengthen psychological principles in coaching and coaching psychology practice. After more than a decade’s endeavour on the development of evidence-based coaching, the psychological standing in the coaching field was assured through three meta-analysis studies and four systematic reviews (Theeboom, Beersma, & van Vianen, 2014; Lai & McDowall, 2014; Jones, Woods, & Guillaume, 2015; Sonesh et al., 2015; Grover, & Furnham, 2016; Athanasopoulou, & Dopson, 2018; Bozer, & Jones, 2018). However, some evidence-based practice advocates still have doubts on the effectiveness of coaching interventions because the quality of the evidence is questioned (Briner, 2012). For instance, the majority of the coaching studies relied on qualitative research methods. However, randomised controlled trials (RCTs) are regarded as the most appropriate methodology to examine the effectiveness of interventions (Guyatt et al., 1995; Guyatt et al., 2000). Thus, the numbers of solid quantitative studies (e.g. trials with definite results) are expected to increase. According to Briner and Rousseau (2011), a systematic review (SR) which assesses all available evidence is identified as the most rigorous methodology for the evolution of evidence-based practice. Therefore, this chapter aims to provide an overview of up-to-date coaching psychology research evidence through synthesising two SRs on coaching psychology (Lai & McDowall, 2014; Lai, 2016). This analysis mainly scrutinises contemporary coaching research methodologies (1995–2016) and makes a comparison between two reviews. This will provide an in-depth understanding of the journey of evidence-based coaching in the past decade and identify future areas of research.
This is a preview PDF to book including foreword, preface, Chapter 1 and references.
Positive Psychology Coaching in Practice provides a comprehensive overview of positive psychology coaching, bringing together the best of science and practice, highlighting current research, and emphasising the applicability of each element to coaching. With an international range of contributors, this book is a unique resource for those seeking to integrate positive psychology into their evidence-based coaching practice. Beginning with an overview of positive psychology coaching, the book includes an assessment of theories of wellbeing, an examination of mindfulness research, a guide to relevant neuroscience, and a review of a strengths-based approach. It also contains chapters that explore the application of ACT, the role of positive psychology in wellness and resilience coaching, positive leadership theory, and developmental psychological theories as they relate to coaching through significant life transitions. In each chapter, theory and research is thoroughly explored and applied directly to coaching practice and is supported with a list of relevant resources and a case study. The book concludes with the editors' views on the future directions of positive psychology coaching. Positive Psychology Coaching in Practice will be essential reading for professional coaches in practice and in training seeking to enhance their evidence-based practice; coaching psychologists; practitioners of positive psychology; and academics and students of coaching, coaching psychology, and positive psychology. Suzy Green is a clinical and coaching psychologist based in Australia. She is a leader in the fields of coaching psychology and positive psychology and is the founder of Sydney-based The Positivity Institute, dedicated to the research and application of positive psychology.
Bu araştırmanın amacı, denetlenenlerin denetime ilişkin tutumlarını ölçen, geçerli ve güvenilir bir ölçme aracı geliştirmektir. Bu araştırmanın evrenini 2016-2017 öğretim yılında Samsun İli merkez ilçelerinde görev yapan yönetici ve öğretmenler oluşturmaktadır. Örneklemini ise, bu evrenden random olarak seçilen ve araştırmaya gönüllü katılmayı kabul eden 554 yönetici ve öğretmen oluşturmuştur. Ölçeğin, açımlayıcı faktör analizi kullanılarak 29 madde üzerinden yapılan analizden sonra özdeğeri 1’in üstünde olan üç alt boyuttan oluştuğu anlaşılmıştır. Üç alt boyutun birlikte açıkladığı toplam varyans yüzdesi ise 65,17 olmuştur. Doğrulayıcı faktör analizine göre ise, bütün maddelerin ilgili faktörler altında anlamlı bir yapı oluşturduğu ve standart faktör yük değerlerinin .30 ve üzerinde olduğu görülmüştür. Ölçeğin toplam puanlarının Cronbach’s Alpha değerleri .95, Guttman değeri .87 ve Spearman Brown değeri .87 olmuştur. Bu değerler, “Denetime İlişkin Tutum Ölçeği”nin denetlenenlerin denetime ilişkin tutumlarını ölçmede geçerli ve güvenilir bir ölçüm yapabileceğinin kanıtı olarak kabul edilebilir.
The rapid growth of the coaching profession has outpaced the development of sound theory and a scientific foundation to anchor it as a psychological discipline. In this paper, which uses transition coaching as a focal point, both Gestalt theory and principles and positive psychology are examined as potential theoretical and scientific bases for the practice of coaching. The author concludes that, though Gestalt theory is an intuitive and useful framework for coaching, particularly when applied in conjunction with models of transition such as Hudson's (1999) model of adult experience of change, its evidence base is lacking. Positive psychology, with a growing body of empirical research on the nature and mechanisms of human thriving, provides a more robust scientific base from which to anchor the profession of coaching.
As has been stated many times by its chief proponents, positive psychology is focused on the application of psychological science to the optimization of human experience (Seligman, 20 ll ). It is therefore no surprise that advances in positive psychological science tend to be closely followed by efforts to develop and validate new positive psychological interventions (PPis). PPis arc intentional acti vi ties that aim to increase well-being through the cultivation of positive feelings, cognitions, and behaviors. Examples of popular PPis include methods used for idcntif), ing and developing strengths (sec Chapter 4), exercises for cultivating gratitude (sec Chapter 1), and visualizations of one's best possible self (Seligman, Steen, Park, & Peterson, 2005; Sheldon & Lyubomirsky, 2006 ). Encouragingly, a recent meta- analytic study of 51 PPI-related studies has reported that many of these practical applications arc capable of both significantly enhancing well-being and reducing psychopathology (Sin & Lyubomirsky, 2009).
Dieser Beitrag beschreibt den Coaching-Prozess aus verschiedenen Perspektiven. Einerseits thematisiert er inhaltlich abzugrenzende Prozessphasen und Abläufe im Coaching und stellt andererseits Analysen zur direkten Interaktion von Coach und Klient vor. Dabei wird der Frage nachgegangen, wie der Coach die Beziehung zum Klienten positiv gestalten und dessen Erfolg im Prozess unterstützen kann. Im Fokus stehen Studien, in denen die Bedeutung verbaler und nonverbaler Botschaften für den Coaching-Erfolg systematisch auf der Grundlage von verschrifteten Coaching-Gesprächen oder Video-Aufnahmen analysiert wird.
This chapter defines life coaching and what sets it apart from executive coaching and from psychotherapy. It briefly describes the development of life coaching and discusses the common factors that may account for what works in different coaching models, and it offers an overview of the existing research about the effectiveness of coaching, as well as the evidence for the effects of positive psychology interventions. The four outcome studies about life coaching have indicated that coaching can improve goal attainment, enhance psychological and subjective well-being as well as resilience, and that coaching can reduce depression, stress, and anxiety. Positive psychology can provide a coherent theoretical framework and a body of scientific evidence that greatly enhances coaching. Life coaches can incorporate positive psychology into their practice as a general orientation or as a source of information, and they can implement purposeful specific interventions and research-based self-help.
Applied positive psychology is concerned with facilitating good lives and enabling people to be at their best. It is as much an approach as a particular domain of inquiry. As shown throughout this chapter, positive psychology has applications that span almost every area of applied psychology and beyond. In clinical psychology, counseling and psychotherapy, applied positive psychology builds on the traditions of humanistic psychology and Carl Rogers' client-centered therapy. It challenges the dominant assumptions of the medical model and promotes a dimensional, rather than dichotomous, understanding of mental health and mental illness. Beyond the alleviation of psychopathology, applied positive psychology has also seen the development of specific happiness-increase interventions, including counting one's blessings, using signature strengths, and paying a gratitude visit. In education, applied positive psychology has been used to promote flow in the classroom, as well as harnessing children's strengths to aid their learning and development. Forensic applications of positive psychology are represented by the good lives model of offender management, which focuses on the adaptive satisfaction of human needs. In Industrial Organizational (I/O) psychology, positive psychology applications are represented throughout work on transformational leadership, employee engagement, positive organizational scholarship, positive organizational behavior, appreciative inquiry, and strengths-based organization. In society, more broadly, applied positive psychology is shown to influence the development of life coaching and the practice of executive coaching, while population approaches are being explored in relation to epidemiology and the promotion of social well-being. Having reviewed these diverse areas, the chapter then goes on to consider the theoretical basis for applied positive psychology; the questions of who should apply positive psychology, as well as where and how; and whether positive psychology applications could be universally relevant. The chapter concludes by considering what the future of applied positive psychology may hold and suggesting that the discipline has the potential to impact positively on people throughout the world.
Introduction Positive Psychology Approaches and Coaching Positive Coaching Psychology Approaches and Models Research Evidence and Positive Coaching Psychology in Coaching Practice Future Research Conclusion References
The explosive growth of coaching over the past decade has been accompanied by comparable growth in coach training as well as in membership of professional bodies representing the industry. Yet philosophical and intellectual debates over executive coaching and its measurable value and outcomes appear limited in much of the existing literature. Many practitioners appear uncomfortable with the hard measurement of real return on investment, preferring softer, more qualitative approaches to evaluation. To challenge the self-perpetuating myth of value which has grown up around executive coaching, The Value of Executive Coaching critically explores the discourses surrounding this aspect of leadership development and considers different ways of thinking about its growth, development and application outside its established functionalist perspective. Using case study evidence, this exciting new text enhances our understanding of how and why the value proposition of executive coaching is perceived and perpetuated, and provides readers with the opportunity to explore some of the issues which influence perceptions of value. This bookwill be valuable reading for practising coaches and students on postgraduate coaching courses.
The applications of positive psychology are different from traditional interventions in therapy in that they are focused on building strength, resilience and well-being rather than being restricted to simply treating disorder. Since the publication of the first edition of Positive Therapy , there is now a comprehensive body of applied positive psychology research to which practitioners may turn in order to inform their own practice, and that sees its purpose as the facilitation of human flourishing and optimal functioning. However, much of this research and its implications are only now becoming more widely understood in counselling and psychotherapy. This new and expanded edition of Positive Therapy shows how the latest thinking in positive psychology can be applied to psychotherapeutic practice, and specifically to person-centred therapy. Making the links between positive psychology and psychotherapy explicit, Stephen Joseph describes the new tools that practitioners can draw upon to help and facilitate positive functioning in their clients. New material includes: An update of the latest positive psychology research A new preface, explaining how positive psychology principles can now be applied to therapeutic practice Focus on positive psychology measurement tools Positive Therapy will be essential reading for all psychotherapists, counsellors, social workers, coaches, psychologists and trainees interested in exploring how they engage with clients, and the implications of this engagement in practice.
Bu araştırmada pozitif psikolojik sermaye, örgütsel güven ve örgütsel vatandaşlık davranışı arasındaki ilişki incelenmiş ve sağlık sektörü açısından kapsamlı değerlendirmelerde bulunulmuştur.
Bu araştırmada pozitif psikolojik sermaye, örgütsel güven ve örgütsel vatandaşlık davranışı arasındaki ilişki incelenmiş ve sağlık sektörü açısından kapsamlı değerlendirmelerde bulunulmuştur.
Purpose
– While advancements in theory have helped illumine the complex workings of today’s organization, little is said on the practical implications for managers in terms of their role and behavioral style. The purpose of this paper is to illustrate how a behavioral diagnostic tool – the Competing Values Framework (CVF; Quinn and Rohrbaugh, 1983) – can be utilized to develop managers in the behavioral skills needed to stay relevant and effective amid new organizational realities.
Design/methodology/approach
– The conceptual anchor of this paper is in complexity theory. The authors conducted a literature search for articles on complexity theory in selective management journals, and reviewed them to extract key lessons for effective managerial behavior.
Findings
– Three behaviors found to be central to managing complexity were: enabling, sensemaking, and facilitating shared leadership. It is suggested that the CVF is a useful tool for helping managers develop their behavioral repertoire and hence their skills for enacting these behaviors.
Originality/value
– The paper synthesizes a guiding frame for developing managers in some of the behavioral skills needed to handle complexity at the workplace. Toward this end, useful tips are offered for putting together a short training workshop where the CVF is rediscovered as a unique developmental tool.
Increasingly the professional development literature in sports coaching encourages coaches to coach holistically. Yet the phrase ‘holistic coaching’ is mired in ambiguity and has the potential to become meaningless. The aims of this article are to explore the relationship between holism, humanistic psychology, humanism and sports coaching, and to pose some challenges, which could support the field to move beyond the influence of humanistic psychology.
This action research is the first reported attempt to examine the effects of executive coaching in a public sector municipal agency. Thirty-one managers underwent a conventional managerial training program, which was followed by eight weeks of one-on-one executive coaching. Training increased productivity by 22.4 percent. The coaching, which included: goal setting, collaborative problem solving, practice, feedback, supervisory involvement, evaluation of end-results, and a public presentation, increased productivity by 88.0 percent, a significantly greater gain compared to training alone. Descriptions of procedures, explanations for the results obtained, and suggestions for future research and practice are offered.
Outlines the 5 research-based strategies that guide one-on-one coaching by a management consulting firm: forge a partnership, inspire commitment, grow skills, promote persistence, and shape the environment. The case study of a typical targeted coaching participant (a female executive who sought to develop stronger relationships with internal customers and enhanced credibility on strategic business issues) is presented and contrasted with other coaching services (i.e., intensive coaching and executive coaching) provided by the firm. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
The author suggests the use of Arnold A. Lazarus's multimodal therapy model as an integrative and holistic approach to executive coaching. So as not to overlook any significant factors, the coach evaluates the executive on seven dimensions. The eclectic-oriented practitioner is encouraged to use a variety of interventions and tests that uniquely suit the client. Suggestions on potential new markets for consultants are discussed. A case study is presented of an executive whose new job demands the undertaking of a major reorganization and corporate culture change. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
Describes a systems-based approach to executive coaching that attempts to maximize the consideration of contextual factors. The case study of a 44-yr-old male executive illustrates this approach. The author notes that perhaps the greatest danger in coaching individuals from organizations in which there is no ongoing consulting relationship is the possibility that the psychologist may inadvertently participate in scapegoating by an organization or by a boss who is unable or unwilling to look deeply enough at the ways that the environment may be supporting the conditions underlying the individual's seemingly maladaptive response. The more removed the coaching is from the organizational context, the more pains the psychologist must take to ensure that the context is woven into the fabric of the coaching relationship and that the organization be persuaded that it, too, needs to play a role in defining and achieving the desired outcome. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
A review of the literature on coaching reveals that very little empirical research has focused on the executive coaching methods used by consultants with managers and leaders in organizations. Within the framework of a 17-dimensional model of systems and psychodynamic theory, the author provides an overview of a conceptual approach to coaching activities that incorporates 5 identifiable components plus an emphasis on goal setting, intervention methods, and hypothesized factors in negative consulting outcomes. A definition of executive coaching is offered as a way of summarizing the literature and differentiating these consulting activities from others for the purpose of improving conceptual clarity and encouraging specific research on the concepts, methods, and outcomes of such activities. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
Seventy-two articles on executive coaching appearing in mainstream and trade management publications between 1991 and 1998 were analyzed to determine (a) general opinions of the practice of executive coaching and (b) the extent to which training in psychology was described as relevant and useful to coaching practice. A content analysis methodology yielded reliable coding across raters. Results of the review suggest that favorable views of executive coaching far exceed unfavorable views. However psychologists were infrequently recognized as uniquely competent practitioners. Implications of these findings for psychologists in coaching roles are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
This article reports a study of current perceptions among professionals regarding therapy and coaching. Whereas therapy and counseling have been traditional fields of study and practice, coaching is not as well developed. It is helpful to examine the perceptions of practicing professionals in order to delineate the distinctions and overlaps in these modalities. A set of 7 questions was used to explore these viewpoints with a participant pool of professional coaches--therapists. Interview data and narrative summaries provide a perspective on the controversy of coaching versus therapy. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
Provides consulting psychologists with an overview of an approach to executive coaching that took place over 3 yrs with a troubled leader. An ongoing 360-degree assessment together with numerous "loops" of feedback and developmental counseling sessions served as the baseline for coaching an autocratic and coercive but valued executive. This case study (of a male executive in his mid-forties) explores a process that was iterative and interlaced and that resulted in significantly different and more positive and functional leadership behavior. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
This article outlines a coaching paradigm derived from constructive-developmental psychology, family therapy supervision, and theories of organizational cognition. The paradigm is one of transformative, developmental coaching, and thus it differs from both cognitive-behavioral and psychodynamic approaches. The paradigm is exemplified by a model of the mental space (topology) in which executive coaching is thought to take place. The paradigm and the model are developmental in a twofold sense, that of "ontic" development occurring in cognitive organisms maturing over their lifetime ("nature") and of "agentic" development brought about by humans ("nurture"). An introduction to the model is presented, followed by the topology of the mental space of coaching, a summary, and suggested topics for future research. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
Determined whether study-skills training contributed to a treatment program that included relaxation training and cognitive therapy. 45 test-anxious undergraduates were randomly assigned to 1 of 4 treatment conditions: (a) relaxation/cognitive therapy, (b) study-skills training, (c) a combination of relaxation/cognitive therapy and study-skills training, or (d) no treatment. Pre- and posttreatment measures were collected on self-reported state anxiety and classroom examination performance. Findings show that relaxation/cognitive therapy was effective in reducing anxiety but failed to improve classroom test scores. Study-skills training had no significant effect on either measure. The combined therapy both reduced anxiety and improved performance relative to the no-treatment control condition and was significantly more effective than was either treatment alone. (37 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
While executive coaching continues to mushroom as a practice area, there has been little outcome research. This article presents the results of a study that explored factors influencing the choice of a coach, executives' reactions to working with a coach, the pros and cons of both internal and external coaches, the focus of executive coaching engagements, indications of successful coaching engagements, coaching tools executives favored, and the sustainability of coached executives' learning and behavior change. The author also raises a question about which executives are most likely to benefit from this development resource and presents a typology for gauging this issue. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
A pretest-posttest control-group design (
N = 20) was used to assess the effects of transformational leadership training, with 9 and 11 managers assigned randomly to training and control groups, respectively. Training consisted of a 1-day group session and 4 individual booster sessions thereafter on a monthly basis. Multivariate analyses of covariance, with pretest scores as the covariate, showed that the training resulted in significant effects on subordinates' perceptions of leaders' transformational leadership, subordinates' own organizational commitment, and 2 aspects of branch-level financial performance. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
The use of an executive or life coach in order to enhance one's work performance or life experience is increasing in popularity. However, there is little empirical research attesting to the effectiveness of executive or life coaching, and there have been few attempts to outline a psychology of coaching. This paper reviews the empirical and theoretical psychological literature on executive and life coaching and, drawing on previous clinical and counselling psychology details a solution-focused, cognitive-behavioural framework for a psychology of coaching. The review finds that there is some measure of empirical support for the effectiveness of coaching, but coaching research is still in its infancy. A number of directions for future research are outlined which may further the establishment of the emerging discipline of coaching psychology.
Several authors have reflected on the underdeveloped state of organizational change theory, research, and practice. This field needs an integrative framework that can synthesize major approaches to change. The Transtheoretical Model has the potential to do for organizational change what it has done for individual behavior change. Conceptually the stages-of-change dimension can be used to integrate principles and processes of change from divergent models of change. Practically, the stages-of-change dimension can be applied by leaders to reduce resistance, increase participation, reduce dropout, and increase change progress among employees.
A science of positive subjective experience, positive individual traits, and positive institutions promises to improve quality of life and prevent the pathologies that arise when life is barren and meaningless. The exclusive focus on pathology that has dominated so much of our discipline results in a model of the human being lacking the positive features that make life worth living. Hope, wisdom, creativity, future mindedness, courage, spirituality, responsibility, and perseverance are ignored or explained as transformations of more authentic negative impulses. The 15 articles in this millennial issue of the American Psychologist discuss such issues as what enables happiness, the effects of autonomy and self-regulation, how optimism and hope affect health, what constitutes wisdom, and how talent and creativity come to fruition. The authors outline a framework for a science of positive psychology, point to gaps in our knowledge, and predict that the next century will see a science and profession that will come to understand and build the factors that allow individuals, communities, and societies to flourish.
Myers and Diener (1995) asked “Who is happy?” but examined the question of who is more and who is less happy In fact, most people report a positive level of subjective well-being (SWB), and say that they are satisfied with domains such as marriage, work, and leisure People in disadvantaged groups on average report positive well-being, and measurement methods in addition to self-report indicate that most people's affect is primarily pleasant Cross-national data suggest that there is a positive level of SWB throughout the world, with the possible exception of very poor societies In 86% of the 43 nations for which nationally representative samples are available the mean SWB response was above neutral Several hypotheses to explain the positive levels of SWB are discussed
This chapter discusses the mental processes that underlie motivation to learn and skill domains (metacognitive, cognitive, and affective) that are represented by these processes. It also discusses types of learning strategies in each of these domains that can be identified and taught to students who are deficient in the processes and skills that are required for motivation to learn. In current views of learning, the learner is seen as responsible for attending to instruction and for actively constructing the mental elaborations that make learning personally meaningful. In order for learners to accept responsibility for their own learning, they must be motivated as well as possess the skills and abilities to actively engage appropriate metacognitive, cognitive, and affective (motivational) strategies. A learning strategies training program has, as one of its most important functions, the purpose of promoting self-control of learning or self-directed learning.
The unrelenting pace of business in modern organizations places constant pressure on employees, challenging the physical and emotional resources of both staff and supervisors. Consultants have become familiar with the
survivalist mentality among workers, each struggling to improve production, solve intractable conflict, and chart realistic growth. This book was written to help organizational consultants understand the chaotic processes and psychodynamic problems that influence executive behavior and performance. In engaging prose highlighted by substantial case illustrations, the author examines organizational conflict and shows how methods and techniques developed in clinical settings can be applied to coach executives and management teams. The book is an important read for consultants who wish to help executives develop human wisdom and to gain insight into the chaotic, "shadow" side of individual and organizational life. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
In this 1st volume of a series in behavior modification, A. A. Lazarus and 11 co-authors present a multimodal psychotherapeutic approach which stresses the assessment of 7 dimensions of a patient's personality: behavior, affect, sensation, imagery, cognition, interpersonal relationships, and drugs. Part 1 addresses some clinical and theoretical foundations, while Part 2 presents applications through clinical reports and case studies. A life history questionnaire is apended. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
Presents the results of a study sponsored by Boston University's Executive Development Roundtable that allow a critical review of the state of the practice of executive coaching. The study consisted of interviews with over 75 executives in Fortune 100 companies, as well as interviews with 15 executive coaches referred to the researchers as leaders in the field. The study was also informed by the practical executive coaching experiences of the authors, who work in a range of institutional settings. When done as intended, coaching can be an effective means of improving business results while contributing to executive development. However, coaching can grow beyond the control of top management as the demand grows for having a "personal trainer." Not only does this aspect add considerably to the cost of doing business, but there is also the risk of wrong advice by external coaches who do not really understand the business, sometimes resulting in disastrous consequences for both the manager and organization. Although the data indicate generally positive outcomes from executive coaching activities, there were three primary areas of concern: managing the growth of demand, addressing ethical issues arising from the coaching process, and defining program scope and controlling costs. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
Presents a systems-oriented approach to the leadership development of top-level executives. A structured program is described that is designed to have a positive impact at the organizational level through focused work with the individual client. Leadership effectiveness is seen as strongly influenced by the individual's past, personal life, and work environment. Comprehensive information gathered from the client's work life and personal life increases understanding of behaviors that influence performance, and thereby fosters change. Development is perceived from a holistic point of view, with benefits to the organization accruing through increased effectiveness in any areas of the client's life. A case example (of a 40-yr-old male) is given to illustrate how this approach is put into effect. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
Outlines the development, implementation, and evaluation of a performance enhancement program for an 18-yr-old female college tennis player. Baseline data were collected, goals were set to enhance performance of tennis and mental skills, and an 8-wk program was devised to meet the goals. The S met regularly with the researcher for imagery sessions and discussions about the processes established for performance enhancement. Psychological goals were improving concentration, coping with negative thoughts, establishing a controlled pre-game preparation, and becoming energized when tired. Satisfactory progress was made on 4 of 5 performance areas and 3 of the 4 psychological goals. (French, Spanish, German & Italian abstracts) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
Representatives from a random sample of 300 U.S. corporations were interviewed by telephone to examine their use of formal developmental relationships as a management development strategy. Based on an 82 percent response rate, findings were obtained regarding the frequency of programs using formal developmental relationships, expectations regarding future use of formal developmental relationships, program characteristics, program visibility, and program effectiveness. In addition, comparisons between organizations with programs and organizations without programs were made on the basis of organization size, sales volume, employee trends, sales trends, and organizational age. From the 246 participating organizations, 52 respondents indicated that their organization had at least one management development initiative currently in place that paired employees with peers, senior managers, or outside consultants. Specific types of initiatives discussed by the respondents included one-on-one mentoring, apprenticeships, team coaching, peer coaching, executive coaching, action learning, and structured networks. Organizations with initiatives in place tended to employ more individuals and have larger sales volumes than organizations with no programs in place.
Thesis (Ed. D., Counseling Psychology Program)--University of San Francisco, 1999. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 87-99).
A personal coach to help your most promising executives reach their potential--sounds good, doesn't it? But, according to Steven Berglas, executive coaches can make a bad situation worse. Because of their backgrounds and biases, they ignore psychological problems they don't understand. Companies need to consider psychotherapeutic intervention when the symptoms plaguing an executive are stubborn or severe. Executives with issues that require more than coaching come in many shapes and sizes. Consider Rob Bernstein, an executive vice president of sales at an automotive parts distributor. According to the CEO, Bernstein had just the right touch with clients but caused personnel problems inside the company. The last straw came when Bernstein publicly humiliated a mail clerk who had interrupted a meeting to ask someone to sign for a package. At that point, the CEO assigned Tom Davis to coach Bernstein. Davis, a former corporate lawyer, worked with Bernstein for four years. But Davis only exacerbated the problem by teaching Bernstein techniques for "handling" employees--methods that were condescending at best. While Bernstein appeared to be improving, he was in fact getting worse. Bernstein's real problems went undetected, and when his boss left the company, he was picked as the successor. Soon enough, Bernstein was again in trouble, suspected of embezzlement. This time, the CEO didn't call Davis; instead, he turned to the author, a trained psychotherapist, for help. Berglas soon realized that Bernstein had a serious narcissistic personality disorder and executive coaching could not help him. As that tale and others in the article teach us, executives to be coached should at the very least first receive a psychological evaluation. And company leaders should beware that executive coaches given free rein can end up wreaking personnel havoc.
Now, discover your strengths
- M. Buckingham
- D. O. Clifton
In support of complexity paradox and wisdom in leaders: How type development theory offers guidance for coaching midlife executives
- C R Fitzgerald
The action lab: Creating a greenhouse for organizational change
- R. T. Pascale
- A. H. Miller
Co-active coaching: New skills for coaching people toward success in work and life
- L. Whitworth
- H. Kimsey-House
- P. Sandahl
Is U.K. business coaching based on testable psychological theory?
- P A Scoular
Feet of clay: A study of gurus
- A. Storr
Using type in executive coaching
- Thompson G.
New directions for teaching and learning
- B. J. Zimmerman
- A. S. Paulson
The mentorcoach training program foundations manual
- B. Dean
Emotional intelligence
- D. Goleman
Solution focused coaching
- J. Greene
- A. Grant
Enhancing leadership effectiveness through psychological type
- R. R. Pearman
Learning and study strategies: Issues in assessment, instruction and evaluation
- B. L. McCombs
Authentic happiness coaching
- M E P Seligman
- B Dean
Coaching for performance
- J. Whitmore