What is ‘Coaching’ all about?
More and more people are becoming ‘coaches’ and are persuaded it’s a way to make a good living – but what is it?
I hear many people say, often in networking meetings, they don’t believe ‘coaching’ whether it be personal or business, has any benefit or just ‘doesn’t work’.
Part of the problem is there’s a lot of confusion about what the process of coaching actually entails. For the answer, we have to look to sport, which, I believe, is where the term ‘coach’ first appeared.
The origin of this usage of the word coach, normally applied to a vehicle, was first in education as far back as the 18th century where ‘a coach’, as a person, was a tutor who helped students achieve their qualifications in terms of ‘carrying them quickly to their goals’ or where they wanted to be in life.
In those days ‘coaching’ students was essentially a short term engagement but in sport it’s become more of a long term thing. Top sportspeople have a permanent often full-time personal coach/trainer.
This doesn’t mean the coach has to be a great or better sportsperson that whoever they are working with. Seven times Formula 1 world champion Lewis Hamilton’s personal coach and trainer doesn’t and never has driven a Formula 1 car but she has been working with him for several years now and is always in attendance at every race weekend making sur he is ‘in the zone’ for the event.
As I’ll explain, coaching is really a mix of several roles and if done properly is essential to peak performance and achievement of goals in all areas of life and business – to get there or even find out where we want to go we all need a ‘coach’ – and possibly a few horses
