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Personal
coaching, in its form as a facilitator of growth and
change in life and business, first appeared
under that name in the mid-1980s. As the writers Judge
and Cowell have pointed out, "Like many other
innovations, it seems to have sprung up simultaneously
on the east and west coasts of the United States.” The
first person believed to have used the term “executive
coaching” was Dr. Dick Borough, a practitioner in Palo
Alto, California, who used the term in 1985 to describe
his leadership development activities.
In Co-Active
Coaching, Whitworth, Kimsey-House, and Sandahl state
that professional and personal coaching can be traced
back to executive coaching in large organizations and to
mentoring programs. By 1988 the term “coaching” had
become sufficiently mainstream that Forbes
magazine printed a controversial article, written by
Dyan Machan, entitled, "Sigmund Freud meets Henry
Ford."
You would not yet
have heard of a personal life coach, and UK
personal coaching took a while longer yet, but now,
personal coaching is the second fastest growing
profession in the U.S. It began in California in the
early 1980s, when Thomas Leonard, an accountant,
realized that many of his clients were looking for
broader direction than mere financial advice. They
weren’t in deep distress, and so were not looking for
conventional psychotherapy, but they did want unbiased
advice on solving practical problems in their
lives.
Why the word "coach"? (See also What is Coaching?)
"Coaching" was first used in the
modern sense of a coach of athletes only in 1889, where
it began to refer to the person who trained a team of
crew athletes. Before that, the word had been used
informally to refer to a privately-hired exam tutor. But
it first appeared in the 1500s, referring to a type of
carriage – and in British-English regions, it still does
refer to a type of carriage, namely, a bus. And thus the
etymology of the verb "to coach", which hinted at
conveying a valued person from where he or she was to
where he or she wanted to be.
Since its
inception in the mid-1980s, coaching has often been
included in executive compensation packages. For
employers, coaching represents a relatively small
incremental investment that can significantly increase
the return on the larger investments that were made to
bring an executive on board in the first place. (To
learn about our onboarding best practices service in
particular, go to Leadership Coaching).
For executives, coaching is a perk that offers its own
enhancements to performance, career prospects, and
personal growth.
But coaching isn’t
just for the boardroom anymore. Particularly in the U.S.
and Britain in the last decade, coaching has flowered
into areas having little in common with the boardroom
except the essential goals: to become more mindful, more
authentic, and ultimately more successful. In
Coaching for Leadership, the editors point out
that "Coaching is a rapidly growing vocation these days
because so many of us are searching for a qualified
person to help us develop and improve." Coaching is also
for:
• People
approaching, in, or just past major life changes hire
coaches to help them attain clarity in their values
and aspirations.
• Parents who
may hire coaches for their college-student children to
facilitate their personal development and help them
into the professional world
• Anyone else
who is committed to making the effort to developing
himself and his creativity, autonomy, and
insight
There are coaching
specialties for clients who are women or entrepreneurs
(or both) and for cancer survivors, for those interested
in help with career or other success, even for people
who want to improve their health, wealth, or
relationships.
Contact us about
a personal coach (UK, US, Canada, Australia, New
Zealand) now, and start your
life coaching today.
Related
Articles:
What is Coaching?
Life and
Personal Coaches
Relationship Coaches
Career Coaches
Spiritual Health Coaches
Business Coaches
Internet Business Coaches
Marketing Coaches
Leadership Coaches
Social Entrepreneur Coaches
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