What is Coaching Psychology? Can it help you or someone you know as a friend or colleague?
The Special Group in Coaching Psychology of the BPS defines coaching psychology as a discipline "for enhancing well-being and performance in personal life and work domains underpinned by models of coaching grounded in .... psychological principles" (Palmer & Whybrow, 2006).
This places emphasis on the role of psychology in informing the more commonly known definition from Whitmore (2002), which says that "Coaching is unlocking a person's potential to maximise their own performance."
Of course, hypnosis can also be used to tap into your unconsious potentials. A recent paper by Andrew Armatas (2009) explains how hypnosis can go beyond the normal talk, and how it can be used as self-hypnosis by clients outside the consultation room to develop and rehearse their performance in virtual reality.
The famous concert pianist Claudio Arrau (1903 - 1991) was once asked how he managed to keep his technique so brilliantly sharp while he was physically unable to practise during his long hours of travel touring the world. He replied that he did practise - in his head - every minute while travelling, and that he could feel his fingers touching the piano keyboard and hear and feel the music as though the whole experience were real. We know now that this was a form of self-hypnosis, and this anecdote resonates well with Armatas's paper.
In essence coaching psychology is an approach that helps you to become better at what you can presently do and to feel better for it - the two go hand in hand. In a sense coaching psychology goes beyond psychological therapy, and is a manifest example of positive psychology (ie, to do with achievement, happiness etc). It looks to releasing your potential into real terms of enhanced achievement, which should bring about the concomitant effects of greater contentment. So, if psychological therapy is like doing repairs to a car engine, then coaching psychology would be a fitting turbo-charger to it. This is not to say of course that you need one before the other, although there may be instances when there would be overlaps.
Coaching psychology can be done on a one to one basis, but often the more effective route is to involve the views of other key people interested in the enhancement of your well-being in personal life and/or work. One simple way of involving them would be to take views before and after the coaching programme, which would be analysed by the psychologist and reviewed between interested parties, where appropriate, and you could be either the client or the client's "interested party". So, this very much takes isolation out of the programme of personal development. However, any proposed programme of work will have to sit comforably with the client, and will not proceed unless the client is perfectly happy with it. Of course it goes without saying that client confidentiality will, as always, be strigently observed.
If interested, contact me for an informal discussion of your needs.
References
Armatas, A (2009) Coaching Hypnosis: Integrating hypnotic strategies and principles in coaching, International Coaching Psychology Review 4(2), 174-183
Palmer, S & Whybrow, A (2006) The Coaching psychology movement and its development within the British Psychological Society. International Coaching Psychology Review 1(1), 5-11.
Whitmore, J (2002) Coaching for performance. London, Nicholas Brealey
