Defining Coaching
The world of coaching, mentoring, sponsoring and even therapy remains, to an extent, poorly understood amongst the general population. They each lack clearly and easily identifiable boundaries and a single clear purpose per discipline that is within grasp for those outside of the profession or those who do not have a deep interest in them.
This creates a complex starting point, for those who would benefit from the disciplines do not understand the role they could play and the value they can offer.
Coaching, according to Elaine Cox ‘is a facilitated, dialogic, reflective learning process,’, however it is notoriously ‘not clearly defined’. The definition of Jenny Rogers is helpful at encompassing the breadth of application as she writes ‘Coaching is the art of facilitating another person’s learning, development, well-being and performance’. She continues ‘the whole aim of coaching is to close the gap between people’s potential and their current state’. The practice as identified by the International Coaching Federation is ‘partnering with clients in a thought-provoking and creative process that inspires them to maximise their personal and professional potential’
However, once you move beyond the concept of unlocking potential and dive deeper, the grey areas at the boundaries of coaching become obvious. Cox references a ‘collection of loosely aligned interventions and activities’, and that ‘it’s identity has been blurred by the adoption of techniques from other fields’. This is also evidenced by Page and de Haan, who claim ‘nowadays coaches…want to use whatever works, borrowing ideas from different approaches.
The overarching idea of coaching is designed to be future focused, increasing self awareness to help the coachee increase the number of options available to them in order to move forward and drive change in a way that best meets the need of the situation. .
In the context of executive coaching, it is to support those in positions of management, or significant responsibility (financial or people) to reach their potential. Executive coaches focus on the development of employees in these positions, providing a trusted environment to help the coachee explore their competence, perception and potential skill set gaps. In the context of executive coaching for relocation, one can expect that the level of change these leaders are experiencing is significant, as Raija Salomaa writes ‘the challenges of expatriates tend to occur simultaneously, complementing and reinforcing each other, especially in the early-assignment stages’. Executive coaching also crucially focuses on the interpersonal and intra personal, which is a fundament at the heart of any international relocation.
It is defined by Raija Salomaa as ‘a human development process of the coachee that involves structured interaction and the use of appropriate strategies, tools and techniques in an international context. It is aimed to promote desirable and sustainable change for the benefit of the coachee and potentially for other stakeholders’ (modified from Bachkirova et al. 2010:1).
