Life Coach Training: My experiences.

Life Coach Training - My Experiences

Contents

I provide these insights and accounts of my experiences of training as a life coach only to serve as an illustration of what the training can be like. If you are interested in becoming a life coach, then this page may be of interest to you.

A Period of Loss and Lack of Satisfaction

My background was as principally as a teacher, though I also had training in counselling. Over the years, I had been feeling more and more unhappy with teaching or rather with the extra demands that were being placed upon teachers. Consequently, I found myself more unhappy with the job and giving less enthusiasm to it.

Late one summer, I lost my mother through cancer and I also lost my job. The was, not surprisingly, a period of great uncertainty and insecurity for me. It was a time of reflection as well as worry. The reflection was largely centred upon finding another career and another way of using what skills I had.

To cut a long story short at this point, I hit upon Life Coaching as a possible career path. I felt that my background in teaching and my interests in counselling and personal development would all be useful in pursuing this choice. Above all, I had a desire to help other people and life coaching seemed to fit that desire.

Choosing the Trainer

My choice of trainer was the UK College of Life Coaching. I had approached and received information from other providers but the UK College seemed to offer more than the others. Also, the UK College offered me the opportunity to 'meet the college' by attending an introduction day.

I must say, the introduction day was very well run. In the morning, we had a series of presentations telling us about life coaching and the work of the college in training and supporting coaches. We also had the opportunity to talk to qualified coaches. Much of what we were shown was very reminiscent of my counselling training except that coaching seemed more tuned to moving people on rather than understanding why they were where they are.

Professionalism Rather than Hard Sell

I went home after that first day with my head buzzing with hope and ideas. However, I had not yet signed up for the training. I wanted time to think about it and consider my options. I feel it was to the credit of the College that they did not push me into making a decision straight away. The appeared far more professional rather than giving the 'hard sell' like some other training bodies I had previously approached.  They also offered a free coaching session with one of their trained coaches.

After consideration, I went back to the College a month later and signed up for the training. Again, I went home with a head full of hope and expectations. One problem for me had seemed to be financing the course. All the trainers had quoted figures around the same mark, so there was little to choose between them. The College had told me that the course would be eligible for a government loan to help me pay for the course, the college also offered interest free credit to pay for it (this was the option I chose).

Starting the Course.

The first part of the course was a residential weekend. This was held at a nice country hotel where the students and tutors could meet and relax in a convivial atmosphere. The first thing that struck me when I arrived at the hotel was the friendliness and warmth of the College tutors who greeted me. I was made to feel very welcome, as were all the students attending. The atmosphere of friendliness and positivity is something that existed throughout the training not just on the residential weekend but afterwards in all my dealings with the College.

My course was starting in the middle of winter so there were fewer than usual students enrolled, even so there were around 20 of us, so it made for a good group. Over the two days of the weekend, the group got to know each other well and also got to know the tutors.

The students were clearly from different backgrounds and walks of life. A couple of us were ex teachers, some were from a business background, others from training fields and others from caring professions. We were all of different ages and a balanced mixture of gender. It was clear that Life Coach training appealed to a wide range of people.

The training over the two days consisted of a range of seminars and practical exercises illustrating different aspects of coaching. The seminars and exercises were broken up by coffee breaks and meals. The meals were excellent and also provided a place for informal chat with the tutors and other students.

The topics covered in the weekend course, included Listening Skills, Questioning Techniques, Values, Beliefs and Goal Setting. These and other 'modules' were all set out in a massive manual that made the training look both comprehensive and professional.

Exhilarating and Demanding

Toward the end of the weekend, each of the students had found the course very exhilarating and also very demanding. Many of us commented about how 'powerful' the weekend had been and how we had each learned a lot about ourselves as a result of the work. A final task was to be assigned a personal mentor who would oversee and guide the rest of our training.

The rest of the training had many parts, there were the modules we had touched upon on the weekend and which we now had to write a number of assignments, there was a 'reflective diary' we had to keep to help us monitor our learning and which would form the basis of an essay at the end, there were the telephone coaching sessions that we would have to perform. Finally we would have to coach our mentor as a means of demonstrating that we were ready to become qualified life coaches.

The training was to take upto a year to complete and started for me with the telephone coaching sessions. These sessions had 2 parts, firstly, there was the 'duo's in which two students coached each other listened to and guided by their mentor, then there was the 'trio's in which 3 different students coached each other.

Duos and Trios

At first I was very nervous about these telephone sessions but, thankfully, my student partner, Angelica, and my mentor, Liz, were both very supportive and enthusiastic. There support and feedback really helped in my learning. After the 3 duo sessions came the trio sessions in which 2 students coached each other while a third listened in and gave feedback. My 2 partners in this were Matt and Pat. The three of us were each very different in our styles and backgrounds, this made for a very informative and positive contribution to our understanding of coaching and coaching techniques.

After all the telephone practice sessions, for me, it was down to writing the assignments. Some were obviously easier than others. Thankfully, the college provided telephone tutorials to help with each module. At the end, we had to turn our reflective diary into a reflective essay to show how we had progressed in our training and how our approach to coaching had been developing. I know many students found this to be both a daunting and a revealing exercise. For me it was interesting to see how my knowledge of coaching had progressed and how I was able to contrast coaching with counselling.

Coaching Exchanges

One of the great benefits of the UK College of Life Coaching is that they run local coaching exchanges across the country and I was able to attend a number of these. Here, both trained and student coaches would meet to exchange ideas etc. I went along to a number of these in order to listen to what was going on and I found them all to be very useful in my studies.

Once the essay and the assignments had been submitted it was time for the final task;- that was to coach my mentor, Liz. As you can imagine, as a student trying to coach a professional coach sounded quite daunting, more so when a senior coach was listening in to assess my suitability. Thankfully, I had a couple of pre-viva sessions with Angelica again to get my hand in and prepare for the final event.

The Final Stage

Well, in the end, the viva session was one of the most enjoyable sessions I had had. I wish I had not been so nervous for then I would have been able to enjoy it more! I was glad that after it, both Liz and the senior coach said that it had gone well and that I was now ready to graduate as a life coach.

I could have had my graduation at another residential weekend but instead I opted to have it at the College centre where I had first attended the 'meet the college' day. There were other prospective students there who were attending a similar 'meet the college' day and it felt like a nice 'circle' for me.

So that is how I became a Life Coach. I am now engaged in CPD or continuing training to maintain my knowledge of the latest coaching practices and techniques.

If you would Like...

If you would like to find out more about the training offered by the UK College of Life Coaching*, simply complete the form below which will be submitted straight to the college.

 *In November 2005 the College changed its name to CMIExcel. This change of name represented a number of developments within the organisation. Firstly it combined the UK College of Life Coaching with the College of Executive Coaching, secondly it represented a commitment to promoting coaching and mentoring (the M in CMI) and, thirdly, it reflected the growing international work of the organisation (the I in CMI).

In all, this is a new and exciting time for the organisation, its members and students. It presents a truly international aspect to the work and future developments at the organisation.

Phone 0870 766 1977

Enquiries dougwoods@dougwoods.com