The coaching industry has grown massively over the past decade (according to ICF, the estimated market size is expected to reach $20 billion USD by 2022, the coaching industry is one of the fastest growing sectors in the world!), yet a lot of people who get qualified don’t use or utilise the wonders coaching supervision can provide them with.
“I am a qualified coach, why do I need supervision?”
Here are the top three reasons why coaching supervision will make you a better coach:
Continuous development and CPD:
Supervision will enable you not only to keep on top of your CPD, but it also enables you to explore new horizons and continue to develop your reflective practice. As a coach, you know full well about the importance of reflection and CPD, but we are all creatures of habit and over time and as life and work get busy, it’s easy to de-prioritise this.
Supervision is an excellent way to refresh your awareness of different coaching approaches, remind yourself of things you might have learnt during your training or qualification, but haven’t had a chance to use yet (or simply forgotten about) and explore new opportunities and challenges in a safe space.
Your own well-being:
As a coach, you will come across a variety of clients, deal with a myriad of challenges and undoubtedly experience some frustrations. For your own well-being and in order to look after your mental health, supervision creates an excellent safe space that you can use to cleanse your mind and energy. Using supervision for your own well-being will not only help you to keep your energy levels up (we all know, how freeing it feels to be able to get things off our chest on a regular basis), but it will also help you to stay in love with the profession. This is sometimes called the restorative function.
Quality assurance and confidence:
With regular supervision sessions you will not only keep your practice and ethical compass in great shape and continue to expand your abilities, but will also have more confidence because you always know that you are on the right track.
According to CIPD report: “Coaches see the main benefits of supervision as developing coaching capability (88%) and assuring the quality of their coaching (86%). “
There are many other compelling reasons for supervision. Push factors include accreditation demands for minimum supervision hours or contractual (or coaching pool) demands from clients to demonstrate regular supervision. The pull factors might include your sense of professionalism and integrity, a love of learning, increasing your capacity for reflection and taking care of yourself.
