Dr. Damian Goldvarg, MCC and Laura Zuvanic, PCC
Introduction
The professional coaching practice has been developing for the last 20 years requiring coaches to receive quality training following ethical standards. The International Coach Federation (ICF) — organization leader in the development of the practice of professional coaching — developed standards to assure that coaching training programs follow guidelines such as providing mentor coaching to participants. They also request mentor coaching for credentialing to assure coaches receive feedback about their coaching from more experienced and trained coaches. In this paper our intention is to share the results from a study that brings light to the competencies a mentor coach should demonstrate to be effective at his or her job.
The ICF defines Mentor Coaching as “providing professional assistance in achieving and demonstrating the levels of coaching competency demanded by the desired credential level (ACC, PCC, MCC) sought by a coach‐applicant (mentee). Furthermore, Mentor Coaching means an applicant (mentee) being coached on their coaching skills rather than coaching on practice building, life balance, or other topics unrelated to the development of an applicant’s coaching competency”.
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Rey Carr
November 12, 2015 at 8:05 pm
The authors present a thorough model. But, lo and behold, why do they even include the term “mentor”? Read the article again and everytime the word mentor appears, either take it out or replace it with the word coach.
This is the problem with the ICF’s approach to mentoring. It’s not aligned with any other viewpoint expressed by experts on mentoring. This model has little to do with mentoring and mostly to do with coaching. If the article makes just as much sense when the word mentor is removed, then the authors have really set up an unnecessary variant of coaches looking after their own professional development.