CPD opportunities just got better in lockdown for coaches and mentors
Lockdown life is providing me with a chance to keep up with my CPD as a coach and mentor.
A plethora of learning and development opportunities has sprung up online. The twitterverse has daily, free offerings on zoom, Do Lectures is posting its awesome and inspiring lectures from past years, and webinars are replacing classroom based activities. There is a lot on offer I haven’t mentioned too, alongside the established favourites of TED talks, for example, and membership body magazines and newsletters, inter alia. A shout out to Sue Knight as well, my favourite NLP trainer, who is running great mini NLP tutorials on YouTube!
Practitioners like myself, however, have the chance to consider using this time in lockdown for a deeper dive, so I have revisited my selection of books on coaching and mentoring that I first used when I completed my post graduate degree some years ago. Here I list five books in no particular order. They are not recommendations, rather just a list of some that were useful for my learning in the two ‘pillars’ of coaching and mentoring practice - andragogical learning and pyschology.
Five books
‘Coaching Skills - a handbook’ by Jenny Rogers. I really like this book. Very accessible and practically focused. Differentiates well between coaching and other forms of intervention. I particularly like how she tackles being able to gain trust. I still dip into this.
‘Mentoring Executives and Directors’ by David Megginson and David Clutterbuck. Focuses on working with people in more senior roles. Academically sound as well as practical. Explores the role of the mentor.
‘Handbook of Coaching Psychology’, edited by Stephen Palmer and Alison Whybrow. All kinds of psychological approaches and theories in separate chapters form the middle section of this practical and helpful book. There’s a good chapter on boundaries too, which I have gone back to a few times to help me in supporting mentoring training projects.
‘Effective Coaching - lessons from the coach’s coach’ by Myles Downey. A practical book that contains a skills-based model fellow practitioners will know about and possibly use, which proposes non-directive coaching. Helpful for those who are internal coaches (especially if you have only learned GROW).
‘The Psychology of Executive Coaching’ by Bruce Peltier. Again a book that offers theory and practice with a focus on working with more senior people. Explores what coaching is and how it is different from therapeutic approaches.
Peltier uses a superb quote from Arrien before the preface that sums up so much of what the role of the coach involves for me:
“Show up and choose to be present.
Pay attention.
Tell the truth.
Be open to outcome, not attached to results.”
CPD is far more than ‘training’
I am hopeful that lockdown helps to shift thinking and practice for everyone involved in people development and that the role coaching and mentoring plays in this is included. The days when the focus was on providing training and having training plans is now, I hope, replaced by development plans for the workforce and personal learning and development (or CPD) plans for individuals.
The role of the coach and the mentor is as relevant as ever and possible with the different range of technologies we now have in this change. Good reasons to keep up with CPD and professional practice!
Reflective practice is a CPD ‘must do’
Keeping up with reflective practice is also a pre-requisite to good coach and mentor CPD. In a busy day it is one of those things that can slip and yet it’s a foundation for improvement in skills, knoweldge and behaviours and it helps with better relationship building and being able to use client feedback purposefully.
How is my coaching and mentoring practice changing in lockdown life?
Right now all my work is in the virtual space with Skype and Zoom. Both work extremely well. Coaching and mentoring is the ultimate 1-2-1 flexible support activity and so is suited to online. I have a ‘rule of thumb’ that the first meeting, which includes intake and contracting, should be face to face in the same place. I will see whether that holds up or not when lockdown is over!
In the meantime, I am keeping up with my development as a coach and mentor and hope you are too.