Coaching supervision services
How to engage in coaching supervision with me
I offer coaching supervision to coaches from a wide range of backgrounds, working both in-house and as external coaches. Most of my coaching supervision clients are working with leaders, managers and others in workplace settings.
Here are examples of how I can work with you to provide coaching supervision. I am open to exploring other coaching supervision arrangements so please get in touch to explore what would work for you.
If you are interested in my coaching supervision, please contact me.
Coaching supervision for individual coaches
Whether you are providing coaching as an independent, external coach or within an organisation, I can offer 1:1 coaching supervision to support your coaching approach, practice and development.
Coaching supervision for in-house coach panels
Over the years, I have offered coaching supervision for panels of in-house coaches in range of different formats, depending on what suits the coaches involved. This can include group coaching supervision sessions, coaching practice sessions, 1:1 coaching supervision sessions and my being available for extra 1:1 support if issues arise between scheduled sessions. For example, for one current client, I provide a combination of group and 1:1 coaching supervision sessions so that their in-house coaches learn together regularly and also have time for individual reflection with me.
Coaching supervision group programme
I am intending to set up a coaching supervision programme that includes group and 1:1 sessions over the course of a year. This will offer participants the opportunity to learn from one another as well as reflecting on their own practice, approach and development needs. I am building up a list of participants for the next programme, so if you are interested in being part of that, please contact me.
Relational Mindfulness based coaching supervision
For coaches who have attended a Relational Mindfulness (RM) for Coaches programme, I run coaching supervision groups that include RM practice. These offer an opportunity for 4-6 coaches to engage in coaching supervision supported by the RM guidelines and foundations. The group sessions include RM practice in the whole group and in pairs/threes. In addition, I meet 1:1 with each participant before the sessions start and am available between group sessions to address any urgent issues or questions that arise in your coaching. I am building up a list of participants for the next programme, so if you are interested in being part of that, please contact me to explore what would work for you.
FAQs
How often do I need coaching supervision?
The frequency of supervision needed will depend on the volume of coaching you are undertaking and your level of experience: for those who have a high volume of coaching work and/or are fairly new to coaching work, it may be beneficial to have more frequent supervision.
Generally, I recommend that supervision sessions take place every 6 weeks, but some clients want/need supervision more frequently or less frequently.
I recognise that for some coaches their coaching work is project-based and, for these situations, we can contract for supervision on a project-by-project basis.
How long are coaching supervision sessions?
Supervision sessions with me generally last 90mins for individuals and 2 hours or more for groups, but some clients prefer a 60mins session.
Our first supervision session will be slightly longer as it will involve establishing agreements for our coaching supervision relationship, understanding how each other work, exploring your aims for supervision and building a ‘contract’ for how we work together.
I also suggest we have a longer session about once a year to include a review of how the coaching supervision is going. (We will do a brief review at the end of every session, but these periodic reviews enable us to take an overview based on a number of sessions.)
Do we meet in person for coaching supervision?
Almost all my coaching supervision sessions currently take place online (over Zoom or MS Teams). However, I am also open to meeting in person or holding sessions over the phone.
Who do you provide coaching supervision for?
I offer coaching supervision to a broad range of coaches, be they newly qualified as a coach or an experienced coach with an established practice.
However, I would not provide coaching supervision to someone if they:
– Were not committed to reflective learning/practice
– Did not subscribe to a code of ethical standards
– Did not have their own professional indemnity insurance.
If I felt that a coaching supervision client was not fit to practice at any point when working with them (for example, due to pressures from their personal life), I would discuss this with them and aim to support them to re-establish fitness to practice.
Is coaching supervision confidential?
Coaching supervision has similar boundaries of confidentiality to coaching, so the content of supervision would be confidential unless you shared material that showed intent to cause harm to yourself or others, or illegal activity. I take material from coaching supervision sessions to my own supervision in anonymised form.
How do I explain to my clients that I might share their coaching sessions with you as my supervisor?
The ideal is to build understanding of supervision into your contract with clients, by explaining up front that you may take anonymised material from your coaching sessions to supervision for the purpose of your own reflective learning and development.
If you record coaching sessions in order to share them in supervision, you must obtain prior informed consent from your client. As part of this you should discuss issues of ownership, storage and security of the recording. Any written consent should be stored separately from the recording to preserve anonymity.
Where does responsibility for the coachee/client rest?
Responsibility for your coachee and any other client stakeholders (the manager, organisation etc.) remains with you as the coach. You must have your own professional indemnity insurance and be clear with your client that the contract for coaching is with you or your organisation.
What if I have nothing to bring to coaching supervision?
Coaching supervision is not just about difficulties and issues; it is also an opportunity to celebrate and learn from successes and what is going well in your coaching work. It can be useful to talk about broader matters, not just specific client work. So, if you have no particular client issues to discuss, you might want to explore how you articulate how you show up as a coach/your approach or explore your next developmental step.
How will coaching supervision quality assure my work as a coach?
As an independent coaching supervisor, I cannot directly manage your coaching work, so the quality assurance element of supervision will be a collaborative approach, in which you bring your coaching work to supervision and we explore whether you are following best practice and ethical principles. You may have questions about quality or ethics and I will bring to your attention any possible blind spots or quality/ ethical questions raised for me by what you describe/show. We will then address these together during the supervision session and agree how you will take things forward after the session. I would expect to follow this up with you in our subsequent supervision session.
How do we end the coaching supervision relationship if it is not working?
If you feel that coaching supervision with me is not working for you, I invite you to raise this with me in a supervision session, so that we can explore what the issues are and whether they can be resolved. It may be that the experience is a useful source of learning for both of us. For example, it may be a symptom of what is going on in your practice: in this case, exploring the dynamics of the situation can be a valuable exercise for each of us and for the supervision relationship.
However, it is possible that I am not the best supervisor for you or that your needs for supervision change and I cease to be the best supervisor for you, in which case we can bring supervision to a close. I would want to have a final supervision session with you to ensure that we reach closure on the supervision relationship.
What if there is a conflict of interest between our work and/or client bases?
Transparency about conflicts of interest is vital. If either of us identifies any conflict of interest in our work, we need to declare it and explore how best to handle it.
How many sessions do I need to commit to?
Some clients like to commit to coaching supervision sessions year by year; others put in dates session by session. For in-house coaching panels, we generally agree the number of coaching supervision sessions I will provide on a year by year basis. Many of my clients have worked with me for a number of (or many!) years and benefited from the coaching supervision relationship deepening over time. However, I am open to shorter coaching supervision arrangements and will tailor what I offer to your need.