Coaching & Therapy – Are they one and the same?
June 19th, 2008 . by Renee
Isn’t coaching just a different form of therapy? As a coach I get asked this question a lot but the general public and clients alike. The answer is no, it is not. Though both coaching and therapy have a similar path and many of the techniques used in the coaching process are similar in nature to a therapeutic approach…”therapy is about uncovering and recovering, while coaching is about discovering” (Coaching vs Psychotherapy by Patrick Williams, Choice Magazine, 2004). To the root of it all, coaching and therapy can and often do coincide in a person’s development. While some works on discovering who they are and how they want to live life, therapy can help to clarify what might be causing someone to repeat the same pattern over and over again and to recover from the past and move forward. Moving forward is where the coaching process excels; it helps people get really clear on matters most to them. While on the surface coaching and therapy have many commonalities; both support the individual, both have regular sessions with the client whether face to face or by phone and both coaching and therapy look to help the client get from where they are now to where they want to be, that is essentially though where the similarities end.
Coaching has developed from many of the early pioneers of what is now considered modern day psychotherapy, Carl Rogers wrote the book “The Client Centered Therapy” which shifted the idea of therapy to focus more on the clients ability to grow and change, this helped to frame the early stages of what has now been coined as coaching. Coaching has blended the best techniques from the psychotherapy world with organizational and personal development training. Tony Robbins is an example of someone who uses many of these techniques.
I’ve pulled this information from the article mentioned earlier written by Patrick Williams of the Institute for Life Coach Training, it provides an easy to view of the differences of coaching and therapy and rather than recreate the wheel…..
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Therapy |
Coaching |
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Deals with identifiable dysfunction in a person |
Deals with a healthy client desiring a better situation |
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Deals mostly with a person’s past & trauma |
Deals mostly with a person’s present and seeks to help then design a more desirable future |
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Helps patients resolve old pain |
Helps clients learn new skills and tools to build a more satisfying successful future |
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Doctor-patient relationship (the therapist has the answers) |
Co-creative equal partnership (Coach helps the client discover own answers) |
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Assumes emotions are a symptom of something wrong |
Assumes emotions are natural and normalizes them |
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The Therapist diagnoses, then provides professional expertise and guidelines to provide a path to healing |
The Coach stands with the client and helps them identify the challenges, then partners to turn challenges into victories holding the client accountable to reach desired goals |
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Progress is often slow and painful |
Growth and progress are rapid and usually enjoyable |
As the general public learn the differences between coaching and therapy and begin to see the great benefits of using a coaching approach to their lives coaching will become a mainstream activity that most organizations and individuals will use to progress through life. Coaching will become a catalyst towards success and will facilitate lives full of purpose and authenticity.
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Other articles of interest about therapy & coaching