Coach, how to become a professional and why

Coach for all tastes (like in Hollywood)

The good news is that never before is there a proliferation of coaches of all kinds: from business to sales coach, from life to mental coach up to the most unlikely “smile coach”, “beauty coach” or “sleep coach” where the term, in truth, seems to be more the result of a fashion than a concept.

From Ben Affleck to DiCaprio

Hollywood, as always, has long been riding the trend. And not for the sake of glamor. Ben Affleck would have needed it (before he married Jennifer Lopez), even a Leonardo DiCaprio and even a very powerful showbiz woman like Oprah Winfrey (without making a mystery). You can have it all, but not be what you want. Or always feel with that less existential on you even in the mecca of cinema.

And while the need for quick advice and adjustments to one’s life is not surprising (we are all human, in the end), what is surprising is the fact that the number of who decides to embrace the profession.

If the former manager reinvents himself as a coach

And not only among new graduates, but above all among former managers, former employees who have decided to reconvert themselves and put their experience away from the logic of the office. Their number increased by 33 percent between 2015 and 2019 alone reveals in an article Madame Figaroaccording to data fromIcf (International Coach Federation). Worldwide, according to the Linkedin network there are at least 50 thousand. In Italy about 1500 are estimatedat least among those formed by recognized schools, but since there is no register there are many thousands more.

Pandemic, smart working and large resignations: what’s behind it?

How should the phenomenon be interpreted: is it a question of the intersection of supply and demand (especially in a moment of epochal transition like this one where lockdown and smart working have brought unshakable certainties to their knees)? Or, as the phenomenon of the Great Resignation seems to demonstrate, is there an escape from a permanent job? In short, why are we looking for them and why are there more and more of them?

The life coaches, the most coveted

«It is the sign of the times. In this moment, even more than before, there is disorientation and confusion »explains the life coach and counselor Elena Garbo. «The old paradigms are transforming themselves and the approach itself to work is much more complex than a few years ago: many do not meet. People ask me to be guided in the search for their talent, they want to bring out their strengths and ultimately be happier“.

Garbo herself worked at Disney Publishing Worldwide. In 2012, faced with a further leap forward, she gave up the role of the career woman and she went back to studying. “Now I finally feel that I am myself and that I can help people in a concrete way.” The starting point was a two-year course in “Problem Solving and Strategic Coaching” with the psychotherapist Giorgio Nardone. «The training course, in reality, never ends. I invest everything in updating ».

A profession (still) with few fixed points

The sector is in great turmoil. The trade associations are lobbying to give firm points to the profession which for now has as its only reference the Law 4/2013, as he explains Laura Leonepresident ofItalian association of professional coaches. «Ours is a delicate profession. We are experts in the processes of change and not in the problem. We do not intervene in the decisions of a company, for example, “she explains. “We are aiming for an expansion of the legislation: it is a guarantee to protect our professionalism and customers from unrecognized guides”.

Boom of requests in companies

Business coaches are also among the most requested profiles. ” Small businesses are looking for them, the most confused nowHe claims Maria Zifaro, associate professor of Business Organization at the Universitas Mercatorum in Rome. «They are useful, in fact, when there is a need to put together the organizational spirit of the team or even of the management. Their contribution is emotional, if they enter the organizational analysis they become something else, that is consultants.

A job that young people like

Why do young people like coaching? “Maybe because it gives them the idea of ​​being freer than the permanent job hierarchy where they cannot express themselves “. Nunzio Casalino, full professor of Business Organization at the Guglielmo Marconi University and professor at Luiss Guido Carli, has followed several degree theses on coaching and curates European projects on the subject.

How to assess if the coach is up to it?

«In Italy they have been spreading for ten years and there is great interest among my students. It is a profession that can be rewarding. The only limits concern their management and the real effectiveness of the intervention. Who guarantees that they are actually qualified to fill this role? Who controls their work? Because there is also the risk of ending up in the hands of people willing to do anything to keep the customer. Some, then, fearful of making mistakes, try to please the entrepreneur. And fear is the enemy of coaching. Not to mention that having experience does not automatically mean being empathetic and effective ».

The market decrees skill

Right. It is, therefore, the market that decrees its skill. And uA good coach can even earn over 250 euros per hour. “There is something wrong with this rush to the coach of companies. They seem to suggest to employees that “you don’t perform”. But compared to what? ” leads Silvio Lenares, trainer, coach and business counselor, who has been accompanying the cultural transformations of his clients for more than twenty years. ” Rather than motivate, let’s train ourselves not to demotivate and to find an alternative to corporate communication that pays little attention to people’s wishes “.

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