Foundation Level Coaching Skills

The AltusQ Coaching Skills program provides practical, experiential training that centres on the core skill of conducting a coaching conversation. It blends classroom training, supervised real-world experience and self-reflective practice to equip participants with the knowledge and skills they’ll need to function as effective coaches in an organisational context.

The program begins with classroom training followed by practical fieldwork, typically over a period of months. Each trainee works closely with an assigned supervisor and is given regular, detailed feedback on their progress in achieving a well-defined set of competencies. In conjunction with this strong support trainees are encouraged to develop and maintain a strong self-reflective practice to ensure they are equipped to take full responsibility for their ongoing development as coaches.

Program goals

The Coaching Skills program aims to provide participants with:

• An understanding of their own capabilities as coaches and of the areas they need to focus on to further develop their skills
• A working knowledge of a framework for coaching conversations and the ability to move with the client through the key stages of awareness, reflection, choice and action
• An understanding of the need to ensure an outcome and action orientation for the client in creating an effective coaching practice
• Confidence in their ability to coach “in the moment”
• Awareness of the level of coaching they are aiming to focus on e.g. performance versus developmental coaching, management versus leadership coaching, individual versus team coaching
• An understanding of the importance of establishing and managing the coaching contract and associated professional standards that underpin the coach/client relationship.

Program components

Trainees accepted into the program begin with pre-reading and the completion of an online self-assessment survey to kick-start their personal reflective practice. They then attend a 3-day group training session designed to give them both a strong theoretical grounding and some powerful personal insight.

Classroom training

Day 1 introduces some core concepts and presents the trainees with a framework for coaching conversations. Trainees are guided to an awareness of their own communication style and how that may relate to their coaching.

Day 2 focuses on the client and techniques for assisting clients to make powerful, actionable choices. Topics include questioning and listening skills, creating reflective space, addressing beliefs, and navigating the energy of the coaching conversation.

Day 3 is practically oriented, addressing such issues as creating compelling action and follow-up plans and managing the client relationship. The day concludes with coaching exercises, recorded on video for review by both the trainee and their supervisor with a view to creating an ongoing development plan.

Supervised, real-world experience

Once the classroom training is complete the trainees are assisted to complete a prescribed number of practical coaching hours, progressing from observing to assisting to solo client sessions. Throughout this process they are guided and regularly debriefed by an assigned supervisor/mentor.

The supervisor is the trainee’s guide and supporter throughout the program and, ultimately, the gatekeeper to successful accreditation. The supervisor, as the person who gets to know the trainee best, is the person who finally determines if the trainee has reached the prescribed level of competence.

The key themes and purpose for coaching supervision at AltusQ are to facilitate learning through reflection on practice, to enable the trainee coach to develop, and to ensure that standards are maintained. The supervisors enable this by providing reassurance, affirmation, feedback and encouragement to the participant, offering a forum to attend to their emotional and professional wellbeing and growth as a coach.

We recognize that participants in our program may have differing levels of knowledge and expertise depending on the experience and the stage of the coach’s personal and professional development. For example, newer coaches may need more “tutoring” and are often looking for input in terms of practical skills and techniques. More experienced coaches often hold greater personal autonomy and are able to co-create the areas for inquiry and reflection depending on the demands of their client portfolio.

Supervisors in the program are all highly experienced AltusQ leadership coaches who meet our stringent training and Continuing Professional Development (CPD) standards.

The learning platform

The AltusQ Foundation Level Coaching Skills Program is managed via a dedicated online collaboration platform. Key benefits include:

• Both the trainee and the supervisor always know what their next step needs to be, via an interactive task list that guides them through the program and provides a simple way to create and record new tasks/actions as they arise
• Easy access via the web and mobile devices, allowing supervisors and trainees to engage with the process from wherever they are, whenever is convenient for them
• A single location for participants to record their reflections as they progress through the program, and to discuss those reflections with their supervisor
• A competencies checklist that makes participant progress in achieving the required competencies immediately visible to both participant and supervisor
• Easy, centralised access to support materials (documents, videos, podcasts etc.) relevant to the program and/or to coaching in general
• Timely and accurate reporting, enabling meaningful estimates of program success levels and ROI
• An audit trail for quality assurance and for resolving any after-the-fact points of contention.

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