Definition of a coach

Definition of a coach by Agata Swieciochowska

From all the readings and researches that I made I came up with a definition of a coach. I am not quite certain if I think correctly, but this is how I understood it.

A coach is a person that has been trained to help other people to reach their goals and objectives. He helps them to awake and reveal their own potential. It’s not a onetime process; it’s a long term exercise that enables individuals to reach concrete goals and results in their professional and personal life. And it really depends on the motivation of the coachee, if he wants to see results very quickly then he has to work seriously.  Through such a process the coachee is learning more about himself and what he is able to do, with the development of his skills in order to discover even more about the profile of his personality.

It is also important to notice that a coach is only here to help you to ask yourself the right questions, he is not advising. He is like a guide that is putting us against our own fears and guides us to our own autonomy. Also a coach is not an expert in a technical domain as an adviser can be.

Being a coach can’t be assimilated to a therapist neither, because when we are coming to a coach we feel good but we want to feel even better. We are not discussing the past with him but only the present and the future in order to increase our performance.

He is a neutral person, this is why he has a neutral point of view, so can’t be part of our family or friends because, they tend to be more engaged into the situation. As said before, a coach is not the person who is going to give the answers to what you need. No, he is going to help the coachee to be able to “say it” and “do it”.

A coach can be specialized in different areas. But they present all common characteristics: they want to be seen as partners, because they adapt to your personality, respecting your rhythm of life in order to really wake you up to your potential. He is supporting unconditionally his client; he is encouraging, inspiring in order to maintain the action.

A professional coach is not giving you a diagnosis like a doctor or a grade like a teacher; he is not imposing actions that need to be taken by the coachee in order to succeed faster.

In my opinion it’s really difficult to be a good coach, because when someone is coming to me and is explaining me his goals then I tend to give him advises on how he or she should do or behave, because of my previous experience for example. But reading these articles I figured out, that I am not even really helping them!

Every human being is different, and has its own objectives. A coach is only here to help him to bloom like a flower on his own, with HIS potential.