|
Coaching’s getting a permanent home in the Ivy League.
The Institute of Coaching, just unveiled at McLean Hospital, Harvard Medical School, is a first-of-its-kind center for coaching research, practice and education—all aimed at transforming the field.
“Research is the foundation upon which credibility is based,” said Ruth Ann Harnisch, whose Harnisch Fund for Coaching established the Institute with a gift of two million dollars. “What’s needed is a large, wide-ranging body of scientifically gathered, academically rigorous, peer-reviewed research that will give credibility to theories about coaching. We have ideas about what works in coaching, what kind of return on investment coaching offers, but what is provably true? That’s why we need research.”
The growth of coaching has—until now—far outpaced the kind of scientific, evidence-based research that might elevate the field of coaching to a consistent level of professionalism and impact. That, Harnisch said, will become the mission of the Institute.
“Ruth Ann has created the only fund dedicated just to coaching research,” said Carol Kauffman, Director of the Institute of Coaching. “We’re trying to help bring coaching to the next level by providing great research and practice.”
The Institute, Kauffman says, will advance the field of coaching through five “centers of excellence”—research; education; executive and leadership coaching; health coaching; and applied positive psychology.
“There is a growing interest in positive psychology, of which coaching is an integral part,” said Philip Levendusky, PhD, director of Psychology, at McLean. “Increasing evidence shows that coaching can have a positive impact on healthcare delivery in terms of lifestyle changes, medication compliance and a host of other changes that reap big rewards for patients and the healthcare system. In her gift to establish the Institute of Coaching, Ruth Ann Harnisch has made a significant commitment to the coaching profession and to improving the lives of individuals.”
The Institute’s roots date to the fall of 2005, when Ruth Ann Harnisch, David Goldsmith and other members of the Thomas J. Leonard Memorial Foundation met in Santa Fe, New Mexico to discuss the future of coaching in the aftermath of Leonard’s sudden death. Their idea was to create a “big tent”—a place where coaching’s brightest minds could gather and create. The resulting organization became known as The Foundation of Coaching.
Last year, in association with The Foundation of Coaching, the first International Coaching Research Forum was held at Harvard and brought together forty academic researchers and coaching leaders to discuss the future of coaching-related research, funded by The Harnisch Foundation.
“This was the first global forum convened specifically for the purpose of identifying a strategic way to build the coaching profession and body of knowledge,” said Dr. Mary Wayne Bush last year. Bush, Director of Research at the Foundation of Coaching, co-chaired the Forum, the results of which led directly to the partnership and establishment of The Institute of Coaching.
“They (the researchers) talked about the challenges they faced as serious academics attempting to do peer-reviewed, respected coaching research,” said Harnisch. “It became clear to me that a respectable academic home for coaching would be a game-changer for the field.”
The Institute of Coaching found its “home” at the Harvard Medical School’s teaching facility, the McLean Hospital. McLean was considered a good fit for the Institute because of McLean’s tradition of cutting-edge research and top flight faculty, not for its reputation as the nation’s leading psychiatric hospital. Of particular interest to Harnisch was a meeting with some of Harvard’s top researchers in psychology and psychiatry, who were intensely interested in expanding their work to include coaching–as a logical extension of the work they already did helping people build and support healthy, balanced lives.
“Several physicians and counselors told me at that event they were so excited about the prospect of adding coaching to their offerings. One after another, their stories and their enthusiasm convinced me that if the country’s mental health professionals saw coaching as a sensible and practical method for helping people live their best lives, that would be a giant leap forward for coaching’s credibility.”
The Harnisch gift, then, was designed to support that work where other academic institutions had shied away. In some cases, researchers reported, due to a preconceived notion of what coaching was. “Some were accused of trying to study new-agey-mumbo-jumbo. One was told that this ‘American fad’ was not a worthy subject for academic study. Another told me that a University official refused to grant permission to do coaching-related research, saying ‘Over my dead body,’” said Harnisch.
One of the Institute’s core missions, then, is to inspire just that kind of research and exploration–inviting and funding some of the top researchers in the world to study coaching. Next week in London, the Institute of Coaching, along with the Institute of Employment Studies, will bring together twenty-five of the most respected European coaching researchers to discuss, as Kauffman says, “raising the bar on coaching research.”
The London meeting’s aim is to find ways to investigate and explain scientifically why coaching works. “Coaching has been described as the ‘Wild West,” said Kauffman, who along with the Institute’s co-directors, Susan David and Margaret Moore, believes the Institute will deliver the kind of rigorous, peer-reviewed research that may help coaching escape its “cowboy” image. “There really is Ivy League quality of thinking in coaching, and coaching just isn’t getting the kind of respect it deserves.”
“People are now doing random assignments, placebo controlled, good objective research, and study after study is showing that coaching is effective; you need a lot of these studies to make an impact,” said Kauffman.
The Institute is already considering applications for coaching research grants, which, as a part of the Harnisch gift, will total $100,000 a year for seven years. Kauffman says the applications–which have already come from countries in Europe, the US, and Latin America involve all aspects of coaching. “The quality is skyrocketing,” she said. “So something is clearly happening.”
Find out more about the Institute of Coaching.
Editors Note: Ruth Ann Harnisch, a philanthropist and coach, endows both the Coaching Commons, as a project of the Harnisch Foundation, and the work of this reporter in his role as the Coaching Commons’ first Community Supported Journalist.
Tweet This
Email to a friend
There are 18 Responses so far...
In one of my Emotional Intelligence workshops, I borrow Victor Hugo’s quote, “There is nothing as powerful as an idea whose time has come”. I also remember one of the comments my coach shared with my as I began my executive coaching certification program…”Allow yourself to trust your intuition. The next day, I bought a magnet at a card store saying; “Trust yourself. You know more than you think you do.” I secured it to my refrigerator so I could “self-coach” myself everyday and encourage myself to use my leadership training background and growing executive coaching skills to make a difference in people’s lives. My business allows me to do this in the corporate world. But I have found I am driven to transfer these skills to working with the youth. My husband shares this passion and we co-founded a committee of teens in our suburban new Jersey town dedicated to developing leadership skills and using those skills to give back to the community through community service projects. These teens continue to amaze us and the community. We are certain some of the success can be attributed to the “leadership coaching” my husband and I (and a third co-founder) provide as these teens come up with ideas and take the initiative to make them happen.
In fact, tonight we are giving the 5 Executive Board members of this committee the opportunity to participate in a 360 feedback process designed for students. We are starting at step one to see how these teens respond to the process and to what extent they welcome the feedback to develop their leadership skills. If the process is successful, we expect to offer the program to another 45 teens on the committee. Our committee has grown from 20 teens to over 350 teens in just over two years. So far, we have experienced extremely positive results from the teens as we coach them to be active community participants.
Up to this point, we have not used the word “coaching” with the teens or their parents. In a suburban town, where sports teams are a priority for many, we are concerned how the term “coaching” would be received.
The research described in this article is long overdue and will give leadership development coaches the credibility needed to proactively engage teens and adults in the leadership/executive coaching process.
We are excited to hear of it…and will follow it closely.
Natalie and Gordon Loeb
This is a fantastic step forward for the field of coaching. Most coaches have no idea how much we owe Ruth Ann Harnisch and the Harnisch Foundation for supporting the profession of coaching in numerous ways, but the Institute of Coaching is a step beyond anything that anyone has done so far.
Coaching has been trivialized by some, but the outcomes of high-profile clients, like Google CEO, Eric Schmidt, and stacks of positive articles in publications like The Wall Street Journal, suggest that it is more than time for researchers to find out why coaching works so well for so many people.
It’s validating to see that institutions like Harvard are now giving coaching the study that it deserves. This will help support the work of good coaches everywhere and ultimately millions of people will benefit.
Thanks to Ms. Harnisch and the Coaching Commons for keeping us informed about this.
This is exciting news, indeed! I have talked to physicians who believe, wholeheartedly, in the power of health coaching, and others who believe it’s a fad destined to die on the vine. A few months ago, I talked to a holistic doctor convinced that when people have knowledge they have the power to overcome their not so great habits. I told her that in my experience, knowledge + support is the key to helping people break through the limiting beliefs that have kept them stuck in habits that are no longer serving them. Though this particular doctor didn’t “buy” what I had to say, another holistic physician I spoke with not too long ago was all over the concept of health and wellness coaching. And it was inspiring to witness his enthusiasm.
I hope this new Institute will provide physicians and other professionals with the data they need to believe in the power of coaching. In the field of medicine, research, for good reason, is King. That this new Institute is making its home at Harvard is exciting beyond words. I can’t wait to see the results of this research and witness how it transforms the field of coaching.
I admit to being very torn about the push to study coaching with so-called academic rigor (by which is almost always exclusively meant, reductionistic, empirical, quantitative methods that strangle the life out of the heart and soul of an interactional phenomenon).
On the one hand I hate to see coaching become over-analyzed, measured to death, and homogenized into best practices the way counseling has become. I’m not really interested in theories of coaching, and peer reviewed ideas from non-coach scientists of what works. Frankly I’m experiencing a nice sense of freedom from leaving all that behind in closing my therapy practice and becoming a coach.
Not everything is improved by sticking it under the microscope of academic scrutiny. In fact, more progress is made by pioneers who go against the tides of accepted mainstream thinking that has been molded (and gotten moldy) by endless dissection and debate.
I’m in favor of the subjective, experiential mysteries of the helping process that can’t be articulated, much less quantified. Qualitative research methodologies can help describe the magic of good coaching, but will never satisfy those who need generalizable, replicated, hypothesis-tested and statistically presented results in order to believe in the usefulness of the lived experience of coaching or being coached.
However, I do believe it is useful to look at what we already know from the worlds of psychology and organizational behavior and training that can be applied to various realms of coaching. Spending lots of research dollars to reinventing the wheel may not be necessary, but a little broadening of applications and following up on implications of previous researches can be useful.
In short, I don’t think good research makes the practice of coaching better.
Hi Mark – interesting post and good to see an attempt to ground coaching in scientific research principles. It seems to be that effective coaching techniques draw a great deal on Cognitive Behavioural Therapy techniques, which have been proven effective again and again – be good to see the results.
If scientifically established coaching could be far more accessible to people who could be referred by their GPs or government-sponsored organisations etc. And that means more work for all of us of course too!
There’s an interesting article I came across that looked at working with clients online and drawing the comparison with the clinical/therapy field, you can see it here if you’re interested http://snipurl.com/t25f5
WOW, what brilliant news! I’ve been watching the growth of evidence-based coaching for some time, and it’s wonderful to see this new development in coaching research.
Ruth Ann, thank you!
I truly believe that the more academic rigour we apply, complementing the coaching vigour that is already out there in our industry, we’re going to have a huge impact on the general public’s awareness and acceptance of coaching. There are of course numerous other benefits to this as well, and for all of those now and to come, I’m grateful to all who are contributing to the growth of this industry we love so much.
Cheers,
Noel Posus
Sydney Australia
Wow. I’m almost (but not quite) speechless. Ruth Ann Harnisch and the Harnisch Foundation have been a consistent force for excellence in coaching on many fronts. Funding hard research is both a logical and necessary next step in establishing the legitimacy of coaching. I can’t wait to learn from this work!
For the last few months we’ve been including information about this research initiative in our monthly publication The Peer Bulletin. I’m saying this to emphasize our on-going support for more research in the coaching field and appreciation to both the Harnisch Foundation for the funding of and Harvard’s McLean Hospital for housing and coordinating this initiative.
But a couple of quotes in Mark’s article have reduced my confidence that this initiative is going to benefit coaching.
First, Dr. Kauffman’s statement that this effort will “raise the bar on coaching research.” I’m pretty sure she was referring to the quality of research, but if anything can improve quality for coaching research it’s actually “lowering” the bar.
Coaching research to be effective and useful must be conducted at all levels not just by academic researchers but also by everyday practitioners. In other words, research initiatives need to take place at the most basic levels of coaching interaction. Practitioners must be encouraged to learn about how to conduct research within their own practices. I’m worried that “raising” the bar means supporting traditional research methods and procedures that are out of the reach of and inappropriate for practitioners.
The second statement that gives me pause about this initiative is Dr. Kauffman’s use of the term “wild west” to describe coaching. This term was used in a Harvard publication from a few years ago that received considerable publicity but was filled with inaccurate statements about coaching, including characterizing coaching as the wild west.
The statement about the wild west originated with a psychologist who was then practicing as an “executive coach,” but had no coach specific training and was advocating for a psychological practice emphasis in coaching. The statement was typical of management consultants who now call themselves executive coaches.
What worries me here is that associating research with Harvard will lead to psychologists hijacking the research agenda and what is approved as research. Maybe this won’t happen, and maybe I’m reading way too much into just a couple of phrases included in Mark’s article. I hope this is the case because increasing research opportunities for coaches and others (including psychologists) is essential for the well-being of coached clients, coaching, and the general public.
I certainly applaud Harvard for stepping up to the plate here. I believe there is much to be learned about why and how coaching works. This research will undoubtedly pave the way towards higher standards in coaching training that will result in a greater expectations and superior results for coaching clients. Today, the terms “coaching” and especially “life coaching” as often as not elicit curious comments and questions from people who are unfamiliar with coaching and incorrectly associate it with therapy or social work. Bringing coaching into the ivory towers still, there are aspects of coaching to which I question how an academic approach and scientific research will ultimately be very relevant, in particular, what is it that makes a great coach stand out from a merely professional and competent coach. For example, can we truly measure and standardize intuition, empathy, life experience or compassion? More importantly, would we even want to do so?
Tatiana Bachkirova at Oxford Brookes University in the UK and I are currently getting ready to get started with a research project that has been funded by the Institute of Coaching.
Over the next year, we will convene 3 one-day meetings of experienced coaches through which we will come up with an instrument that can be used to describe what happens during a specific coaching session. The instrument will consist of a list of items describing the coach, the client, and the coaching dyad, and users of the instrument will rate each item, as it applies to a specific session, on a scale from “highly uncharacteristic” to “highly characteristic”.
Given similar research that has been done on the process of psychotherapy, we expect that this instrument will be able to be used for future coaching research such as:
- What are the differences between different types of coaching?
- How does what coaches actually do in sessions compare to what coaches believe they do?
- How is coaching different from neighboring fields?
- What coaching behaviors, at what points in a coaching relationship, correlate positively with positive outcomes?
Of course, we are honored to have received this grant and look forward to contributing to our shared body of knowledge.
Hello All –
Thank you for all these posts – it is exciting to hear what you all are thinking.
We do hope to be part of the trend toward understanding why and how coaching works. For those of us who have experienced coaching, we know it is a powerful process of change – unpacking what that is should be fascinating and we hope helpful.
Some of you expressed concerns, so I’d love to address that.
Dean expressed worry we’d become reductionistic and strangle the life and soul of coaching. I agree with his concern – it is exactly what we don’t want! We want to find rigorous ways to study the heart of coaching. It is a joyful, powerful experience and we must find reliable and valid ways to study what is truly exciting and powerful. One of the grants we’re looking at is studying positivity for example.
Dean also comments on how he’d hate to see coaching become overanalyzed and result in homogenized. I hope for the exact opposite! I hope for diversity and multiplicity in coaching. Different approaches work for different people at different times, and what one coach does best another does not. Our research needs to reflect the real world – we are not, nor ever should be, a one-size-fits-all profession.
For those of you who are not aware of the rich tradition of qualitative research – where one can dive deeply into the lived experience of coaching – Dean’s point is correct. We need to cultivate many forms of research, quantitative, qualitative and even transpersonal. However, on one point we disagree, I do think good research can make the practice of coaching better.
Rey Carr also raised some important points. Regarding Rey’s comments that we need to “lower” the bar. I believe coaching practitioners can do high-level research. Great research doesn’t have to be overly complicated. I would hope for synergy.
David Drake made a great comment – while we need evidence-based practice, we also need practice-based evidence. I hope practice can inform research and the reverse.
Regarding the “Wild West” comment, I used it because it is so often quoted as a criticism of the field – but I think your point is well taken. I do think he was wrong then – and he’s even more wrong now!
Equally, it is crucial that psychologists do NOT hijack the research agenda. The agenda should be informed by the entire field. I am also dismayed by psychologists who suddenly dub themselves coaches without coach training (as the Wild West one) – I think this dishonors the field. My own experience was that I was as credentialed as a psychologist could be, and my own coach training showed me how vastly different coaching is from therapy. So I believe very strongly in coach training.
Much of my time is spent in my executive coach supervision practice. I currently supervise about 25 top-level coaches from around the world. None of them are psychologists and each of them does superlative work. I see that their coach training has prepared them to effectively do very important and transformative work.
Thank you all for the opportunity to connect with you – and please come visit our website.
We have our first iteration up, videos are coming, and we welcome feedback on what else we can add.
Best,
Carol K
Director, Institute of Coaching
After 12 years closely watching it grow, its great to see progress in the coaching field. I think that many of the most tangible benefits of this institute will emerge through applications of coaching to the medical field, which is an urgent and valuable thing and definitely a sign of progress to me.
I think it’s also good that there is further research going to occur, as we’ve not explored more than a few percent of the issues that should be explored I believe.
The challenge with an institute like this is it quickly becomes a voice for psychologically-trained (both positive and general) practitioners to try to do what they have been trying to do for years, which is own the intellectual high ground. Unfortunately this is often by attempting to trash any other ideas or approaches to coaching that are not based in psychological paradigms. I’m sorry psychologists, but systems thinkers are equally important, as are people who’ve trained deeply in learning theory, and even people who’ve studied how the brain works. There are fierce intellectual battles for conceptual supremacy at the start of any new field, and the outcome of these battles do mean something: power, resources, etc. It happens in religions, it happens in coaching. May the institute flourish, may the arguments be useful, and may I never see the kind of research come out of this as I see coming out of some universities that directly attack the bulk of the coaching field in order to get column inches in the newspaper for their authors.
David Rock’s and others’ concerns about the institutionalization of coaching are all very well founded. I would hate to see coaching relegated to an arm of psychology and certainly what’s going on in much of the medical field these days is nothing to be envied.
And if researchers try to isolate aspects of coaching that ‘work’ and then try to reconstitute it in some linear fashion, we’ll get something much less than mediocre coaching, as a result.
On the other hand, what if they see the light and realize there is something to intuition and whole brain (and body) integration, after all? What if the main stream learns to appreciate genuine acknowledgment and sincere curiosity? Wouldn’t that change them? Might it not change the world?
Coaching is not a medical therapy, nor even a new form of psychology. Coaching is, dare I say it? Better.
Uh oh, maybe I’ve just stabbed my own stake in the sand for the coming turf war.
I hope it’s clear that there are many forms of research and that it is should be quite possible to look at who helps whom, in what situations, by doing what without the risk of medicalizing coaching.
For example, in therapy, there is research supporting the importance of the relationship between therapist and client and of the role of the client’s hope. This doesn’t prescribe what to do, but does begin to look at the role of fit between therapist and client. I would find it surprising if there isn’t useful research to be done about the fit between coach and client.
There is also increasing research on the role of right-brain to right-brain interaction in therapy and healing.
I hope that coaching doesn’t become yet another silo where only research from within the field is valued. Coaching seems like exactly the sort of field where we might look at what we can incorporate from psychology, neuroscience, adult development, etc., as David Rock also mentioned.
When I read “What if the main stream learns to appreciate genuine acknowledgment and sincere curiosity?” I imagine some potential hypotheses that could be researched:
- Common factors in coaching are genuine acknowledgment and sincere curiosity
- These factors correlate with successful coaching (e.g., the client meets his/her goals)
- These factors are present in coaching and not in other forms of helping (or are more present)
Perhaps these are all true, perhaps not.
It’s reasonable to hope to avoid the pitfalls seen in other professions. At the same time, that still leaves room for a lot of research that could be useful to our profession.
The evidence that such research will be able to deliver will start to provide the ammunition that many clients and their organizations often require before entering into coaching engagements. Having said this those of us who are already convinced of the merits and benefits of coaching in all its guises should be open minded and prepared to accept whatever rigorous research shows as some of the outcomes may not be as expected – but that of course is why the research is going ahead.
The willingness to explore, research, incorporate ‘thinking & evidences’ from varied & other professional fields into coaching research, and as a result, generate useful and meaningful ‘coaching models/concepts/practices’; that would make coaching efficient, effective, impactful and truthful for the coaching discipline/profession; that benefits the coach, coachee and stakeholders concerned, should be welcome. How will any discipline/profession/industry evolves without theory informing practice, and practice verifiable/validated through research?
Openness to be questioned/explored, willingness to accept & embrace, critical to analyze & immersed into creative thoughts, engaging into intellectual discussions/conversations about coach & coaching-related research findings so that theory is supported by evidential practice, and practice is supported by evidential research/theory, should go a long way for the coaching discipline/profession. I see the Institute of Coaching as one of the vehicle for achieving all of these. Am I correct to say that?
As far as I am aware, there are only a handful of institutions and coach practising firms that are willing and seriously investing & engaging into coaching research. To me, the coaching discipline/profession needs ‘seriousness’, determination, and concerted efforts in research. In this respect, I envisage the Institute of Coaching is among the pioneers of ‘serious’ coaching research.
My personal wish is to see more research done to verify/validate coaching practice. The Institute of Coaching may hold the answers? What are your thoughts on this?
Are we seeing a pioneering and evolutionary process in the coaching discipline/profession/industry with the establishment and the work of the Institute of Coaching?
Billy C H Teoh
Malaysia.
I think many people don’t realize just how important research is in this field, but like any science, because to me this is like a science similar to psychology, there must be constant research and adaption to allow coaching services to keep up to date with peoples needs.
Great news and I look forward to learn more about that.