Michael Cavanagh & Stephen Palmer

Welcome, readers, to the first edition of the ICPR for 2010. As we begin the second decade of this century the world of coaching psychology and coaching is moving forward apace. Last December’s Second European Coaching Psychology Conference sponsored by the SGCP was a great success. Some of the keynotes and papers presented will be published in this volume of ICPR.

Coaching psychology continues to make an important contribution to coaching globally. As this issue goes to press, work in Australia is about two-thirds of the way toward completion on a national standards framework for workplace and executive coaching under the auspices of Standards Australia. While several excellent competency and training standards already exist around the world, (such as the British ENTO National Occupational Standards for Coaching and Mentoring), the Australian project is a little different in that it will be the first produced by a national standards authority aligned with the International Standards Organisation. While many bodies produce standards in countries around the world, national standards authorities (such as the Standards Australia, the British Standards Institute and the American National Standards Institute) often contribute to the creation of international standards via the International Standards Organisation (ISO). The Standards Australia project is also noteworthy in that it covers a particularly wide range of areas. It includes standards and guidelines concerning provision of coaching services, coaches’ knowledge, competence, training and ongoing development, as well as coach selection and the management of coaching processes by organisations - making it one of the most comprehensive yet produced.

Coaching psychology is well represented in this process. Peter Zarris (National Convenor of the APS IGCP, and Henry McNichol (National IGCP committee member), represent the IGCP on the working committee formed to help create and edit the standards. This working committee is made up of representatives of all stakeholder groups including coaches, coaching psychologists, training organisations, universities, coaching / coaching psychology professional bodies and purchasers of coaching. The document itself is being drafted by the ICPR’s Michael Cavanagh. The project commenced at the beginning of 2009. It is due to be published as a guideline later this year, and is expected to become an official standard soon thereafter. The process is being followed with keen interest by coaching/coaching psychology bodies around the world, as is a similar national standards process underway in Mexico.

Publications like the ICPR, the conferences, symposia and congresses of SCGP and IGCP, and our contributions to conferences and research worldwide mean that we as coaching psychologists make a real contribution to setting the standard in evidence based practice. So keep those articles coming in and submit papers to our conferences too!

This edition has another diverse range of articles for your edification and reading pleasure. Alex Linley and colleagues begin this issue with a fine article exploring another contribution of positive psychology to coaching practice. They look at the use of signature strengths in the pursuit of goals among college students and find that the use of strengths is associated with improved goal progress, psychological need fulfilment and enhanced well-being. They discuss some interesting implications for coaching practice. Following the positive psychology theme, Alison Maxwell and Tatiana Bachkirova review the concept of self-esteem in the literature to date and present a model of self-esteem illustrated by four case studies. Again, the implications for coaching practice are discussed. Emma Short, Gail Kinman and Sarah Baker report on an intriguing empirical study in which undergraduate psychology students were provided some basic training in coaching skills and conducted a peer coaching programme. They outline the positive impact of this intervention and consider how it might be extended further. Elouise Leonard-Cross reports on a mixed methods study that uses both quasi experimental methods and qualitative analysis to explore the potential business benefits of coaching in the workplace. We will leave the reader to discover what she found! Jonathan Passmore contributes another qualitative study on the coachee experience. Using grounded theory approach Jonathan explores the behaviours and attitudes coachees look for in coaches, and discusses the implications of this for coach training and practice. Our final article also uses a qualitative approach looking at the practices and attributes of a group of coaches identified by HR professionals as producing exception results. This is the first of a series of studies conducted by Gavin Dagley exploring the practice and impact of these exceptional coaches from the perspectives of the coachee, coach and organisation. They promise to be a very useful contribution to the literature. In addition to our full articles, we also have brief report by Tom Cerni that looks at the preliminary findings on a school based programme that uses Epstein’s Cognitive Experiential Self Theory in coaching. This report is as tantalising as it is brief.

It is well worth reading the reports from the new SGCP Chair, Ho Law, and the IGCP Convenor, Peter Zarris. They both mention the exciting news that coaching psychology is going to hold its own International Congress during 2010 and 2011 in different locations around the world. The SGCP and IGCP are hoping that this on-going event will help to bring the global coaching psychology community even closer together, enhance the profession and break new ground in the theory, research and practice of coaching psychology. We will be inviting other professional coaching psychology bodies to become involved too. Watch this space.

We once again commend the articles in this issue for your consideration. Happy reading.

Correspondence
Michael Cavanagh
Coaching Psychology Unit,
Department of Psychology,
Sydney University,
Sydney, Australia.
E-mail: [email protected]

Stephen Palmer
Coaching Psychology Unit,
Department of Psychology,
City University London,
Northampton Square,
London, UK.
E-mail: [email protected]