Special Group in Coaching Psychology News

Ho Law

The winner is … Well, by the time you read this, you would have known which team won the World-Cup, who won Wimbledon and, etc. At the time of writing this update, history had been made by John Isner and Nicolas Mahut at Wimbledon with the longest match, which lasted 11 hours 5 minutes (70-68 in the final set). People in the UK are still pre-occupied with the World Cup, Wimbledon, and the economic condition of our time. The connection between coaching psychology and our everyday life may seem to be remote. The idea that coaching psychology may be one of the ways that can actually help the nation through the current tough economic crisis or winning the next World Cup in 2014 may only belong to a few coaching psychologists themselves. This takes us back to my previous update about the importance of coaching psychologists to demonstrate the benefits of applying coaching psychology by engaging the wider community… (Law, 2010).

So I hope you all have had a nice summer holiday; and welcome back to the SGCP business. We have now finalised our strategic plan with the following strategic aims:

1. Promote and advance coaching psychology.
2. Develop coaching psychology as a profession.
3. Encourage and promote the development of coaching psychology through a variety of mechanisms.
4. Engage our members and the wider community.
5. Support our members and the profession of coaching psychology.

Our next step is to develop an action plan that will involve input from all the SGCP Committee members and Officers. This will form part of our business plan 2010-2012. As the SGCP at present has 2255 members with a bank balance of over £59.8k. It is vital for us as a professional body to produce a proper business plan so that we (as coaching psychologists) can lead by example: to be more business-like and evidence-based in everything that we do. The aim of the business plan is to help us to implement our strategic plan. Its objectives are to:

• Show how our strategic aims will be achieved.
• Ensure that the actions are accountable, transparent and achievable/feasible-specific, measurable, agreeable, realistic, time bound, and can be subjected to reviewed and evaluation.
• Enable each Committee member and Officer to have a sense of ownership, responsibility, direction, working proactively rather than reactively.
• Increase clarity.
• Provide accountability for stakeholders.
• Promote evidence-based evaluation.
• Help future planning.

In the next Update, I hope we could be able to show you what we should have achieved, and judge the quality and value of those achievements against the actions that we set out in our business plan…

At present, I am delighted to report that the planning of the 1st International Congress of Coaching Psychology is progressing well (thanks to a team of enthusiastic volunteers and our Past Chair Vicky Ellam-Dyson’s continuous leadership). As I always said, the SGCP would not function without the volunteers. I am looking for ways to acknowledge and honour their contributions to our profession.

Externally, quite a lot has happened since the last Update. There has been numerous debates about the confusion that coaching buyers (and coaches) are facing when trying to select a coaching accreditation offered by different coaching organisations (CaW, 2010, p.19). A roundtable was set up quite a few years ago which consisted of a number of coaching bodies. It has been making a concerted effort (a ‘project’) to provide a collective response to this issue with an aim to develop a means of capturing the range of accreditation levels provided by the coaching bodies (members of the roundtable) to provide a meaningful comparison for the coaching community.

At the same time, the British Psychological Society has been continuously implementing its re-structuring since the regulation of practitioner psychologists was taken over by the Health Professions Council on 1 July 2009 (www.hpc-uk.org/). The redevelopment of Society registers was discussed at the recent Board of Trustees meeting. A seminar of stakeholders was convened on 14 May at the Society’s London office, which Dr Angela Hetherington (Chair-Elect) and I attended on behalf of the SGCP in response to the invitation by Sue Gardner, the Society’s President. From the presentations, we were informed that a matrix or framework for various Society registers was being developed that would meet the diverse needs for our members. For example, a register had been developed for Improving Access to Psychological Therapies (IAPT) practitioners which could provide a model framework for Coaching Psychology - with two levels of entry: Chartered and non-Chartered. This has obvious implication to our development of accreditation for coaching psychologists. It means that it may be possible to provide a similar route for our non-chartered members to be accredited in the future within SGCP. At present, our Accreditation Working Party is developing such a new framework as a proposal for the Society’s next Membership and Professional Training Board (MPTB) meeting in autumn.

So we are certainly living in exciting times; and watch this space …

I am also pleased to learn from our Publications and Communication Sub-Committee that ICPR is available through PsychINFO, and that a list of databases that consist of ICPR’s entry is being compiled. The accessibility of ICPR is important for the dissemination of our knowledge (part of our strategic aims). This would enable researchers to seek the papers published in ICPR. It would have a significant influence on the impact factor of the publication. Of course, for the readers, the benefits and value of ICPR are far more reaching than the impact factor can measure. I shall let the individual articles published in this journal speak for themselves. So enjoy reading! I look forward to welcoming you all on 14 December 2010 at our first International Congress.

Ho Law
Chair, British Psychological Society Special Group in Coaching Psychology
E-mail: [email protected]
www.sgcp.org.uk

References
CaW (2010). View from the balcony - Too much of a good thing? Coaching at Work, 5(2), 19.

Law, H.C. (2010) Special Group in Coaching Psychology News. International Coaching Psychology Review, 5(1), 86-87. The Australian Psychological Society & British Psychological Society.

Interest Group in Coaching Psychology News

Peter Zarris

Dear IGCP Member and Coaching Psychology colleagues at the British Psychological Society.

Times does indeed fly when I come to realise that I have been the Chair (or National Convener) of our interest group for nearly three years now. Not only has time flown, the landscape of Coaching Psychology has also changed dramatically in that time and it is a dramatically growing and maturing field of interest.

The initial impetus of coaching psychology was provided by a small but highly committed band of academics and practitioners. The International Coaching Psychology Review is one of the flagships and key reasons for being for our group and the current addition is the latest instalment of the great body of research being conducted between both the British Psychological Society Special Group in Coaching Psychology and our own Interest Group in Coaching Psychology.

It is, however, imperative that we broaden the research base and encourage students and researchers to contribute to this body of knowledge, and, therefore, we need to broaden both the research and the people conducting research globally.

As such one of the key foci of my last 18 months as the Chair of the IGCP will be to incentivise and encourage this research in Australia. There is little doubt that there is an enormous opportunity to professionalise the broader area of coaching, but in particular to professionalise coaching psychology.

There is clear evidence that the use of coaching in corporate situations is increasing, and, therefore, this offers not only a rewarding and exciting career path for psychologists in general, it also provides a unique opportunity for psychologists and the profession of psychology to make an impact among some of the business leaders and broader community and public sector leaders globally.

Part of this opportunity is to continue research in the area of coaching psychology both in terms of its methodology and effects, and we as a national committee will continue to make this a key priority.

The First International Congress of Coaching Psychology 2010-2011
The IGCP is proud to partner with Coaching Psychology groups globally to enable the first ICCP. As is well stated on the website the aim of this two-part congress is to promote the development of the coaching psychology professional globally and to bring the coaching psychology community together.

The congress at the global level is being co-convened by Stephen Palmer in London and I am the representative of the IGCP assisting Stephen in this endeavour.

As many of you would know historically our national symposium has been the flagship of the group bringing together local and international presenters and researchers to discuss and explore the latest trends and research in the area.

The ICCP, however, allows us to explore this opportunity globally and also provides us an opportunity to make links with a range of international organisations. It is hoped that this will provide the impetus for not only professionalising psychology, but for bringing together the movement globally and beginning to more define our role as a profession moving forward.

As will no doubt be documented elsewhere, the congress will be in a number of countries around the world. The Northern Hemisphere chapter will hold its first congress event in London on 14-15 December at City University and I strongly encourage all of you to attend. Ireland will be hoping to run its congress event in Dublin in June, 2011. Other coaching psychology groups in Europe including the Danish and Swedish groups are still developing their plans. To keep up-to-date with congress events, please visit our joint website which will be updated on a regular basis: www.coachingpsychologycongress.org

The Southern Hemisphere chapter, which at this stage will include representatives from our own IGCP and from counterparts from South Africa, New Zealand and other professional bodies in the AsiaPac region, will be announced.

At this stage it is envisaged that the congress will occur at some stage in March to April in 2011 and will build on what will no doubt be an exciting and groundbreaking event in London in December.

I strongly encourage you all to visit the website and become registered supporters of this initiative.

2010 Symposium
2010 marks the 4th National IGCP Symposium.

The Symposium will be conducted later this year in Melbourne on 26-27 November. The Symposium sub-committee is being chaired by Nic Eddie who is also the Convener for the Victorian State Committee. Nic and his Victorian committee along with some input from the national committee are essentially the Symposium sub-committee.

They have identified a clear approach to the Symposium which will focus on the development of specific coaching skills and there will be a clear theme and a different approach utilised in the upcoming Symposium.

Nic and his committee will distribute information regarding this in the coming weeks.

The Symposium continues to be one of the key professional development activities within our group and this year promises to be another exciting event which will act as a great precursor to the 1st ICCP Congress event in London the following month.

This event has always been very well attended by our IGCP members and I look forward to seeing you all again there later this year.

The National Standards
As some of you will be aware but perhaps many not, there is a National Standards project to develop guidelines for workplace coaching standards.

These standards will provide clear guidelines on how to undertake work based coaching.

The two primary authors are Anne White and our own Michael Cavanagh.

When the events are published later this year this will again provide a unique opportunity for the development of the coaching profession. It will set clear expectations and parameters of what work based coaching is and creates a unique opportunity for the further development of coaching as a profession.

We (the IGCP) are a key signatory to these standards and further underpins our commitment to the development of coaching and psychology as a profession. We believe that psychologists have a key and crucial role to play in the development of capabilities in a variety of forums and we will have a key role to play in coaching in the workplace.

We encourage all of our members to remain cognisant of these standards and how to be able to present the status of this project at the National Symposium later in November.

Upcoming events
In addition to the two major events being conducted over the 12 months there are ongoing professional development events occurring at your local state branches.

One of these events will have completed by the time this goes to print, but nonetheless there will be a national roadshow showcasing four globally-renowned coaching psychologists entitled ‘The Reflective Practitioner’.

Your local state committees will keep you informed of other important events.

The future
There are two key areas I would like to focus on in terms of the future.

First, the need to have greater involvement from our members in the running of the IGCP. So coaching psychology is fast becoming one of the most exciting and dynamic areas in the professional, but it requires us to continually upgrade our state national committees. Often the amount of work that needs to be done to continue to create professional development events and longer term a profession by which all of our members and broader psychologists can benefit is difficult.

As such it is imperative that we have people involved at local state committees moving forward.

In particular, our members in Queensland, South Australia and Western Australia are encouraged to become involved at a state level and if you have interest please contact one of the National Committee via our website.

Second, I’d like to talk about the profession moving forward.

As a practitioner of some 20 years in the area of psychology and as somebody who has worked with both corporate and Government institutions I believe that the opportunity to influence the future direction of these institutions has never been greater.

Whilst to a minor degree the movement in Australia has plateaued, it continues to gain pace globally and there is evidence of increasing interest from non-psychologists in the area of coaching.

The basic responsibility of our professional body is to provide professional development opportunities for psychologists. There is, however, a more pressing challenge and that is to have a seat at the table with key organisational and community decision makers. The coaching psychology profession is a real and exciting career option for not only our members, but for psychologists more broadly.

As such the thought I would like to leave our members, as well as all readers and our partners from the SGCP, is that now is the time for us to understand the opportunity to contribute more greatly.

The two areas in which we can most directly contribute is by contributing to the publications and by becoming actively involved in the committees we have developed.

Whilst the last three years have been a great challenge, they have also been not only rewarding for me, but also developed my professional capability and credibility beyond what I would have thought possible.

As such my final and most important message is to ask you all to become more involved and to take a greater interest in this area. As a professional group we have an enormous opportunity to make the impact that we all so often talk about.

It’s time.

Until next time best wishes.

Peter Zarris
National Convenor, IGCP.
E-mail: [email protected]