In this issue
Features
In transition: the benefits of maternity coaching
Kathy Cotter
A place of safety: getting the most out of supervision (free article)
Jo Birch and Sarah Corrie
Working the web: a coach’s guide to social media and online marketing
Emer O’Leary
The first step: empowering people with disabilities
Rachel Waddington
Ask Kathleen
Kathleen Daymond explains BACP’s Ask Kathleen guidance and information service
Regulars
Coach journeys
Coach, author and broadcaster Nick Williams in conversation with Eve Menezes Cunningham
A pdf of this issue is available in the Coaching Today archive
Editorial
A very Happy New Year to you all, and welcome to our third anniversary issue. As our Chair, Gill Fennings-Monkman, describes in her Message, there have been a number of significant changes in BACP Coaching over the past year, including changes within the Executive and the inclusion of coaching in the BACP Ethical Framework. We also have further exciting changes on the immediate horizon as we move into the new year, including the launch of our new website.
More significantly, as Editor of our journal, I am delighted to welcome the forthcoming launch of Coaching Today online. Our digital version will embrace the latest ‘page turn’ technology and will be fully accessible. As Gill also mentions in her Message, the online issue will launch later this year. We are publishing this issue both in print and online.
In keeping with the theme of change and transition for our first issue of the year, our cover feature by Kathy Cotter explores the burgeoning arena of maternity coaching – supporting working women through the transition into motherhood and back into the workplace as working mothers. As Kathy explains, the role of the maternity coach is to ‘provide a bridge’ for women as they go through this ‘critical transition’. She also looks at the longer-term implications of maternity coaching and how the benefits can have a far-reaching and lasting impact, not only for the mothers themselves but for organisations and business as a whole.
Rachel Waddington, a coach working for a Yorkshire-based disability charity, also explores sustainable change. Rachel describes the work she does within a specific project focused on reducing social isolation for people with disabilities and asks how a short-term intervention can have long-lasting benefits for the people it is designed to serve.
We also celebrate the impending launch of our digital version of Coaching Today with a special guide to using online social media to promote your practice or business. As the plethora of digital marketing options grows and companies from LinkedIn to Facebook exercise changes in policy and privacy, it can be increasingly confusing for practitioners to know which platform is most suitable and for what purpose. Social media expert Emer O’ Leary’s article provides a handy guide through the tangled ‘web’ of options and highlights issues you will need to consider when creating an online profile and interacting with ‘friends’, ‘followers’ and ‘contacts’.
As we transition into a new year and a new format, I look forward to the future sustainability of our journal and to ensuring that Coaching Today continues to support you – members and subscribers alike – in your development as practitioners in the growing field of dual coach-therapy practice. Please do keep your ideas and feedback coming; you are all contributors.
Here’s to change, transition – and a wonderful New Year.
Diane Parker
Editor