Developmental coaching: Theory and practice

Although coaching is often portrayed in the literature and amongst coaches as a developmental enterprise, the concept of developmental coaching is less than clear and open to misinterpretations. This paper introduces a theory specifically developed for coaching practice and fully described in the author’s book »Developmental Coaching: Working with the Self«. The theory is based on a new conceptualisation of the self and suggests a developmental framework that implies a certain trajectory in the adult development process. For coaching practice this theory advocates an individual approach to coaching clients of the three different groups and suggests three mechanisms of influencing development