I earned my certification in December and feel more empowered by having it. Good luck to you in your endeavor!

I really liked Andrea's interview and have to say that I agree with her in her assessment that some time very soon the "mainstream" will demand an answer as to what exactly coaching is. I have some journalistic background, and I'll be honest: I have a very strong gut feeling (or maybe it's a fear?) that some time soon somebody is going to write an unpleasant feature story in some prominent magazine about the coaching profession. Frankly, if I were still in journalism, I might do it myself. Given how there is no regulation and no real training requirements, and given how popular coaching is becoming, I have no doubt that there are some freelance journalists getting curious about cases of people falling victim to coaches who are less than scrupulous in their approach, making false claims, and failing to deliver value.

Let's face it - to the outsider, the profession doesn't really look like a profession at all. If you look at the definition of Life coaching on Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life_coaching), it's pathetic. A profession that doesn't require any training or certification? Sounds like amateurism to me at best. It's no wonder that some coaches are actually avoiding calling themselves coaches.

We among ourselves all know that certification has nothing to do with who's a truly great coach and who's not. But school grades have very little to do with who's really talented and gifted either. Still - we do grade students, because the society insists on having ways to measure achievement.

If we are going to turn coaching into something that's understood, respected, and in demand by the mainstream - our potential clients - we all have to do our part to improve the standing of the profession. Certification is one way of doing it. Without it, coaching will remain misunderstood, underappreciated, and trivialized.

Apologies if this sounded too strong... but I actually do have very strong feelings about this. Probably because professionalism is one of my top values, which is why I feel particularly irked when people refer to coaches as substitutes for friends...

Andrea, if getting the certification will get you the work you desire, by all means go for it! This certification and graduate degree game continues to be the collective reality frame-work agreement; you get the respect with the paper along with certain gigs; cuz people really hold that certification as a holy grail and they collectively agree to follow that trail; however a coach is as good as a coach is plain and simple. As it says in the good book that many continue to hold in high regard; "you shall know them by their good works"...that could be enuff and thankfully it is for many.

All the best,

Alana in NZ

I am an ICF member but have no intention of jumping through its certification hoops. To do so would be another "vote" for ICF standards, and I think coaching is a wider field than the ICF says it is.
Does every coach need certification? I don't think so, and I don't think good coaches should be bullied into a certification process.
As a political statement alone, I was prepared to be an example of a "good" coach without initials after her name.
However, several years ago, I was asked to join the IAC Board of Governors. I agreed to pursue IAC Certification as a condition of board service.
I applaud Andrea's decision to seek IAC Certification. It's important for a number of reasons, not the least of which is a "vote" for a certification other than ICF's.
The ICF, excellent as it may be, should not have an unchallenged monopoly on the certification business or on the coaching profession itself.
The ICF became the de facto authority on the profession by default. However, the ICF is a trade organization with a very specific political point of view about coaching. It has a vested business interest in promulgating its very narrow definition of a professional coach. Absent other voices, the ICF will define professional coaching. To me, that's not in the best interest of clients or coaching itself.
Any certification system that demands a certain number of hours of practice or schooling does not take into account the personal and professional experience that may qualify a person to coach.
To me, it doesn't matter how much schooling or practice a coach has if s/he is not an effective coach. And if a person is an effective coach, then it doesn't matter how the skills were acquired or how long they've been practiced.
I think clients should be informed about the variety of qualifications a coach may have, and make choices about choosing a coach based on that information and personal interviews with prospective coaches. Not every prospective client needs a coach with years of hoop-jumping experience.
Because in the end, it's not the initials after the coach's name. It's the relationship between client and coach, and the effectiveness of their partnership.
Andrea seems to have been a most effective coach for her many clients without having "official" credentials!