Life Coach Education & Career Guide
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Life Coach Job Description
Life coaches do more than cheer on their clients. Listening, building trust, and helping clients set goals are key to effective coaching.
You’ve heard the buzz: Many people have a life coach, and not just celebrities like Oprah Winfrey and Serena Williams. Some of your friends, relatives, or neighbors may have a coach for guidance as they make life changes that require a new journey and new goals.
Luke Davis, vice president of coach training for the International Coaching Federation, says successful coach practitioners “are great listeners and have a genuine interest in helping others. They demonstrate interest, are curious by nature, and ask great questions.”
If that sounds like you, a career as a life coach might could be a good choice.
In This Article
Overview
Life coaching is a fairly new career, and those who pursue it come from an array of backgrounds. They are often accomplished individuals with college degrees who have been successful in another calling. They may be executives looking for a career change, homemakers looking for fulfilling part-time work, or psychologists who want to use coaching skills in their practice.
Jenny McGlothern is a busy mom with two children. She also owns the retreat and life coaching business Mama Needs A Refill, and currently coaches clients all over the world.
Coaching can be a lot of things, says McGlothern, but mostly it’s about “getting on the phone with a client for a scheduled session and the client hanging up the phone with clarity, inspiration, and a plan of action at the end of our call. Then on our next phone call, it’s about celebrating that client’s success, forward action, or revelation.”
Highly experienced coaches learn to listen and “hear” at a deeper level, recognizing the client’s gifts, limiting beliefs and patterns, and growing sense of self-awareness.
How You’ll Work with Clients
No matter where a life coach works or whether they choose to specialize, there are activities and tasks common to the role:
As a coach with multiple clients, you’ll:
You may meet with clients in person, especially if you’re employed as an internal coach by a business or government agency or by a coaching agency that matches you with clients. Coaches also conduct client sessions over the phone or by video conferencing.
Essential Skills for a Life Coach
Angelina Corbet, a former executive who left the corporate world to start The Mobius Company, works as a coach with individuals, partners, and organizations. Corbet says a successful coach:
The Art of Active Listening
Active listening is one of the most important core competencies for a coach practitioner.
For a coach, active listening is the ability to focus completely on what a client is saying—and not saying—to truly understand the client’s desires and goals.
Highly experienced coaches learn to listen and “hear” at a deeper level, recognizing the client’s gifts, limiting beliefs and patterns, and growing sense of self-awareness. A coach can use all of this information to help their client set goals and reach them.
It’s worth noting that while life coaches and therapists share similar traits and skills, their roles are actually quite different. Life coaches help clients look to the future, while therapists help clients examine the past.
Life Coach Specialties
In many situations, life coaches can choose to specialize. This is especially true if they are self-employed or independent contractors.
If you work for a company, nonprofit, or agency, you might be a generalist and see a variety of clients, or you might specialize by topic or by population—people launching a new business, for example.
Top life coaches and their focus:
For a coach, active listening is the ability to focus completely on what a client is saying—and not saying—to truly understand the client’s desires and goals.
Where You’ll Work
If you don’t strike out on your own, there are a number of businesses and agencies that employ life coaches. Where you work could determine the type of coaching you do and the clients you’ll see.
Here are some of the workplaces that employ life coaches:
Coaching businesses:
You may work with senior corporate leaders and managers to help them improve their leadership skills.
Corporations:
A company may hire you as their in-house coach to help develop leaders and high-performing teams.
Rehabilitation centers:
Your role could be to help people with disabilities develop strategies to help them live independently.
Residential care centers:
You may work with seniors who want to make lifestyle changes.
Hospital or medical practices:
You may work with patients who need to make changes to lead healthier lives.
Insurance companies:
You may work with members of an insurance plan that includes wellness coaching.
Starting Your Own Business
A significant number of life coaches are self-employed or independent contractors. If you’re interested in taking this path, you’ll need to be prepared to run a small business. This means learning various business tasks, such as:
Some coaching and continuing education programs include training on how to set up your own business. McGlothern says it takes about five years to build a practice and suggests that new coaches develop a marketing plan. Life coaches out to make a name for themselves can:
Building Your Career
There are a number of ways to plan out your career and boost your salary. Davis says experience, credentials or certification, and specialization can boost a coach’s reputation, especially in government and corporate settings.
Both Corbet and McGlothern say that most of their business comes from client referrals, underscoring how important it is to build your reputation.
When it comes to signing a client, they say it’s the rapport the client feels with you that seals the deal.
Written and Reported by:
Sheila Mickool
Contributing Writer
With professional insight from:
Luke Davis
Vice President of ICF coach training programs
Jenny McGlothern
Owner of Mama Needs A Refill
Angelina Corbet
Founder of The Mobius Company