Integrating Rigor, Compassion and Creative Design: The Promise of Integral Coaching and New Ventures West’s Professional Coaching Course

J Flaherty, A Handelsman International Journal of Coaching in Organizations 2004

What becomes possible in coaching when we treat clients as marvelously complex beings who live in language and moods, inhabit bodies and physical environments, and possess both wisdom and blind spots? What opens up when we coach them at the appropriate depth and can appreciate multiple streams of their competence? In short, what would it be like if our coaching included everything and everyone? And who would we need to become to fulfill this audacious aspiration? These questions can serve as an entry point to studying Integral Coaching, and they model the type of inquiry that is at the heart of New Ventures West's Professional Coaching Course.