The Case for Supervision of Mentors & Coaches

For the largely unregulated field of mentoring/coaching to boost it's professional credibility, increase it's level of accountability as expected of professionals and to provide clients with quality assurance it would be prudent to embrace supervision of practice. Supervision has been the mainstay of other professional helping professions such as counselling, social work and psychology.

There are four professional international associations for mentoring/coaching, all of which have as their goal the promotion of best practice and raising awareness and standards across the sector. Whilst these professional bodies have codes of ethics and good practice guidelines, and they promote the practice of supervision, supervision is not mandatory.

What do we mean by ‘Supervision'?

Supervision in this context is not supervision by an overseer, but rather, supervision as a process of accountability, education and support that encourages the highest professional standards and encourages safe practice. Supervision is a formal arrangement for mentors/coaches to regularly reflect on their work with a trained supervisor.

Supervision is a professional development process that is not linked to courses and is not the same as mentoring or coaching. Through the supervision process, the primary concern of the supervisor is to ensure that the mentor/coach is addressing the needs of the clients as well as monitoring the relationship between the mentor/coach and the client to maximise the effectiveness of the relationship. In addition, supervision is also a way of ensuring that the ethical standards are adhered to through the coaching process. Although supervision is not concerned primarily with training, it is legitimate for supervisors to encourage and facilitate the ongoing self development and learning of the mentor/coach.

Supervision is referred to as "Super Vision", highlighting that it is not restrictive or prescriptive, but rather, a process for increasing professional competence. It is a supportive process.

Why is supervision relevant & important to the practising mentor/coach?

Protection

• To protect clients (individual, team, organisation) . As client work is discussed with a trained professional areas of potential concern are identified and guidance offered or referral to specialist support provided, if appropriate.

• To protect the mentor/coach, "I am the tool I use....". Provides the opportunity to keep up to date with professional developments in the field and to continually work "to increase your competency".

Developmental benefits to mentors /coaches

• To monitor, develop and explore the mentoring/coaching process. It provides the opportunity to reflect on their work and identify patterns which may give useful insights to improving their interventions.

• To assist the mentor/coach's personal development. Supervision offers the opportunity to identify your own personal strengths and weaknesses as a mentor/coach in order to realistically judge what limitations to set with respect to the type of work you undertake.

• To help the mentor/coach to evolve their practice by relating theory to practice

Ethical Standards

• To ensure coaching is applied ethically and effectively

Adapted from Prof Mike van Oudtshoorn & David Lane coach academy UK

Working with people in mentoring/coaching is a privilege that embodies a ‘duty of care' for all involved parties - the client and the mentor/coach. By its very nature, mentoring/coaching is a demanding process and the opportunity to reflect on the mentoring/coaching practice in confidence with a trained supervisor is more than invaluable it is essential. Whilst the emerging profession is in the process of developing appropriate models for mentoring/coaching the overarching importance of supervision for the professionalism of the field cannot be underestimated.