Chris Chance, Ph.D.
P.O. Box 66 100 High Street, Exeter, NH 03833 (603) 580-1136 [email protected]
COACHING POLICIES AND INFORMED CONSENT
Coaching Services:
The purpose of coaching is to develop and implement strategies to help the you reach personally identified goals of enhanced performance and personal satisfaction. Coaching may address a wide variety of goals including specific personal projects, life balance, job performance and satisfaction, or general conditions in the client's life, business, or profession.
Feedback:
If, at any time, you feel that your needs are not being met or you are not getting what you want out of the coaching or training group, please tell me, so we can discuss your needs and adjust your coaching program, as needed. We will continue to work on the goals that you define unless you want to stop, which we will do whenever you ask.
Call Procedure:
When conducting a scheduled telephone followup, Coach will call the Client at the prearranged time at the phone number designated. If for some reason the client is not available within 10 minutes of the scheduled time (normally the coach will try to call back 2x over ten minutes, given modern technical glitches), it will be the client’s responsibility to contact the coach to reschedule.
Cancellations:
Please remember that you must give 24 hours prior notice if you need to cancel or change the time of an appointment, otherwise you will be charged for the session in full. The Coach will make reasonable efforts to reschedule sessions which are cancelled in a timely manner.
Termination:
Either party may end the coaching relationship by providing the other party with a one-week written or verbal notice, which may be transmitted by email, fax, or telephone voicemail (if using voicemail, please consider communication complete when receipt of message confirmed).
Confidentiality:
As a licensed therapist, I protect the confidentiality of the communications with my clients, including my coaching clients. I will only release information about our work to others with your written permission, or if I am required to do so by a court order. There are some situations in which I am legally obligated to breach your confidentiality in order to protect others from harm, including (1) if I have information that indicates that a child or elderly or disabled person is being abused, I must report that to the appropriate state agency and (2) if a client is an imminent risk to him/herself or makes threats of imminent violence against another person, I am required to take protective actions. These situations rarely occur in coaching practices, but if such a situation does occur, I will make every effort to discuss it with you before taking any action.
Some sessions are conducted in groups, including teleconference groups. You agree to maintain the confidentiality of all information communicated to you by other coaching clients and by your Coach. We also understand that progress is often enhanced when clients discuss their coaching relationship with trusted colleagues and friends. You can have these discussions, but you are expected to be very careful not to share any information which would allow others in the group to be identified. One way to decide how and what to discuss is to think about how you would feel if someone else in the group was discussing you.
As you are probably aware, it is impossible to completely protect the confidentiality of information which is transmitted electronically. This is particularly true of E-mail and cell phones. It is suggested email communication be limited to brief logistical contact such as rescheduling an appointment.
Coaching and Psychotherapy:
In addition to being a Coach, I am also a licensed therapist in NH, with training and experience in diagnosing and treating emotional and psychological problems. I have outlined on my website some distinctions between psychotherapy and coaching, and will expand on that here. Although there are some similarities between Coaching and psychotherapy, I will not conduct psychotherapy with my coaching clients. These are different activities, and it is important that you understand the differences between them. Although both Coaching and psychotherapy use knowledge of human behavior, motivation, behavioral change, and interactive counseling techniques, there are major differences in the goals, focus, and level of professional responsibility.
As your Coach, my job is to help you to take information and skills that you already have and (1) to make decisions about which changes you would like to make (2) to develop a personal “action plan" in order to make those changes, (3) to implement your action plan and make the behavioral changes, and (4) to develop strategies to maintain the changes you have made. I will support, encourage, teach, and help you stay "on track" toward your goals.
You, as the Client, set the agenda for your coaching, and your success will depend on your willingness to define and take risks and try new approaches. You can expect your Coach to be honest and direct, asking straightforward questions and using challenging techniques to help you move forward. You are expected to evaluate your own progress, and if the coaching is not working as you wish, you should immediately inform your Coach so we can both take steps to correct the problem. Like any human endeavor, coaching can involve feelings of distress and frustration which accompany the process of change. Coaching does not offer any guarantee of success.
Psychotherapy, on the other hand, is a health care service. Its primary focus is to identify, diagnose, and treat nervous and mental disorders. The goals include alleviating symptoms, understanding the underlying personality dynamics which create symptoms, changing the dysfunctional behaviors which are the result of these disorders, and developing helping patients to cope with their psychological problems. It is usually reimbursable through health insurance policies (while coaching is not, at present).
Psychotherapy patients are often emotionally vulnerable. This vulnerability is increased by the expectation that they will discuss very intimate personal information and will expose feelings about themselves that are understandably sensitive about. The past life experiences of psychotherapy patients have often made trust difficult to achieve. These factors give psychotherapists greatly disproportionate power that creates a fiduciary responsibility to protect the safety of their clients. The coaching relationship is designed to avoid this power differential.
Because of these differences, the roles of Coach and psychotherapist are often in potential conflict, so I believe that it is ethically inappropriate, under most circumstances, for me to play both roles with a client. If I am your Coach, I cannot be your therapist. This means that if either of us recognizes that you have a concern that would benefit from psychotherapy, I will refer or direct you to appropriate resources. In some situations, I may insist that you enter psychotherapy and that I have access to your psychotherapist, as a condition of my continuing as your Coach.
It is also important to understand that Coaching is a professional relationship. While it may feel at times like a close personal relationship, it is not one that can extend beyond professional boundaries, either during or after our work together. Considerable experience shows that when boundaries blur, the hard-won benefits gained from the coaching relationship are endangered.
Chris Chance, Ph.D.
P.O. Box 66 100 High Street, Exeter, NH 03833 (603) 580-1136 [email protected]
COACHING POLICIES AND INFORMED CONSENT
Coaching Services:
The purpose of coaching is to develop and implement strategies to help the you reach personally identified goals of enhanced performance and personal satisfaction. Coaching may address a wide variety of goals including specific personal projects, life balance, job performance and satisfaction, or general conditions in the client's life, business, or profession.
Feedback:
If, at any time, you feel that your needs are not being met or you are not getting what you want out of the coaching or training group, please tell me, so we can discuss your needs and adjust your coaching program, as needed. We will continue to work on the goals that you define unless you want to stop, which we will do whenever you ask.
Call Procedure:
When conducting a scheduled telephone followup, Coach will call the Client at the prearranged time at the phone number designated. If for some reason the client is not available within 10 minutes of the scheduled time (normally the coach will try to call back 2x over ten minutes, given modern technical glitches), it will be the client’s responsibility to contact the coach to reschedule.
Cancellations:
Please remember that you must give 24 hours prior notice if you need to cancel or change the time of an appointment, otherwise you will be charged for the session in full. The Coach will make reasonable efforts to reschedule sessions which are cancelled in a timely manner.
Termination:
Either party may end the coaching relationship by providing the other party with a one-week written or verbal notice, which may be transmitted by email, fax, or telephone voicemail (if using voicemail, please consider communication complete when receipt of message confirmed).
Confidentiality:
As a licensed therapist, I protect the confidentiality of the communications with my clients, including my coaching clients. I will only release information about our work to others with your written permission, or if I am required to do so by a court order. There are some situations in which I am legally obligated to breach your confidentiality in order to protect others from harm, including (1) if I have information that indicates that a child or elderly or disabled person is being abused, I must report that to the appropriate state agency and (2) if a client is an imminent risk to him/herself or makes threats of imminent violence against another person, I am required to take protective actions. These situations rarely occur in coaching practices, but if such a situation does occur, I will make every effort to discuss it with you before taking any action.
Some sessions are conducted in groups, including teleconference groups. You agree to maintain the confidentiality of all information communicated to you by other coaching clients and by your Coach. We also understand that progress is often enhanced when clients discuss their coaching relationship with trusted colleagues and friends. You can have these discussions, but you are expected to be very careful not to share any information which would allow others in the group to be identified. One way to decide how and what to discuss is to think about how you would feel if someone else in the group was discussing you.
As you are probably aware, it is impossible to completely protect the confidentiality of information which is transmitted electronically. This is particularly true of E-mail and cell phones. It is suggested email communication be limited to brief logistical contact such as rescheduling an appointment.
Coaching and Psychotherapy:
In addition to being a Coach, I am also a licensed therapist in NH, with training and experience in diagnosing and treating emotional and psychological problems. I have outlined on my website some distinctions between psychotherapy and coaching, and will expand on that here. Although there are some similarities between Coaching and psychotherapy, I will not conduct psychotherapy with my coaching clients. These are different activities, and it is important that you understand the differences between them. Although both Coaching and psychotherapy use knowledge of human behavior, motivation, behavioral change, and interactive counseling techniques, there are major differences in the goals, focus, and level of professional responsibility.
As your Coach, my job is to help you to take information and skills that you already have and (1) to make decisions about which changes you would like to make (2) to develop a personal “action plan" in order to make those changes, (3) to implement your action plan and make the behavioral changes, and (4) to develop strategies to maintain the changes you have made. I will support, encourage, teach, and help you stay "on track" toward your goals.
You, as the Client, set the agenda for your coaching, and your success will depend on your willingness to define and take risks and try new approaches. You can expect your Coach to be honest and direct, asking straightforward questions and using challenging techniques to help you move forward. You are expected to evaluate your own progress, and if the coaching is not working as you wish, you should immediately inform your Coach so we can both take steps to correct the problem. Like any human endeavor, coaching can involve feelings of distress and frustration which accompany the process of change. Coaching does not offer any guarantee of success.
Psychotherapy, on the other hand, is a health care service. Its primary focus is to identify, diagnose, and treat nervous and mental disorders. The goals include alleviating symptoms, understanding the underlying personality dynamics which create symptoms, changing the dysfunctional behaviors which are the result of these disorders, and developing helping patients to cope with their psychological problems. It is usually reimbursable through health insurance policies (while coaching is not, at present).
Psychotherapy patients are often emotionally vulnerable. This vulnerability is increased by the expectation that they will discuss very intimate personal information and will expose feelings about themselves that are understandably sensitive about. The past life experiences of psychotherapy patients have often made trust difficult to achieve. These factors give psychotherapists greatly disproportionate power that creates a fiduciary responsibility to protect the safety of their clients. The coaching relationship is designed to avoid this power differential.
Because of these differences, the roles of Coach and psychotherapist are often in potential conflict, so I believe that it is ethically inappropriate, under most circumstances, for me to play both roles with a client. If I am your Coach, I cannot be your therapist. This means that if either of us recognizes that you have a concern that would benefit from psychotherapy, I will refer or direct you to appropriate resources. In some situations, I may insist that you enter psychotherapy and that I have access to your psychotherapist, as a condition of my continuing as your Coach.
It is also important to understand that Coaching is a professional relationship. While it may feel at times like a close personal relationship, it is not one that can extend beyond professional boundaries, either during or after our work together. Considerable experience shows that when boundaries blur, the hard-won benefits gained from the coaching relationship are endangered.