My Journey into Supervision

Although supervision is strongly recommended if not mandatory for counsellors, very few coaches were in supervision when I first started coaching in 2001. For the first few years of coaching, whenever I had a client challenge, I turned to one of my mentors for input. I was lucky. I had some great peer mentoring from all around the world. Although I had experienced some supervision in my days of facilitating groups, which I had found very useful, I didn’t have a real need for supervision in my work as a coach, or so I thought. It took until 2007 for me to discover how wrong I was and how I was missing out on the benefits of supervision.

What prompted me to introduce supervision into my own practice was being turned down as an associate by one of the top providers of coaching worldwide.  In spite of my coming highly recommended by one of the HR Directors of GSK,  and their being impressed by my other credentials, they were not at all impressed that I was coaching in the world without supervision. Peer mentoring didn't count at all. They saw coaching without supervision as downright unprofessional.

Both being professional and being seen as professional has always been important to me: so I tried out supervision to see if it was really worthwhile. Very quickly I saw how the multi-dimensional aspect of supervision was not only much more effective for the work I was doing with clients but at the same time - it was extraordinarily effective for my own personal development too.

Today I am converted to the value of supervision, and I wouldn't want to be without it.  So much so that after more than 8 years of coaching clients myself, in 2008  I undertook a Diploma in Coaching Supervision, which included supervising a number of executive coaches,  working in monthly triads, working with my own supervisor and tutor, writing a case study and completing a learning journal, and reading extensively on the subject.

Not only has supervision helped me enhance my coaching across the board, but also it has given me some of my most valuable insights which have supported me with my own personal development.  One of the reasons I think supervision is so valuable is that it is designed to serve the supervisee on so many different levels, as well as their clients. I can see now how it would have benefitted me in my earlier days as a coach and would have fitted in very well along side the mentoring I was receiving.

Please explore the rest of this site to find out more about coaching supervision – and to discover whether now is the time to including supervision in your practise as a coach or into your organisation .

If you have been thinking about trying out supervision, now’s a great time to do so.

Karen Skehel