Some Notes on Therapy, Coaching, & Consulting

Many people are unsure what the difference is between therapy, coaching, and consulting. Here’s our answer:

THERAPY is concerned with mental health, often focusing on emotional or behavioral problems in order to help you live a functional life. Traditionally the relationship has been hierarchical, with the therapist in the role of expert and the client in the role of the person being “fixed,” though that hierarchical model has began to change in recent years. We do not offer therapy, though we definitely recommend it to people who can benefit from it. Many of our clients have previously worked with a therapist before working with us, or continue to work with a therapist while working with us. Coaching and therapy are completely compatible.

COACHING is concerned with helping “functional” people function even better. The relationship is one of equals working together to further the client’s goals. While therapy is focused on healing, our coaching is focused on transformation.

CONSULTING is concerned with producing specific results based on the consultant’s expertise. Sometimes the consultant just does the work themselves, and sometimes the consultant transfers knowledge to the client (i.e. does the work while teaching the client how to do the work).

Our Coaching and Mentoring services are a combination of coaching (transformation) and consulting (getting results based on our expertise). The balance between coaching and consulting we bring to an individual client depends on your needs and preferences.

If you have worked with a coach before, or have talked to other coaches, you have most likely come across the wide variety of coaching available today: “wellness” coaching, “life” coaching, “spiritual” coaching, “leadership” coaching, “executive” coaching…

While such niche approaches may prove useful to some, we find that our clients are interested in working on the totality of their lives, not a small part of it. So our coaching includes aspects of all the above approaches (and more), but is not limited to any of them.

Though we have learned and can utilize “coaching techniques,” we are not focused on technique. We are focused on relationships. It’s why our clients tend to work for us for years rather than weeks, and why they feel transformed by the work. Such transformation is rarely possible in a month, or three months.