Coaching Voices: The Association for Coaching Podcast

In the second episode of our Psychology in Coaching series, host Lucy Whitehall sits down with organizational psychologist Michelle Minnikin, author of Good Girl Deprogramming, to discuss how psychology informs coaching, particularly around gender roles and conditioning. Ten years ago, Michelle burned out after years of trying to change organizations from the inside. Her next move was to build a practice around what corporate life had denied her: autonomy, freedom and fun.
 
The women who come to her, often in their thirties to sixties and long practiced at being useful, agreeable and available, say some version of "I don't know who I am. I don't know what I want. I don't know what I need." Michelle explains how her ADHD diagnosis helped her recognize her own "good girl" conditioning, and how she now supports women to identify the conditioning that has been holding them back and regain their autonomy. Sometimes that means asking questions about childhood: What did you love doing? What made you angry? Where did you find joy? Sometimes it means handing over a book, a podcast or a talk to explore between sessions. Michelle jokes that her love language is giving people homework, but the assignment is an invitation, not an obligation. It is a fine balance between non-directive practice and guidance, while preserving client choice. She stresses the importance of naming the psychology you are using when contracting with clients and is clear about where coaching ends and when a client may need signposting to a therapist.
 
Michelle also challenges the idea that women need fixing. She is sceptical of leadership programs that train women to be more confident and then send them back into the conditions that made confidence feel risky, so she works with women, their managers and wider teams. For men, she offers "Model Man Conditioning" coaching, helping them recognise their own gender conditioning. The expectations differ, she says, but nobody is outside the water they are swimming in. In this candid, open conversation, Lucy and Michelle address the impact of gender conditioning on individuals, relationships, organizations and society. It is a reminder for coaches not to ignore it with their own clients.
 
You will learn:
 
·       Why its important to be transparent about the approaches you use when contracting
·       To recognize when an issue needs therapeutic support and signpost accordingly.
·       Gender conditioning shapes everyone, so support women, men, managers and organizations rather than expecting women to change alone.
 
"I struggle to understand how you would say, I'm not going to use psychology in coaching. It's humans! And if you aren't using psychology, how deep a transformation can you support your clients with?"
 
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For the episode resources and guest bio, please visit: 
https://www.associationforcoaching.com/page/dl-hub_podcast-channel-psychology-in-coaching-gender-conditioning-contracting

In this first episode of our podcast series, Psychology in Coaching, host Lucy Whitehall talks with psychologist and coach Dr Hayley Lewis about how psychology shapes coaching practice. Hayley's journey runs from occupational psychology and organisational development at the BBC to executive coaching. She shares how her sketch-note summaries aim to make psychology accessible to the public, and how one of them ended up in Adam Grant's book, Think Again, after she mistook his publisher's emails for phishing. Her story opens a wider conversation about impostor feelings, and why self-doubt can signal that we are learning or stepping into unfamiliar territory.
 
Lucy and Hayley explore how coaches can draw on psychological knowledge without needing to be psychologists, and why curiosity, humility and attention to individual context matter when applying theory and research. Hayley reflects openly on supervision and the coach's use of self as an instrument, including how it helped her recognise her own rescuing tendencies. They also discuss coach wellbeing, adapting how explicitly psychology is used with clients, and psychological safety as the ability to face discomfort while preserving the relationship.
 
The conversation closes with an important note of caution. Hayley explains that psychological concepts used without suitable training and supervision can harm clients, and why she is learning about somatic coaching but does not yet feel ready to use it in her practice. This is a thoughtful listen for any coach who wants to use psychology well and responsibly.
 
You will learn
·       Impostor feelings can signal learning. Self-doubt often appears when we are in unfamiliar situations, which makes it a cue for growth rather than evidence of inadequacy.
·       Know yourself to coach well. Reflective practice and supervision help coaches spot personal patterns, such as the urge to rescue, before they shape the coaching room.
·       Curiosity and humility will help you become a self-aware and a student of psychological theory in your practice
 
 
"I think a really good understanding, not surface understanding, a really good dive into an understanding and learning of key psychological theories and concepts can be really helpful in coaching."
 
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For the episode resources and guest bio, please visit: 
https://www.associationforcoaching.com/page/dl-hub_podcast-channel-psychology-in-coaching-theory-practice-ethics

This episode is part of our 'A Day in the Life' series, where we talk to coaches about their real lives and businesses. What happens when creativity, personal story and deep self-reflection find their way into coaching? In this warm, honest conversation, our host Maxine Bell, talks with Paul Williamson, Group Head of Talent Development at ATG Entertainment.  He has designed acclaimed in-house leadership development programmes, helped to build a successful internal coaching faculty, and coached leaders at all levels within the organization. Paul traces his path from a creative childhood filled with art, drama and storytelling, through management roles, to becoming a qualified coach. Like many people, he was steered toward more 'sensible' career paths, but his creative instincts never left him, and he came to see creativity as a powerful tool for transformation.
 
Central to Paul's practice is Childhood Story Work, the approach pioneered by Dr Sarah Hill. He explains how looking at your own childhood story and its influences can reveal surprising connections between early narratives and present-day behaviour, work he describes as "transformational for me personally." Paul sees his role as creating a safe container for deep exploratory work, one that invites people to call on "all aspects of who they are, including their creativity." Drawing, music, imagery and metaphors help clients move beyond intellectual defences and into deeper layers of meaning.
 
Running through the conversation is the question "Who am I?", which Paul returns to throughout his work and his own life. It shapes how he shows up as a coach, from his shift away from structured models like GROW towards a more intuitive, emergent style, to his commitment to self-care, supervision and reflective practice. For Paul, the goal is genuine connection: finding out "what lights up their soul."
 
You will learn:
·       Understanding the early narratives that shape us can reveal the influences behind present behaviour and empower clients to change limiting narratives and create real transformation.
·       The importance of creating a safe container for creativity and deeper, exploratory work.
·       The power of asking 'Who am I?' and 'How do I want to coach?'
 
 
'I think if you can encourage people to step into that childlike space of wonder and possibility, you can start to get wonderful results.'
 
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For the episode resources and guest bio, please visit: 
https://www.associationforcoaching.com/page/dl-hub_podcast-channel_day-in-the-life-of-coaches-childhood-storywork-creativity

In this final episode of our series: AI, Ethics and Trust in Coaching, we step back from individual perspectives and ask what all these conversations might be telling us about coaching itself. Rebecca Rutschmann, co-founder of Viva la Coaching, researcher, educator and long-standing explorer of the space between coaching and technology, joins host, Smaranda Dochia, to consider whether AI is forcing the profession to become clearer about what coaching is really here to do.
 
Together they explore what should remain distinctly human, why people choose to work with another human being in coaching, and what we want technology to support rather than replace. Rather than framing AI as something to embrace or resist, the conversation is about engaging with curiosity, maturity and agency, and making deliberate choices about how we use it.
 
It's a conversation about finding our core, and about what AI may be asking the coaching profession to become next.
 
You will learn:
 
·       New capabilities are pushing us to revisit what coaching is for, who it can reach and why people value working with another human.
·       It's not a choice between embracing or resisting AI but staying informed, curious and deliberate about how you use it
·       Build strong roots in who you are and what you value, with enough curiosity to explore what is becoming possible.
 
 
"You need your North Star; you need your core. As long as you have roots, you can also fly. That's something my parents taught me very early. You need roots to hold you tight, and you need wings to fly."
 
Don't forget to subscribe, rate, and leave us a review! Your feedback helps us bring you more valuable content.
 
For the episode resources and guest bio, please visit: 
https://www.associationforcoaching.com/page/dl-hub_podcast-channel-AI-ethics-trust-in-coaching-what-AI-asks-of-coaching

AI coaching is moving fast, but the evidence hasn't quite caught up with the excitement. In episode 9 of our AI, Ethics and Trust in Coaching series, host Smaranda Dochia sits down with Professor Nicky Terblanche, Professor in Leadership Coaching at Stellenbosch University Business School in Cape Town, South Africa, where he leads the master's and PhD programmes in leadership coaching. Nicky began his career in electronic and software engineering before moving into coaching and applied psychology and has been researching AI coaching since well before generative AI arrived on the scene.
 
The conversation centres on a key distinction: 'AI in coaching' versus 'AI coaching' itself, and why the field still needs clearer definitions and professional boundaries. Nicky brings the research into focus, sharing findings that AI coaching can be effective for goal attainment, but has yet to show the same results when it comes to areas like stress, wellbeing, and resilience: the deeper developmental terrain where skilled human coaches still lead. They also explore whether AI should even aspire to imitate a human coach, why coaching methodology matters when evaluating a platform, cultural bias in AI coaching tools, and how AI might ultimately raise the bar for human coaching rather than simply replace it.
 
Throughout, one message keeps returning: keep an open mind, but remain critical and ask for evidence. Nicky's research suggests a more nuanced picture than either the hype or the anxiety around AI coaching would have us believe - AI coaching can already support outcomes like goal attainment and offers real value through its scale, cost, and accessibility, reaching people who might otherwise have no access to coaching at all. But when it comes to deeper transformation, human coaching still holds its ground. Nicky's closing challenge lingers too: perhaps we're worrying too much about AI replacing coaches, and not enough about what it means to outsource our thinking to technology over time.
 
You will learn:
 
·       'AI in coaching' and 'AI coaching' aren't the same thing. The field still lacks clear definitions and professional boundaries, and getting this distinction right matters for standards and accreditation.
·       AI coaching if far off from replacing human coaches but it does have value in it's scalability and reach.
·       The real risk may not be replacement - it's outsourcing thinking:  what happens to our critical thinking and capability when we lean too heavily on technology to do it for us.
 
 
"AI coaching is not competing with human coaching, but it can be incredibly scalable and helpful to millions of people who would never otherwise have any coaches."
 
Don't forget to subscribe, rate, and leave us a review! Your feedback helps us bring you more valuable content.
 
For the episode resources and guest bio, please visit: 
https://www.associationforcoaching.com/page/dl-hub_podcast-channel-AI-ethics-trust-in-coaching-AI-coaching-research-service