What Coaching Is and Isn't

At Sayge, our mission is to enable all companies and people to realize their full potential by democratizing access to the best coaching.

The International Coach Federation (ICF) defines coaching as “partnering with clients in a thought-provoking and creative process that inspires maximum personal and professional potential”. The coaching process helps dramatically improve one’s outlook on work and life, while improving leadership skills and unlocking potential. Each of our coaches is expert in working with individuals to help them do what they love and love what they do. They do this by:

Encouraging self-discovery
Eliciting client-generated solutions and strategies
Holding you, the client, as responsible and accountable

Coaching is Inherently Collaborative. Think about that word partner - you will partner with your coach to tackle the topics you select, dig into your goals and values, and work through situations and scenarios. Your coach will ask questions, prompt you to inspect and reframe your thoughts, and together you will devise action plans to get you to your next level.

Coaching is different than other types of development:

Professional coaching focuses on setting goals, creating outcomes, and managing personal change. Sometimes it’s helpful to understand coaching by distinguishing it from other personal or organizational support professions.

Therapy. Therapy is mostly rooted in the past and deals with healing pain, dysfunction, and conflict. The focus is often on improving overall psychological functioning. Coaching, on the other hand, is future-focused and supports personal and professional growth based on actionable strategies for achieving specific goals in one’s work or personal life.
Mentorship. We define mentoring as a development-focused relationship with a domain relevant mentor who passes on their skills and experience to a mentee. Historically, a mentor is someone within the same company as the mentee, but in a more senior or tenured role. Generally do not have formal training in mentorship. Their main focus is passing on specific skills and expertise to another person so they can be more successful.
Consulting. Individuals or organizations retain consultants to diagnose problems and do the work to develop and implement the solutions. With coaching, the individuals or teams are capable of generating their own solutions, with the coach supplying supportive, discovery-based approaches and frameworks along the way.
Athletic Development. The athletic coach is often seen as an expert who guides and directs the behavior of individuals or teams based on his or her greater experience and knowledge. Professional coaches possess these qualities, but their experience and knowledge of the individual or team determines the direction, and the focus is not on winning or losing.

Most people feel like they have untapped potential:

All the research, and our own experience, tells us the same thing: Most people aren’t confident that they’re working at their full potential.

There can be a variety of reasons for this:

You know you’re capable of even more, but aren’t sure how to unlock the strengths, talents and potential inside you.
You feel ‘stuck’ and aren’t sure how to get from where you are to where you want to be.
You ‘fell into’ your career and haven’t ever been certain that it’s the right career for you.
You’re looking to make a change, big or small, but aren’t sure how to actually do it.

Whatever the reasons, we believe that the vast majority of people will benefit from coaching, no matter what they’re hoping to accomplish. That’s why we started Sayge, after all.