02: Coaching in faith

In this episode Dr Natalie Lancer, with Justin Wise and Dr Michael Marx, explores how some coaches integrate faith-based concepts and secular equivalents, including meaning, intuition and a capacity to respond to life’s challenges, into their coaching. We learn how religious values, ethics and practices may inform  the work that coaches do with their clients. In this episode, we discuss Christian and Jewish orientations as examples of coaching with faith-based principles. We ask:

• What is coaching in faith?
• What if the client is secular or a different religion to the coach?
• Which religious concepts or secular equivalents, frequently show up in a coaching conversation?
• Which specific practices drawn from a religious life could be of value in coaching?
• How can coaching from a faith perspective allow the coachee to develop other stories and perspectives about themselves?
• How can faith-based thinking help us transcend normative problem-solving in coaching sessions?
• What can coaching in faith teach us about meaningful ways of living?
• How can thinking from a faith-based approach towards relationships and communities serve us better?
• What alternative conceptualisations of life and human beings does religion provide?
• How can coaching in faith help us recognise our inherent complexity? 

Coaching in faith is an often over-looked and rarely acknowledged topic and can offer alternative ways of thinking about common coaching issues. Our guests help us to begin to unpack this potential and explore the possibilities of coaching in faith. Our guests today are:

Justin Wise is a coach, educator, founder and faculty member at Thirdspace. He is a graduate of the MSc in People and Organisation Development at the Roffey Park Institute, UK and holds first-class postgraduate degrees from both Cambridge University and University College London. He has been an accredited Integral Development Coach (New Ventures West / Thirdspace) since 2008 and holds the PCC Credential from the International Coaching Federation. Justin views coaching and organisational development as vital disciplines in the creation of sustainable, ethical communities, organisations and societies.

Michael J. Marx, MBA, EdD, MCC, CMCC, is an ICF Master Certified Coach specialising in business coaching and corporate consultation. He is a past-president of Christian Coaches Network International and the author of the book Ethics and Risk Management for Christian Coaches (2016). Dr. Marx has served as the leader of the ICF ‘Global Community of Practice on Ethics.’ He is the Administrative Director of Success Unlimited Network, a school which specialises in coaches who are on a spiritual journey. He has also founded a not-for-profit called Coaching Suicide Awareness. 

Your host, Dr Natalie Lancer, is a Chartered Coaching Psychologist, and British Psychological Society (BPS) Registered Supervisor. She is the Chair of the BPS’s Division of Coaching Psychology and an accredited member of the Association