From Amateur to Professional: How Coach Training Transforms Your Impact

After training thousands of aspiring coaches over the past decade, the journey from being a passionate amateur to becoming a professional coach is one that’s close to our hearts here at Lumia!  

The process itself isn't just about getting a coaching certification, or adding letters after your name with an International Coaching Federation credential. Becoming a pro is about fundamentally shifting how you show up in the world and the profound impact this can have on your clients' lives.

The Amateur's Passion

If you're reading this, you've likely got that spark – the burning desire to help others, to make a difference, to be a force for good in the world. That fire in your belly is the starting point for every great coach, and it's invaluable.

But here's the thing: passion alone, while incredibly powerful, isn't going to be enough to create lasting, meaningful change in the lives of others. It's like having a high-performance sports car without knowing how to drive – all that potential, just waiting to be unleashed.

The good news? Great coaches aren’t born, they’re trained. The skills of coaching can be learned.

The Coach's Toolkit: Elevating Your Impact

Professional coach training is not about dampening your enthusiasm or turning you into a generic coaching robot. Instead, it's about giving you the tools, techniques, and frameworks to channel your passion effectively and ethically.

Let's break down how professional training, especially when it’s aligned with ICF (International Coach Federation) standards, can amplify your impact in the world:

1. Deepen Your Self-Awareness

Professional training starts with you – as a living, breathing member of the human race. Deepening your own self awareness will support you in embodying a coaching mindset, which is essential. This involves ongoing learning and development, maintaining awareness of your own emotions and biases, and having an understanding of how cultural dynamics and personal identities shape the coach/client relationship.

How it transforms your impact: When you understand yourself better, you can show up more authentically for your clients. You'll be better equipped to manage your own reactions and unconscious agendas, creating a safer, more effective coaching environment.

2. Gain Evidence-Based Techniques

ICF-accredited programs like Lumia's are grounded in science. You'll learn methods that are tested and validated, based in positive psychology, neurobiology, and other evidence-based fields.

How it transforms your impact: Instead of relying solely on intuition (which is itself also necessary and invaluable!), you'll have a toolkit of proven strategies to help your clients create lasting change. This increases your credibility and the effectiveness of your coaching.

3. Use an Ethical Framework

The ICF Code of Ethics is a cornerstone of professional coaching. In an unregulated industry, it provides you with clear guidelines on client confidentiality, conflicts of interest, and professional conduct.

How it transforms your impact: Understanding and adhering to ethical standards protects both you and your clients. It creates a foundation of trust that allows for deeper, more transformative work.

4. Build a Diverse Coaching Toolkit

In the field of professional coaching, the International Coach Federation (ICF) Core Competencies guide coaches in their practice and professional development.

These core competencies are not just a theoretical framework, but an honest reflection of the collective understanding and commitment of ICF coaches worldwide towards upholding the highest standards in their work.

ICF Core Competencies include skills like active listening, powerful questioning, and facilitating client growth. In coach training, you’ll learn a variety of frameworks and techniques that are directly tied to these competencies.

How it transforms your impact: With a diverse toolkit, you can adapt your approach to each unique client. This flexibility allows you to support a wider range of clients more effectively.

5. Gain Business Acumen

Many professional training programs, including Lumia's, cover the business side of coaching to help you get started after earning your coaching certificate. Lumia offers classes in branding, sales, and developing  your own coaching specialty to help you stand out in the field.

How it transforms your impact: Understanding how to build and run a sustainable coaching practice means you can help more people over time. It's about creating a real career on your own terms, not just a hobby.

6. Cultivate Your Coaching Presence

The ICF emphasizes the importance of being fully conscious and present with your clients. This is a skill that's developed and refined through professional training and the hours of practice that you take part in as a student.

How it transforms your impact: A strong coaching presence creates a container for powerful work to happen. Clients feel truly seen and heard, often leading to deeper insights and more meaningful change.

7. Master Powerful Questioning

Asking the right question at the right time can change everything. Learning how to engage in appreciative inquiry from a coaching perspective will help you challenge your client's assumptions, which supports them in achieving fresh insights.

How it transforms your impact: Skilled questioning can lead to breakthrough moments for clients, helping them see situations from new perspectives and discover their own solutions.

The Ripple Effect: Beyond Individual Clients

As you develop these professional skills, your impact grows exponentially. It's not just about the individual clients you work with (though that's incredible in itself). Here’s just a few ways that a coaching relationship translates to the wider world: :

Workplace Impact: A client who improves their leadership skills affects their team or organization.

Family Dynamics: Personal growth often leads to improved relationships, benefiting entire families.

Community Influence: As your clients step into their potential, they often become more engaged in their communities.

As a coach, you become a catalyst for change, sparking transformations that ripple out far beyond your individual coaching sessions!

Your Unique Voice: Coaching Authentically

Becoming a professional doesn't mean losing what makes you unique. In fact, it's quite the opposite. Good training helps you refine and amplify your authentic voice as a coach. It gives you the confidence to bring your whole self to your practice, quirks and all.

The ICF emphasizes this too. One of their core competencies is "Maintains Presence," which involves being curious, flexible, and responsive to the client – all while being true to yourself.

ICF Credentialing: A Path to Excellence

For many coaches, pursuing an ICF credential is a natural next step in their professional journey. Here's a brief overview of the ICF credential levels:

1. Associate Certified Coach (ACC): Requires 60 hours of training and 100 hours of coaching experience.
2. Professional Certified Coach (PCC): Requires 125 hours of training and 500 hours of coaching experience.
3. Master Certified Coach (MCC): Requires 200 hours of training and 2,500 hours of coaching experience.

Each level represents a deepening of skills and experience, allowing you to continually grow and expand your impact as a coach. Wondering if this path may be right for you? You can learn more about it in our podcast episode and resource guide: Why Should You Get Your ICF Credential?

Remember: the world needs what you have to offer. With the right professional training, your unique blend of experiences and insights can create ripples of positive change that extend far beyond what you can see.

Ready to Become A Coach?

One of our values at Lumia is that we dare to be different. Our life coaches ignore the expectations society tries to impose on them, and seek to live from their own truth instead. If you are ready to step into your power and you’d like a partner in the process, come check out Lumia Life Coach Training and Book a Call with one of our Admissions Coaches. Grounded in science, our ICF accredited program features authentic instructors, a robust curriculum, and business instruction to prepare you for liftoff.

‍Lumia Coaching: Vibrant community. Evidence-based life coach training. Lifetime support.