Coaching and Mentoring

Learning Outcome 1: Understand the role and responsibilities of the coach and the mentor
1.1 Identify the roles and responsibilities of the coach and the mentor

Although coaching and mentoring use a very similar set of skills there is a difference between them and the approach to either session with a client would be varied.

A definition of coaching is provided by Timothy Gallwey (1986) which states: “Coaching is unlocking a person’s potential to maximise their own performance. It is helping them to learn rather than teaching them.”   This quote demonstrates how coaching is used as a tool to guide, support and improve rather than instruct a learner through their own goal setting journey.   A coach is responsible for focusing an individual to look for their own solutions over having it enforced upon them.   The relationship between a coach and learner tends to be in a structured environment over a relatively short period of time so that a specific goal is set and achieved.
John C Crosby provides a quote stating that “mentoring is a brain to pick, an ear to listen and a push in the right direction”.   This demonstrates that the mentoring role is a longer process between those involved and is used as a development tool to provide more direction to a learner based on their own knowledge and experience.   The relationship between those involved can be less formal and will call for a strong rapport to be built between the two in order for successful outcomes to be achieved.   The mentor would also be responsible for continually motivating, engaging and encouraging the learner reiterating past successes that they have had .