A practitioner’s perspective on coaching effectiveness

In past decades, coaching – which involves a “result-oriented, systematic process in which the coach facilitates the enhancement of life experience and goal-attainment in the personal and/or professional life of normal, non-clinical clients” (Grant, 2003, p. 254) – has grown into a $2 billion industry worldwide (International Coach Federation, 2012). In order to facilitate the personal and professional development of their employees, organizations increasingly rely on coaching as a human-resource development (HRD) tool (Theeboom et al., 2014). Not surprisingly, this increase in the popularity of coaching together with the relatively costly individualized nature of coaching (e.g., as compared to training) has raised the question whether coaching can indeed be effectively used as a human resource development methodology and whether the investments in coaching can be justified (Bono, Purvanova, Towler, & Peterson, 2009). Consequently, the question of how coaching effectiveness can be measured is a central topic of discussion in both coaching practice and research (Grant, 2013).