Coaching vs Counseling
Coaching and counseling are words that have become very commonplace in present times. These are acts or processes that involve providing help and assistance to individuals and groups, to improve their performance or to help them in learning new skills. Counseling is more used in terms of resolution of interpersonal relationships and personal, mental conflicts whereas coaching is used more in terms of instruction and training. Despite similarities in these two concepts, there are many differences that will be talked about in this article.
Counseling
Counseling is a process that is conducted by professionals known as counselors, to help their clients overcome mental and social problems. People having emotional problems go up to these professionals for help. Counselors try to resolve the emotional problems by asking questions and striking a conversation so as to unearth the root problem. After diagnosis, counselors try to solve these problems by suggesting making changes in one’s behavior, perspective, and the manner of interaction in personal relationships.
Counseling delves into the past of an individual in an attempt to understand the cause of the problems being felt by individuals. It is a conversation with an expert that helps people to gain a better understanding of their own behavior and emotions. Counseling lets people identify their patterns of thinking and suggests changes to start to feel better.
Counseling helps in alleviating symptoms of anxiety and depression, in individuals, by removing baseless fears and better coping with the circumstances. Counseling also helps in resolution of mental conflicts and frustrations, often leading to better interpersonal relationships. Counseling helps in expanding the horizons in the lives of individuals who are facing mental and emotional problems.
Coaching
Coaching is a word that is very closely associated with the trainer and instructor. We are all aware of coaches of sportspersons, and there is proliferation of coaching centers to help students clear competitive exams at all places around us. There is coaching for improvement of skills in a particular area and also to improve the performance of employees at a workplace. Whether you want to learn a new language or a particular dance form, there is coaching available with instructors demonstrating and helping in the learning process. If you want to be a bodybuilder, you need coaching with the help of a trainer or a supervisor who would tell you the exact way of exercises and also the right food to eat according to a schedule. Coaching can be personalized as in one to one training, or it can be large scale coaching where a large number of people attend seminars or classes to improve their skills.
What is the difference between Coaching and Counseling?
• Counseling delves into the past of an individual, to help in making the present better. On the other hand, coaching looks at present, to improve the future.
• Coaching is primarily to improve upon performance or skills whereas counseling is primarily to help resolve emotional problems and conflicts in interpersonal relationships.
• Today counseling is done in many walks of life such as marital counseling, psychological counseling, and career counseling, and so on. On the other hand, coaching has also spread to all walks of life these days.
• Counselors are trained to diagnose problems in a bid to help clients to resolve their mental and emotional conflicts while coaches are mainly concerned with goal setting and improving the present skill levels of the clients.