NOTE: As of 2022 the Center for Executive Coaching is now accredited with the ICF as a Level 2 Coach Training Organization. The ICF has changed their language and replaced ACTP with Level 2. We were among the first group of coach training programs to receive this accreditation, after a rigorous review by the ICF.

The limits of “Certification”

At the Center for Executive Coaching, we are lucky that our students are almost uniformly people with an outstanding track record. Seasoned executives, entrepreneurs, psychologists, and degreed professionals complete our program.

They already have the credentials required to build credibility with a C-level executive.

But every once in a while a prospective students calls and says, “Tell me about how powerful your Certification is in the marketplace…” When they do, I roll my eyes, because this person does not quite understand how CEOs go about hiring a coach.

First, CEOs don’t wake up one morning and say, “Gee, I need a coach.” And, if they do, they don’t say, “Gee I better find one who has a Certificate.”

We show you the effective way to communicate what you do and position your coaching services.

In brief, it comes down to a few keys:

1. Choose a target market.

2. Show the executives in that market how you can solve their most pressing problems and bring immediate, compelling value.

3. Get visible in your target market.

4. Be credible, trustworthy, and somebody that an executive can relate to.

A piece of paper doesn’t achieve any of those goals. It doesn’t hurt, but it isn’t anything near the determining factor(s).

Furthermore, many certifications focus on the hours you have spent coaching clients. That’s wrong, because the focus should be on results, not how long you spend getting the results. Suppose you spend 2,000 hours with clients getting no results? Should you be “Certified”? I know a financial coach who can increase the enterprise value of a company by a factor of 10 or 100 with his advice to CEOs — and it takes him about 3 phone calls to give that advice and start getting results. He would have to coach 700 CEOs to be Certified by some organizations, and yet his results on a dollar basis (and the fees he earn) exceed 99.9% of Certified coaches.

Now, if your goal is to coach middle managers via the HR department of a large company, certification can be useful. However, I believe that it is much better if you start at the top (and C-level executives usually don’t turn to their HR administrator for recommendations for coaches), and then have the top send you around the organization. That way, you command much higher fees and have access to people who can make required organizational changes when needed.

Be careful of hiding behind Certification. Being “certified” as a coach might help your own confidence and self-esteem, but it won’t get you many clients or top fees.

Aflac

Amazon

Ancestry

Army Corp of Engineers

Ascension Health

AT&T

Bank of America

Bechtel

Best Buy

Booz Allen

Bose

Bristol-Myers Squibb

Brown University

Capital One

Caterpillar

Charles Schwab & Co.

Children’s Hospital Colorado

Cisco

Citrix

Coca-Cola

Deloitte

Dropbox

Duke Energy

Galveston Independent School District

General Atomics

General Electric

Google

Harvard Business School

Home Depot

Inland Steel

International Red Cross

Johnson and Johnson

Kaiser-Permanente

KPMG

Laser Spine Institute

Lexis Nexis

Liberty Mututal

L’Oreal

Macy’s

Mckinsey Consulting

Merck

Microsoft

MIT

NASA

National Basketball Association (NBA)

Nike

Nissan

Nvidia

Partners Healthcare

Philips

Procter & Gamble

Price Waterhouse Coopers (PWC)

Ralph Lauren

Regeneron

Rice University

Ross Stores

Russell Reynolds Associates

Schneider Electric

Shell Oil

SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory

Stryker

The Ohio State University

Tom’s Shoes

United Nations

University of Florida

Unum

UPS

US Air Force

US Army

US Army Medical Corps

US Marines

US Navy

USAID

Valassis

VMWare

Xerox

Zappos

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