262 - Whitney Capps - Do You Need An Executive Coach Or A Therapist?

Aug 7

“Leaders and managers and cultures have to have their eyes on people's growth over time. Nobody can grow unless they can make mistakes.” - Whitney Capps

Confession time: I harbor biases against folks who call themselves coaches. The profession is completely unregulated, and many (most?) coaches lack the education necessary to help clients navigate change. Anne’s conversation with longtime friend and, ahem, executive and team coach Whitney Capps challenged my prejudices as much as it corroborated my rationale for remaining skeptical.

“I don't do life coaching,” asserts Whitney. “The coaching I do is very specific to work and leadership.” That clarification addresses some of my less-than-favorable opinions about the profession. A good therapist is trained to assist clients with the “life” stuff, the challenges that stem from complex PTSD, interpersonal relationship struggles, or an ongoing mental health issue. A good coach, on the other hand, offers task and accountability strategies to optimize talents or skills. “I don't create something that's not already there,” Whitney says. “I help you find something that might be there. That's a very big distinction in terms of what coaching work is as opposed to some of the other modalities of healers.”

Whitney curates plans that help clients identify and achieve goals. “Somebody who's never gone through a coaching journey might not anticipate the amount of work that's required. It's not a passive kind of a thing,” she says. Sure, there is some overlap around the strategies used, but to my mind, a coach’s expertise ends well before a therapist’s. Whitney agrees. ”There's a mandate in my work that I have to be able to see the person I'm coaching as whole, complete, and resourceful. But, I’m not bringing in anything to fix, diagnose, or treat.”

My other bias against coaches is that many haven’t adequately investigated their relationships to power. To be fair, I level this critique at therapists, too. Whitney recognizes her privilege in the coach/client relationship and the responsibility she holds for doing her own work. “There's a huge onus on the coach to continue their professional development,” she says. “I find myself broadening the toolkit of ways that I can respond to other people when I'm upset [or] frustrated.”

Both the coaching and psychotherapy fields could use more of Whitney’s self-awareness and conscientiousness!

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A Brief History Of Everything

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Whitney Capps (she/her) is on a mission for transformation! Learning is best when it's experiential, community-based, personal and fun. She has been facilitating, training, coaching, hosting development programming for humans for over ten years. Currently, Whitney is sharing her gifts and sharpening her practice with emerging leaders and teams via her own LLC Rootworks and with a number of other coaching/development organizations.

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