Co-Active Coaching, 2nd Edition: New Skills for Coaching People Toward Success in Work and, Life

I found Co-Active Coaching to be an easy read and filled with useful information for anyone in the coaching world. The book came with a CD that contained very useful forms and additional information.

One of the things that really stuck out in my mind after reading this book is that everyone is creative, resourceful, and whole. Keeping this in mind when coaching clients will help to stay focused on the fact that people can make the changes necessary to better their lives and move forward. It is not the coach's job to dig into their client's past but rather to help their client focus on where they are today and where they would like to be in the future. The coach is then able to provide tools and insigts and to help pave the path to helping their clients achieve their goals.

I would definitely recommend this book to others, and feel it is a great addition to any coach training program.

Isabelle Zehnder
Certified Family Coach
[...]

I'm an Agile coach at a software company and I got a reference to this book from a colleague specifically for 'Chapter 5 - Curiosity'. After reading that section and the toolkit on CD, I read other chapters and WOW!!! This book rocks. I work with teams more than individuals but a lot of the concepts can fall to Agile Scrum teams that are looking to move to self-organization instead of command and control. I look to share some nuggets with my team to help them improve.

This may be a product of my incorrect expectations, but the title and subtitle of this book led me to believe it would provide comprehensive elements of the process of coaching and individual development. Instead, I found what I see all too often in training and human resource works: a presentation of a single methodology which the author has developed, which is not very flexible and focuses on the methodology more than the client's results. I think coaching involves processes which are to be flexibly applied depending on individual, environment, other performers, etc. So I'm not a fan on lock-step techniques which we superimpose on everyone as if we're trying to fix equipment. Perhaps with a different title and subtitle, I wouldn't have been expecting something else (and wouldn't have purchased the book). One final comment: I see no indication of validity of the approaches, merely the assertion that the author practices them.

I liked going to the IAC website & MindTools website and getting most of this info. for free!

Since I have been trained and certified through CTI, I am a bit prejudiced but still have to say that this second edition of the book is just as wonderful as the first but with updated hands-on forms and new perpectives taken I am sure from the numerous classes CTI runs and more insight.

Wonderful, wonderful book.