What is the difference between coaching, consulting, and therapy?
Knowing the difference between these 3 things will help you know what avenue is best for you to take for your personal growth, business/career, and mental health. So let’s dive in!
Consulting:
is basically when an expert gives you advice. Business consulting is a very common example. Someone who has a successful business can give you business advice for you to grow your own business. They may give you steps, tools, practices, and suggestions for you based on what you are getting consulting around. Now to coaching:
Coaches:
(certified through an International Coaching Federation) partner with the client and through asking questions help the client maximize their personal and professional potential.
Coaches don’t typically tell others what to do, although they certainly can share suggestions after asking the client permission to share first.
Coaching is a partnership where the client is seen as the expert in their life (only they know the full ins & outs of their life) and the coach holds the space and guides them to growth & new learning, then partners with them to take action on the new learning and growth.
Since coaches mostly ask questions and focus on coaching the client, and not their problems, coaches can usually help the client with any topic they bring to a session. It’s very results-driven and can help you grow and reach goals in a faster amount of time.
Again, I only speak for ICF trained life coaches, the ICF is the largest company in the world that regulates the industry and professionally trains their coaches at the highest level, I’m unsure of how other coaches do it. I personally haven’t worked with a non-ICF life coach in 3 years. Now on to therapy:
Therapy:
is another example of an expert in the field who can guide you through better mental health, coping mechanisms, making sense of the past, regulating the nervous system, emotional regulation, and generally healing from painful stuff.
Therapists are seen as an expert in the client relationship and they do a lot of teaching about the brain as well. I love therapy and have had tons of experience with therapists, my partner is also a therapist!
