The process of one-to-one coaching supervision from the perspectives of the coach and coaching supervisor: what do coaching supervisors actually do?

Abstract

To understand what coaching supervisors do, I conducted an Interpretive Phenomenological Analysis of practitioners’ lived experience through semi-structured interviews with three coach/supervisor dyads. The findings suggest coaching supervisors and their supervisees are clear about the defining features and tasks of coaching supervision. I propose a coaching supervision process heuristic, which describes joint exploration as an antecedent to the supervisor choosing interventions that support the functions of coaching supervision. Intuition, the supervisor’s coaching experience and their expertise in the process of coaching inform this choice. Further research is needed to develop the heuristic into a conceptual framework for coaching supervision interventions.

Keywords

• coaching supervision
• phenomenology
• reflective practice
• supervision interventions
• working alliance