Values-Based Coaching

A Guide for Social Workers and Other Human Service Professionals

My two lovely daughters, Sara and Jessica, are and have always been my main inspiration. They have been wonderful coaches to me over the years—gently admonishing me, often late at night while I am still at my computer, not to “work too hard” and to keep balance (something we coaches talk about a lot) in my own life.

I am grateful to both my friends—particularly Pam Narahara and Kris Lasker—and staff—particularly Forum leaders Roger Smith, David Cunningham, and Joe DiMaggio— at Landmark Education, where, as a result of my experience participating in the Landmark Forum and other courses, I learned to live life from a place of new possibilities, to bring possibility to others, and to expand my world into a space larger than I ever would have imagined.

I also want to thank Mimi Sohn Licht, Patience Sampson, and the late Bonnie Jaffe, my trusted “peer group.” We came together over 18 years ago to discuss cases but have ended up “doing life” together—marriage, divorce, raising children, grandchildren, illness, job transition, and career reinvention. Carol Trust, Executive Director of the Massachusetts Chapter of NASW, has been my main champion. It was she who had the courage to promote my conferences both locally and regionally, produced home education tapes that have been widely distributed, and encouraged me to spread the word on this new and somewhat controversial area. I salute her for her groundbreaking approach to social work in her column in NASW Massachusetts’ Focus newsletter, “Possibilities.”

Thanks also to Mike Harris, a corporate client who trusted me enough to actually go into business with me, and to David Herron, a respected senior IT consultant who welcomed me into that world.

I also have been fortunate enough to be mentored by Roz Zander, who was instrumental in pointing me to Landmark Education, where I experienced a significant personal transformation that led me toward coaching; the late Laura Whitworth, an original founder of the Coaches Training Institute, who was one of my initial trainers in co-active coaching; Frederic Hudson, whose workshop I audited with friends at Fielding Institute in the 1980s; and Carl Kaestner, good friend and neighbor, who I met while he was teaching an executive coaching course on Cape Cod and with whom I have had the pleasure of brainstorming and collaborating since. Also an inspiration, as well as the person responsible for my sticking with my game plan over the past 10 years, is Jinny Ditzler, creator of the Best Year Yet planning process. Jinny was coaching long before there was even a word for it.

I am grateful to Carl, Marita Frijohn, David Cunningham of Landmark Education, Virginia Kellogg, Randy Nathan, Phil Sandahl, Ruth Hegarty, and others—some wellknown in the field and some not—for sharing their experiences of coaching with me.

Finally, I thank my cousins, Natalie and Arthur Schatz, for their support and kindness over the years. Special thanks go to Arthur, who helped with the painstaking editing process of my initial homegrown publication, and to my good friend Joyce Levine, author of Breakthrough Astrology, who gave me the real push to submit my proposal to the publisher. Finally, I thank Daniel Dreyfuss, whose persistent challenges to help him understand how coaching is distinguished from psychotherapy and wise commentary on my manuscript helped me refine my thoughts and clarify my message.