Executive coaching is a good way for leaders and managers at all stages of their career to grow and refine their leadership and management skills.  It is a space that is created specifically to explore the relationship between role and how to attend to specific problems that might occur. It is also a space for thinking. Senior leaders and managers often find themselves in spaces where they are isolated and left alone with challenges; should they speak to colleagues about emerging issues? Whatever the focus of coaching, be it relational or developmental, the need is understandable as leadership is increasingly complex and challenging. Navigating multi-dimensional strategies and projects, and the management of a web of interpersonal relationships can be a consuming aspect of any role. 

When coaching within the Tavistock approach, coaches seek to help the client to understand the overt, subliminal, and systemic aspects of their leadership role. Enabling them to discover new ways of engaging with colleagues and teams with the emergence of new and productive ways forward. Our programme provides ideas and models to help coaches unlock issues and promote change in a client and their organisation. 

The Certificate in Coaching for Leadership has run for 20 years, training well in excess of 300 coaches across the globe. 

Who is this programme for? 

The Certificate in Coaching for Leadership: Psychodynamic Approaches, is an internationally renowned programme and draws participants from the UK and across the world. The programme is enriched by the wide mix of cultural and organisational backgrounds and substantial experience in a range of disciplines and sectors that coalesce in the group. Participants are attracted to the theories, models, and techniques from the Institute’s tradition – role analysis, group relations methodology -and to more contemporary thinking around diversity, intersectionality and embodied practice. These frameworks and perspectives are powerful in practice. There is plenty of opportunity to practice and apply them on the programme alongside other participants and the programme directors.

Participants may include executives who have an internal coaching brief or who want to develop a new style of management; consultants or therapists adding coaching to their portfolio; coaches who want to understand psychodynamic issues more deeply. You might be an experienced consultant looking to develop interpersonal skills or a senior manager in an operational or developmental position, responsible for developing staff and colleagues. 

We expect participants to be coaching clients throughout the programme and this is supported by individual supervision with one of the programme Directors.

The value of taking the Certificate in Coaching for Leadership: Psychodynamic Approaches

Graduates from our programme emerge with their own style – an integration of what they have learnt on the programme and their previous models and practice. We are not didactic or formulaic. You will develop a broader repertoire, an instinct for the deeper drivers of emotions and behaviour, and the confidence to coach clients across a range of contexts.

Programme outline

Each of the modules combines elements of theory, experiential learning and coaching skills practice.  Between modules, individual supervision is provided on a 1-1 basis during the programme. We also work on Basecamp – our online forum for participants where you can post messages, attach documents (and collaborate in writing them) share articles and papers and carry on discussions; offer and gain help with the written assignment: nourishing the connections participants make during the programme.

You will have opportunities to explore your current coaching assignments and to generate ideas in the context of an emerging community of practice.  Each module includes at least one hour of individual supervision, and will draw from the following content range:

Module #1, Contracting and conceptualising

• Contracting
• Entering and establishing a coaching relationship
• Coaching from a systems psychodynamic perspective
• Applying theory in practice

Module #2, Individuals: Identity and change

• The structuring of self-identity
• Psychological patterns
• Interpersonal and intersectional issues
• Perspectives on Role
• Coaching as an embodied practice
• Applying theory in practice

Module #3, Focus on the organisation

• Understanding organisational culture
• Understanding group dynamics
• The individual in the system
• Coaching in the virtual space
• Applying theory in practice

Module #4, Evaluation, ethics and endings

• Evaluation of coaching
• Extending your repertoire
• Ethics and endings
• Applying theory in practice

Programme Directors

Format and Venue

This programme is offered in hybrid form, with participants able to attend both in-person at our London Office and online (via zoom). 

Modules will take place at the Institute offices in London. Situated between Farringdon, Barbican and Old Street, we moved into our office at Gee Street in mid-2021. Our office is a bright and flexible space, with a state-of-the-art video conference system set up to accommodate both in-person and online learning, and in hybrid. We have a fully stocked kitchen, board room, consulting rooms and studio space for larger groups and movement. For those joining online we use Zoom. 

Please note, the programme is non-residential and participants are responsible for their accommodation / meals during each module. Refreshments will be provided; you can bring your own lunch or alternatively there is a local walking-distance market and many nearby shops/ supermarkets. 

Accreditation Process

In order to qualify for the Tavistock Institute Certificate in Coaching for Leadership, participants will be expected to have attended all modules and to present a portfolio of their coaching work together with a comprehensive analysis of a client and their organisational context, against a framework to be provided on the programme. Our international network of coaches are accredited by the Tavistock Institute of Human Relations.

After the programme

Successful participants from the programme will be eligible to join the Tavistock Community of international alumni and TIHR practitioners, a peer-based network providing continuing support and professional development opportunities. The Tavistock Community is a place for alumni to connect with others, to further the learning, exchange ideas, to develop practice and work together, all underpinned by Tavistock methodologies.

Next steps

To join this programme please complete the online application form and pay the deposit. If you have any questions and/or would like a conversation about the programme with one of the directors, please contact Meg Davies, Professional Development Manager at: m.davies@tavinstitute.org