The practice of coaching has its roots in sports, hence the name. Timothy Gallway’s The Inner Game of Tennis published in 1974 marks the emergence of a new approach to personal performance that dismissed much of the behaviorism psychology prevalent at the time. Based on humanistic and transpersonal psychological principles, the new approach to “coaching” shifted the focus of performance from physical action to the mental mindset of the athlete. The philosophy asserted that once an athlete learned control of the mind and the inner mental game then the proper physical action will follow. The huge popularity of the Inner Game series and sports psychology support the philosophy, with athletes continuing to push the limits of the capabilities of human beings.
Soon those in business adopted the same ideas that gave athletes a competitive advantage in sports to business. In the 1980’s coaching was the buzzword in many corporate and counseling circles, and a number of books, articles, and dissertations attempted to define and promote the practice. Starting in the early 1990’s the Coaches Training Institute and the International Coaches Federation among other companies, were established to train coaches and ensure the integrity of the practice. John Whitmore’s Coaching for Performance published in 1988 sought to lay out the basic philosophy of the kind of Coaching practiced off the sports field.
With John Whitmore’s Coaching for Performance published in 1988, Coaching emerged as a practice used outside of sports as a tool to help individuals increase their performance in all areas of life. The practice soon found itself used in several corporations, and currently a majority of Fortune 500 companies hire coaches to work with upper management.
Currently one can find a coach who specializes in working with people from corporate coaching for Fortune 100 C.E.O.’s to personal coaching for the wives of professional water polo players. U.S.A. today estimates that coaching is the second fastest growing profession in the United States, after Information Technology, and in 2003 the newspaper estimated that coaches grossed about $50 million that same year.
