Mindset, skills and practical application close the gap between knowing and doing
How we might work together
All programmes are a starting point and can be adapted to your context.
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An introduction for all staff to build a shared understanding and experience of coaching. The session is based on guided practice, not presentation. Can stand alone or act as a starting point for further work.
Includes:
• 2-3 hour interactive session
• Pre-session planning conversation
• Practical activities based on your context
• Follow-up resources
Outcome: a shared understanding of coaching and practical approaches to apply straight away. £800
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A deeper programme for teams or cross-school groups who want to develop their coaching practice in context.
Focus: developing the self-awareness, mindset, skills, and confidence to coach within the realities of school leadership.
Includes:
• 5 sessions over two terms
• Group sessions with reflection and practice
• DISC psychometric profiling
• Email support between sessions
Outcome: leaders who are more confident coaching in real situations and more able to develop others through everyday conversations. £300 per participant.
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A programme to develop concrete and transferable leadership skills in young people. Coaching ensures they can support and challenge their peers' thinking rather than simply directing or advising.
Students who develop coaching skills become more self-aware and more effective in their leadership roles. The programme is designed for secondary age students and can be adapted to suit the group - a prefect team, a student council, or a wider group taking on leadership responsibility.
Includes:
Single session or short programme of 3-4 sessions over a term
Interactive sessions built around practice not theory
Pre-programme conversation to shape content for your context
Follow-up resources for students and staff
Outcome: student leaders with the skills and confidence to have better conversations - with peers, with staff, and with themselves. From £600.
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A focused space for individual leaders to develop their coaching approach in relation to their role.
Includes:
• 6 sessions over 4 - 6 months
• Pre-programme conversation
• DISC psychometric profiling
• Email support between sessions
Outcome: greater clarity and confidence in handling the conversations that matter most in your role. From £500
The Coaching That Sticks Framework
Three conditions for coaching to become part of how a school works
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How I show up
Mindset is the internal stance a person brings to a conversation:
Self-awareness
Beliefs about the other person’s capability
How judgement and bias are managed
Intentional choice about the kind of support needed
When this stance is present, coaching becomes more than a set of techniques. When it isn’t, coaching tends to be displaced by default patterns of support in schools - patterns that are often rewarded because they feel efficient and competent.
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What I do
Skills are the behaviours that allow a coaching mindset to show up clearly and usefully in school conversations
Skills are not “coaching techniques” or a script to follow. They are the practical behaviours that express a coaching mindset in ordinary school interactions.
• Making sure the focus and outcome of the conversation are clear
• Ensuring enough structure to move forward without taking over
• Listening and noticing deeply, rather than moving quickly to solutions
• Asking the questions that shift perspective
• Doing this within the time that is actually available in schools
These are not instinctive skills. They need to be learned, practised, and refined in context.
Research helps explain why this gap persists. Joyce and Showers found that training alone leads to very low transfer into practice - sometimes as little as 10% of participants consistently applying what they learned.
The investment schools make in professional learning - courses, visiting speakers, external programmes - largely doesn’t translate without something to embed it afterwards.
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Whether it happens
Practical application is how coaching is integrated into the routines and interactions that make up school life.
Corridor and informal conversations
Make these everyday moments of reflection and clarification count.
Conversations with and between students
Support wellbeing and learning through dialogue that builds reflection, ownership and peer leadership.
PRD and professional learning conversations
Structure discussions to support reflection, ownership, and development.
Team meetings and collaborative groups
Use coaching structures to shift dialogue from information-sharing to collaborative thinking and problem-solving.
Follow-up to external courses
Ensure professional learning is applied and sustained, not lost.
Most approaches to coaching in schools address part of what is needed. Mindset without skills stays at the level of intention. Skills without mindset become technique. Both without sustained application remain in the training room. This framework addresses all three - and the relationship between them.
Coaching sticks when how people think, how they respond, and where those responses happen are aligned.
What the evidence says
There is strong evidence behind this approach.
Collective teacher efficacy - identified by John Hattie as a major influence on student outcomes - is built through how staff think and work together, not through isolated initiatives.
Psychological safety, as described by Amy Edmondson, enables teams to speak openly, raise concerns early, and take productive risks. Coaching helps build this through consistent, everyday interactions.
Anthony Grant’s research shows that coaching improves goal attainment, resilience, and wellbeing, and that these effects increase as coaching becomes embedded.
Education-focused research by van Nieuwerburgh and Passmore highlights improvements in teacher confidence, self-efficacy, and willingness to try new approaches where coaching is part of school culture.