The Difference Between Coaching and Criticism


There are those who are afraid of coaching.  They know they need guidance but criticism in the past was not always helpful. There is a major difference in coaching and criticism.

Coaching is about encouraging better behavior, practices and skills.  Criticism is about finding fault and correcting specific actions, behavior or practices.

Coaching at its best is designed to explain and guide every participant to find new habits and refine old habits by opening the mind to new solutions and insight into solving old problems.

Criticism is at its best in finding fault, mistakes and problems in habits, behavior or skills. While criticism is important in recognizing problems, real or perceived, it does not find ways to change the behavior it criticizes. Here is what Winston Churchill said about criticism.

Criticism may not be agreeable, but it is necessary. It fulfils the same function as pain in the human body. It calls attention to an unhealthy state of things.

Getting coached by a professional coach calls attention to the healthy state of things, about how things could be.  Coaching is a teaching, training and development process in which an individual gets support while learning to achieve specific personal or professional results or goals.

At Supernova our skills are in coaching not criticism. We do not tear down in order to build up.  We coach successful adults-men and women, managers and sales people, planners and advisors who want more success and believe there is more to learn about being a client-centered, highly-productive professional without pouring their lives into their practices.

This is the first in a series. Want to know and grow?  Then join us in this journey and we will all learn together.