As both a qualified counsellor/psychotherapist and a coach, working in both capacities, my thoughts on this are as follows:
Firstly it’s party about how the services are valued and the audience they are aimed towards. Counselling is aimed at people who are struggling with mental health issues and need support and therefore it is priced to be more accessible and in line with other therapies.
Coaching evolved out of sports performance and crossed over into the professional arena. It is often around career issues and sometimes paid for by organisations, who also benefit and can afford to contribute to, the persons improved performance.
Of course it’s not quite as clear cut as this and it’s interesting that as a generalisation, counselling and psychotherapy require much longer term training and investment on behalf of the practitioner. Generally the more training and expertise, the higher the fee so this is an anomaly in the counselling and coaching arena.
I bring both areas of expertise and training to my work with clients. I charge more for coaching partly for the first reason stated above, but also because my coaching is contracted to achieve a particular measurable outcome within an agreed period of time. In support of this I create a bespoke roadmap for each coaching client which involves specific work in between the one to one session time.
Another factor in my consideration is that counselling clients are often in a more emotionally vulnerable position. One might say they are hoping to a return to a baseline position where as coaching clients are often looking to achieve something that could perhaps be described as aspirational. It therefore seems appropriate to me that counselling should be more financially accessible.
For both counselling and coaching clients, I receive supervision support and do ongoing CPD (continuing professional development) so the work doesn’t stop after the session ends!
If you are interested in working with me in either capacity, do get in touch and we can discuss which approach is best for you.
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Article by Catherine Noel
Published 15 Mar 2023
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