Index:
Section 1—What is Health and Wellness Coaching?
Section 2—Education and Training for Health and Wellness Coaches
Section 3—Why National Certification is Essential
Section 4—How to Become a Certified Health and Wellness Coach
Section 5—Our Four Extraordinary Health and Wellness Coaching Master Classes
Section 6—The Director of our Health and Wellness Coach Certification Program
A health and wellness coach works with individuals, groups and/or organizations who want to invest in a vision to become healthier, in large part by making lifestyle changes that optimize health, wellness and wellbeing. The National Consortium for the Credentialing of Health and Wellness Coaches (NCCHWC) expressed it this way: “Health and Wellness Coaches partner with clients seeking self-directed, lasting changes, aligned with their values, which promote health and wellness and, thereby enhance well-being. In the course of their work health and wellness coaches display unconditional positive regard for their clients and a belief in their capacity for change, honoring that each client is an expert on his or her life, while ensuring that all interactions are respectful and non-judgmental.”
A growing demand for credentialed health and wellness coaches has resulted from many changes in society including but not limited to:
Health and wellness coaches have a variety of tools at their disposal. Recent developments have provided even more tools to enhance the impact of their coaching.
As a result, health and wellness coaching is not only an exciting and important field but is rapidly emerging as a thriving one with many opportunities to make a difference and to specialize.
Health and Wellness coaching requires a unique set of knowledge and skills that are not taught in traditional coach training programs. That includes a thorough understanding of evidence-based processes of lifestyle change as well as lifestyle, health, wellness, and positive psychology.
Health and wellness coach training and education has evolved over the past several years and our MentorCoach program has evolved with it. MentorCoach’s health and wellness training faculty continue to stay up to date with national trends, changing requirements of the National Board for Health & Wellness Coaching (NBHWC), and goes beyond that to have an active voice in the development of the field.
It is because of this unique set of knowledge and skills that health and wellness coaches around the world have felt that a credential from the International Coach Federation alone cannot identify who may be a competent health and wellness coach. So, several coaching leaders in this emerging field came together to create the National Board for Health and Wellness Coaching (NBHWC).
Through Patricia Hinton Walker’s involvement as a member of the Advisory Committee, MentorCoach has been and continues to be involved with the NBHWC. Pat is a member of the MentorCoach faculty, coordinates our health and wellness coaching certification, and teaches two of our Health and Wellness master classes.
We need professional standards in health and wellness coaching for several reasons. One is the focus of the coaching; anyone involved with our health must be verifiably competent. We must protect the public from inadequately trained coaches who may share erroneous information. We must also assure that coaching in this often, sensitive area is respectful, compassionate, and empowering to the client. When individuals, groups, or organizations seek coaches to assist them in improving health and wellness, there should be some indicator of a coach’s competence. Health and wellness coaches should be well-prepared to work with clients on major issues of health, activity/exercise, stress management relationships, nutrition and diet, self-compassion/care, resilience, and assisting clients with self-management of chronic conditions.
Consequently, a group of health and wellness coaching leaders associated with the National Consortium for Credentialing of Health and Wellness Coaches conducted a ‘job-task analysis’ to clearly define health and wellness coaching and to set the standards for education and training in this important field.
Initially, the ICHWC was established as a consortium and pathway for practicing health and wellness coaches to earn the National Certification via a Transition Phase. MentorCoach was an approved transition program. After collaboration with the National Board of Medical Examiners (NBME) the ICHWC organization moved from approving programs in a ‘transition phase – which applied to MentorCoach to now a Program Approval Phase. MentorCoach’s health and wellness coaches training program is now in the process of moving from ‘transitional approval’ to program approval status to a NBHWC Program Approval. Our MentorCoach application for full program approval is in process of review by the National Board of Medical Examiners.
NOTE: Graduates of an NBHWC-Approved Transition Programs who met all requirements by October 30, 2020 must sit for the exam by the close of 2021.
NBHWC now requires Practical Skills Assessment as a key component of achieving certification. This has now been added to the MentorCoach Health and Wellness Certification.
The instructional time required to meet the practical skills development and evaluation standards do count towards the required instructional time. Details of the Practical Skills Assessment are provided below:
1. Practical skills development
a. A student demonstrates three complete practice coaching sessions, each a minimum of 20 minutes in duration.
b. These practice coaching sessions are followed by faculty-led developmental feedback on practical coaching skills. The feedback must be provided verbally, in real-time. A minimum of one hour of total feedback time per student, over the three sessions, is required and counts as part of the required minimal synchronous hours.
c. Practice coaching sessions can be presented in a live or recorded format.
2. Practical skills evaluation
a. At least one of the above three, complete student practice coaching sessions. The coaching session can be presented in a live or recorded format, typically near the end of the program, and a passing grade is required for successful completion of the program. The program’s grading rubric must meet the guidelines as set forth in the NBHWC Practical Skills Guidelines, including listing observables for what a pass/fail grade would be. For more see the Practical Skills Guidelines.
After full program approval review is completed, individuals who have completed the MentorCoach Health and Wellness Certification will need to provide the following to earn the NBHWC National Certification:
**The Three Mentoring Session and Practical Skills Examination are new requirements for approval to take the NBC-HWC examination. We at MentorCoach will work with all previous graduates to work with prior students/graduates, as needed.
There are three approaches to become a Certified Health and Wellness Coach through MentorCoach (see 1: Detail, 2: Detail, and 3: Detail below).
MentorCoach Health and Wellness Coach Training Programs
MentorCoach offers three levels of training leading to Health and Wellness Coach Certification.
In the Level One Health and Wellness Coach Training Program, you will become acquainted the fundamental core skills of the coaching process and the role Positive Psychology plays in building a productive coaching relationship. You will also develop an appreciation of the ethics involved in being a coach; have an opportunity to practice how to effectively use your coaching skills and see how health and wellness coaching can help to transform the lives of clients who are interested in health and wellness improvement and/or chronic care self-management. (See (1): Detail below).
In the Level Two Health and Wellness Coach Training Program, you get the opportunity to deepen your coaching skills to become an extraordinarily impactful and confident coach. In the Level Two training, you will learn and practice dealing with several sensitive and important coaching issues you may encounter in your health and wellness coaching practice. In this program, you will be closely supervised by accomplished master coaches who provide feedback in a positive, encouraging manner helping you to be the best coach you can be. (See (2): Detail below).
The third and shortest route to Health and Wellness Coaching Certification is for professionals who are already certified coaches. (See (3): Detail below).
(1): Detail. Level One Health and Wellness Coach Training Coursework and Requirements:
| Foundations Course | 31 hours (25 hours of the 31 hours count as training in ICF core competencies) |
| Living and Coaching the Good Life: It’s All About You | 13.5 hours |
| Mastering Wellness Coaching: Healthy Lifestyles | 17 hours |
| Living and Coaching the Good life: You and Your Clients | 13.5 hours |
| Mastering Wellness Coaching: Interventions | 16 hours |
| Individual Health Wellness Coaching Mentoring/Supervision to Meet Practical Skills Development/Assessment/Exam | 4 hours |
| TOTAL HOURS: | 89 hours |
Except for the Individual Health and Wellness Coaching Supervision to meet Practical Skills Development/Mentoring/Assessment, you can find descriptions of these courses on the Master Classes Web Page.
Other Level One Health and Wellness Requirements
NEW – Individual Coaching Mentoring/Supervision to Meet NBHWC Practical Skills Development/Final Assessment.
During your individual coaching supervision/mentoring sessions, you will provide recordings of your coaching and debrief/ these coaching sessions with the NBHWC Faculty member with at least one session which meets all requirements (pass/fail) of Practical Skills Exam.
Written Exam
Once the above Level One requirements are met, you will complete an open book written exam to demonstrate your knowledge of Health and Wellness and Health/Wellness coaching.
Associate Health-Wellness MentorCoach (HWMC)
Upon completion of the Level One Health and Wellness Coach Training, you will receive the designation of an Associate Health/Wellness MentorCoach (HWMC)
Also, after completing Level One Health and Wellness Coach Training, you will have enough coach specific training hours to apply for an Associate Certified Coach (ACC) designation from ICF through the Portfolio path. You will also need to meet the any other requirements set down by ICF outside of the coach training hours.
(2): Detail. Level Two Health and Wellness Coach Training Coursework and Requirements
| All Level One Associate Health and Wellness MentorCoach (HWMC) Requirements | 89 hours |
| Intensive Individual Coaching Skills | 24 hours |
| Individual Coaching Supervision Class (Which includes six one-hour advanced supervision sessions) |
18 hours 6 hours |
| Individual Health Wellness Coaching Mentoring/Supervision to Meet Practical Skills Development/Assessment/Exam (as Previously mentioned)** | (4 hours included above) |
| Successful completion of all requirements for the Certified Mentor Coach (CMC) | 16 hours |
| TOTAL HOURS: | 137 hours |
(3): Detail. If You Are Already Certified:
If you have been designated a Certified MentorCoach (CMC) by MentorCoach® or if you are an ICF Certified Coach (ACC, PCC, or MCC), you have already demonstrated that you have coaching skills at or above the level of an ICF Certified Coach.
To become certified as a MentorCoach Health and Wellness Coach, you must:
Individual Health Wellness Coaching Mentoring/Supervision to Meet Practical Skills Development/Assessment/Exam (4 hours)
Passing an Open Book written exam (multiple choice and essay)
Demonstrating you have at least 100 hours (with 20 of those sessions focused on health and wellness topics). Of the 100 hours, only 25% can be pro-bono and these must be accrued by coaching at least 10 different clients.
Please note that upon receiving your CMC (Certified MentorCoach) and meeting the requirements above, you are immediately eligible to receive your MentorCoach Health and Wellness Certification and your ICF Certification as well.
We offer four extraordinary Health and Wellness Coaching Master Classes (see below), totaling 60 hours of training. All four must be successfully completed to become a certified Health and Wellness coach through MentorCoach. The Four Health and Wellness Master Classes are shown below; please see them listed on our Master Classes page for time and date of next offering. For full class descriptions and teacher bios, click on the links there. Click anywhere in the list below to go to the Master Classes page for more information.
A basic description of each required course is given below, but you can learn more by looking up the actual course description. Just click on the course title in the chart above or on the Master Classes page.
The classes described below have no prerequisite, so you can begin with any of them and can even take two simultaneously. You can begin either in Spring or Fall with any of these classes. And you can theoretically complete all four in a single year.
Living and Coaching the Good Life: It is All About You (13.5 hours) This class teaches you to learn and live the principles of wellness as you create and use your own personalized wellness plans. By extension, the lessons taught apply to your coaching clients. You will explore and deepen your understanding of your needs, values, and goals through use of exercises in awareness, visioning and goal setting. Together we will embrace the psychology of possibility as we delve into the necessity of fun, connectedness, meaning, and contribution. This class explores the integrative holistic models of wellness coaching, definitions and wellness principles designed for lasting lifestyle change. You will learn about the far-reaching value of mindfulness and self-compassion for enhancing motivation, coping, and emotional wellbeing; promoting positive health behaviors; and maintaining healthy habits. The course examines cutting edge research from top neuroscientists, physicians, and psychologists such as James Prochaska, Ellen Langer, Kristin Neff, Jon Kabat-Zinn, and Andrew Weil.
Mastering Wellness Coaching Interventions (16 hours) This class is designed to put the Health and Wellness coach’s skill set into action by helping you coach your clients towards their goals of improved lifestyle. In this wide-ranging course, we will cover sleeping difficulties, poor diet, overweight/obesity, inactivity, increased stress, energy depletion, and tobacco use, along with strategies for making progress in each area. We will also discuss issues unique to different developmental stages including teens, pre-post pregnancy, menopause, and aging. Topics to be explored include effective goal setting, will-power, self-esteem, self-efficacy and more. We will also examine evidence-based coaching models for change that are particularly valuable for clients seeking to make and manage sustainable lifestyle changes. You will leave with your own personal toolbox of evidence-based coaching models and interventions to use with clients who seek coaching for health and wellness challenges. Building on science related to health and wellness coaching, you will learn how to assist clients in exploring the scientific coaching interventions with appropriate focus on ICF Competencies related to the Direct Communication in order to maintain the use of coaching strategies and avoid becoming an ‘educator’ versus a health and wellness coach.
Mastering Wellness Coaching: Healthy Lifestyles (17 hours) Health and wellness coaching is a tremendously important area and healthy lifestyles are central to it. Just consider the massive number of people who die prematurely each year from preventable causes or those whose capacities later in life are diminished due to poor eating, lack of exercise, inadequate stress management, and other lifestyle-related issues. “Positive health,” an area that has grown out of positive psychology was ignored for years but is now part of mainstream thinking in the field. New research now establishes that there is a clear connection between happiness and a healthy body. While this area seems simple and straightforward (just a matter of “do this” and “avoid that”), that perception is based on an illusion. The statistics on change and personal experience reveal it is incredibly difficult to alter lifestyle behavior. In this class we will look at everything we know about what a healthy lifestyle looks like, what it requires, and how to help people have a fighting chance to bring it about. This class can also help you understand how to move towards living a healthier, younger, and more zestful life yourself, making you a wellness role-model for your clients as you “walk your talk.” Two major focus in this class is initial review of the ICF competencies included in the Practical Skills Exam with relationship to the ICF Competencies and Markers that are used for evaluation of coaching.
Living and Coaching the Good Life: You and Your Clients (13.5 hours) Many people working toward greater health and wellness, including many coaching clients, start off motivated but fall off the wellness wagon after a time. Stress is often cited as a factor in this. What is needed is to develop an inner trust in ourselves so that we can become more aware, listen to the body, and react to stress in a more positive way. Without addressing both the mind and the physiology of the body, it is hard to get lifestyle and behavioral changes to stick. In this class, we consider the science of mindfulness, self-compassion, habits, exercise, and sleep, as well as how to go deeper with clients using complementary mind/body strategies. Learning and practicing mind/body techniques can help our clients become more confident, optimistic, and resilient. This class will help you develop a toolbox of cutting-edge approaches to help clients become more aware and empowered, make healthier choices, and sustain positive health behaviors.
To sit for the National Certification Examination, all health and wellness coaches are required to provide a written log of 50 health and wellness coaching sessions AFTER PASSING THE PRACTICAL SKILLS ASSESSMENT that meet the following criteria.
Health and wellness coaches may begin recording coaching sessions on their coaching log after they have successfully completed the final practical skills assessment provided by an NBHWC-approved training program. If you have questions, please contact your program directly.
In lieu of providing a coaching log documenting 50 sessions, applicants who are limited by their employer’s regulations may submit a letter from their supervisor on company letterhead stating they have completed 50 health and wellness coaching sessions of at least 20 minutes in duration, and of which at least 75% of each session was devoted to coaching facilitation and not education.
For each coaching session, your log must include:
Pat Hinton Walker, PhD, RN, FAAN, MCC, NBC-HWC, Certified Executive and SEI Coach, is a nurse, coach, educator, organizational development consultant, author, and presenter. With over three decades of experience in working with clients seeking change in health and wellness, executive and career coaching.
Pat hails from a farming community in western Kansas and obtained her Bachelor of Science in nursing at the University of Kansas. After serving in the Air Force Nurse Corp, she later obtained her Master’s Degree in nursing and her PhD in higher education administration at the University of Mississippi. Pat has also served as a Dean of three schools of nursing and as a Vice President at the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences (part of the Department of Defense). She has a thriving coaching practice and continues to teach leadership, health information technology, leadership and health promotion in nursing at Holy Family University in Pennsylvania. She also continues to provide organizational development consultation to healthcare delivery and higher education systems.
Pat is a MentorCoach graduate as a PCC and went on to achieve her ICF Master Coaching Certification (MCC). She is a long-standing member of the trainer team for MentorCoach and provided leadership for MentorCoach’s health and wellness certification. She was involved in the early years of the ICHWC and served as an item writer for the now National Board for Health and Wellness Coaching’s written exam. She also still serves on the NBHWC council of advisors. Her contributions to the MentorCoach Trainer Team are enriched by her more than 25 years of coaching, mentoring, and consulting with senior professionals across many disciplines.
Recognized for her leadership/executive contributions nationally and globally in nursing profession and in health information technology, Pat presents and writes on nursing, healthcare, coaching, leadership, and resiliency. She has contributed over 100 publications and has served as editor of at least four books.
Through her coaching firm, Stepping Stones Coaching, Pat coaches individuals, groups, and organizations. Many of her individual coaching clients seek career-focused coaching in executive coaching, entrepreneurial and/or small-business coaching, or transitioning into retirement-related careers. Pat focuses on two important areas of growth, identifying career changes that would provide meaning, purpose or a “calling” and then taking the steps needed for career-life transitions that follow. She also attends in her coaching to stress management using emerging knowledge and research about neuroscience and neuroplasticity to assist her clients with behavioral change.
One of the strengths of Pat’s coaching is her attention to balance in personal and professional time/relationships and stress management. Her coaching is enhanced by the rich background and expertise she brings to her coaching practice. Through her business, Stepping Stones, and an emerging health/wellness training initiative with large health care institutions, she continues to provide consultation to organizations. She has provided consultation and presentations throughout the US and in Canada, Thailand, Hong Kong, Japan, the United Kingdom, Belgium, Sweden, Finland, Poland, Saudi Arabia, Taiwan, and most recently Brazil and Lebanon.
Pat resides in Georgia and her address is: 301 Grant Court, Canton Georgia 30114. Her phone is: 240-426-8268. Her email is: phintonwalker@gmail.com and her website is: www.coachingsteppingstones.com.
With 25 years’ experience in helping people find solutions and make positive life changes, Carol is a natural teacher and coach. Carol is a licensed clinical psychologist and ICF Master Certified Coach (MCC). She was one of the first MentorCoach Foundations Trainers and routinely received rave reviews. (She is a member of Ben’s elite MentorCoach Trainer Team Hall of Fame.) Carol presented on marketing on the MentorCoach Alaska Cruise and at a plenary session of the MentorCoach Conference in Bethesda and has taught dozens of internet marketing classes over the last ten years.
Carol loves to help people identify and use their strengths to incorporate and build a healthy lifestyle, decrease stress, lose weight, and strengthen their resources. She leverages her experience and expertise to help people identify and use their strengths to become healthier and find more peace and joy in life. As a seasoned coach and educator, she teaches two of the four health and wellness coaching courses for MentorCoach. Her classes build on the science of mindfulness, self-compassion, habits, exercise, and sleep, and teaches students to with clients using complementary mind/body strategies with clients. Her focus on practicing mind/body techniques assists all clients, but particularly those clients coming for health/wellness coaching, to become more confident, optimistic, and resilient. Carol’s cutting-edge approaches help clients become more aware and empowered, make healthier choices, and sustain positive health behaviors.
In addition to her expertise in health and wellness coaching, Carol also trains coaches to leverage the internet to develop compelling websites, streams of passive revenue and a sustainable coaching practice. She teaches the important Master Class, Internet Marketing for Coaches. Since coaches, especially health and wellness coaches need to know how to market their practice, develop websites, newsletters, and blogs, Carol’s very popular internet marketing course is definitely an asset to the growing focus nationally on health and wellness coaching!
Carol models the success of available to our MentorCoach coaches. She is the author of five ebooks and an email newsletter that reaches over 13,000 subscribers. Her first website brought her 25 coaching clients in the first year as a coach. Carol has a warm and genuine personal style and an enthusiastic love of learning. She enjoys a thriving coaching practice and is passionate about helping others succeed. She was also a pod leader in the Authentic Happiness Coaching program and a graduate of MCP 14. Her website is www.CarolSolomon.com.
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Note: MentorCoach reserves the right to modify the requirements for certification or tuition at any time.
