Supervisory Perspectives on Accreditation: Balancing Standards and Individual Growth

Caching accreditation is frequently hailed as a beacon of professionalism, a mark of quality that reassures both coach and client. 

Yet, its presence is rarely neutral. 

While it offers a shared language of competence and trust, it can also carry the weight of our deeper, often unspoken, need for certainty.

As supervisors, we are attuned to the emotional and existential undercurrents that shape coaching practice. Accreditation—beyond its procedural aspects—can sometimes act as a balm for the discomfort of ambiguity, a response to the very human longing for something solid in an ever-shifting world. This dynamic, explored in Nick Totton’s book Implausible Professions, challenges us to think critically about the role accreditation plays—not just in shaping the profession, but in addressing the insecurities of those who inhabit it.

Accreditation and the Illusion of Certainty

One of the ideas posed in Implausible Professions is that accreditation and credentialing systems often arise from an emotional, rather than purely rational, desire for certainty. 

For clients, accreditation offers the assurance that they are in safe hands. For coaches, it becomes a symbol of legitimacy, a way to ward off the fear of being “not enough” in the face of complex and unpredictable client needs.

Yet supervision invites us to wonder: how much of this certainty is real, and how much is an illusion? 

While accreditation can provide a useful framework for recognising competence, it cannot eliminate the uncertainties inherent in coaching. The work itself remains relational, dynamic, and unpredictable—qualities that no credential can simplify.

This is not to say that accreditation lacks value, but rather to acknowledge that its significance may be as much emotional as it is practical. 

By bringing this to light, supervisors can help coaches examine their relationship with accreditation more honestly, exploring whether it is serving their growth or merely soothing their anxieties.

The Risk of Over-reliance

When accreditation becomes a primary focus, it risks narrowing the broader horizons of coaching. 

In supervision, we might notice how a coach’s preoccupation with achieving or maintaining accreditation can subtly shift their priorities. Perhaps their reflective practice begins to centre on meeting external criteria rather than exploring deeper questions about their values, biases, or blind spots.

This narrowing can be particularly evident when accreditation is viewed as a final destination—a point at which the coach is deemed “complete.” 

Such a mindset may unintentionally discourage ongoing learning and curiosity, replacing them with the comfort of a credential. As supervisors, we are called to challenge this narrative, holding open the possibility that accreditation is not the end of growth but merely one chapter in a lifelong journey of development.

Accreditation and the Coaching Profession

On a systemic level, accreditation reflects the coaching profession’s ongoing desire to define itself, to create boundaries and standards that distinguish it from other forms of helping or advising. This can be a positive step, particularly in protecting clients and establishing a foundation for ethical practice.

Yet, as Implausible Professions suggests, systems of accreditation can also reinforce rigid hierarchies and cultural norms, favouring certain ways of thinking while marginalising others. 

As supervisors, we might ask: who benefits most from accreditation, and who is excluded? How do these structures shape the profession’s identity, and what unexamined assumptions might they perpetuate?

For example, a coach from a non-Western cultural background may bring unique perspectives and methods that do not fit neatly into standardised accreditation frameworks. 

Does this mean their work is any less valid—or does it highlight the limitations of the system? These are challenging questions, but they are necessary ones if we are to embrace the diversity and complexity of coaching as a global profession.

Holding Accreditation Lightly

Ultimately, the task of supervision is not to dismiss accreditation but to hold it lightly—to view it as one piece of a much larger puzzle. By exploring the emotional and existential dimensions of accreditation, we can invite coaches to reflect on their relationship with it in a way that goes beyond compliance.

Is accreditation a useful milestone or a source of pressure? Does it support the coach’s practice, or is it an unconscious response to the discomfort of not-knowing? These questions may not have definitive answers, but they open up space for deeper reflection—a space where the true richness of coaching can emerge.

In this way, supervision becomes a place of gentle questioning, where accreditation is neither vilified nor idolised but held as part of an ongoing inquiry into what it means to practise with integrity, humility, and courage.