January 2015 President’s Letter
ICF-Long Island Chapter
I want to wish all ICF-Long Island Chapter members a happy and healthy 2015. This is the first of regular letters in which I plan to share what’s happening in our chapter.
As you may know, we have recently changed our name, and I wanted to be sure that you understood why your board decided to become more closely aligned with ICF Global.
The coaching profession is growing rapidly not just in the U.S. but around the world. The International Coach Federation (ICF), the Gold Standard in the coaching profession globally, has long been dedicated to maintaining high and consistent professional standards of competency and ethics in the coaching profession. Recently, ICF Global announced new requirements in order for local chapters to continue to be affiliated with and supported by ICF Global. After careful consideration, the ICF-LI Board decided to more closely align itself with ICF Global for the following key reasons:
- ICF Global has a strong commitment to maintaining high, consistent professional standards of competency and ethics in the coaching profession. Recognition of this self-regulation and ICF’s stringent credentialing standards elevates the credibility of our profession in the communities we serve, whether we are business-related coaches or focus on life coaching specialties.
- ICF Global provides educational and developmental opportunities that enable our coaches to continue to learn and grow. In addition, going forward, only chapters that adopt this new affiliation with ICF Global can continue to provide ICF continuing education credits for the programs that we currently offer, a benefit that our membership finds valuable.
- ICF Global provides its affiliated chapters with resources and research to help us educate the public about what coaching is and the reasonable expectations that it provides. This elevates the status of coaches as helping professionals within our community.
This decision was voted on and approved at the chapter’s October 2014 monthly meeting. To learn more about ICF-Long Island and our upcoming programs, please visit the new ICF-Long Island website (www.icf-li.com) and join our LinkedIn and Facebook groups.