Introducing the PBC Coach Competencies: A Resource to Enhance Implementation

Introducing the PBC Coach Competencies: A Resource to Enhance Implementation

Joyce Escorcia: Welcome today to the Coaching Corner webinar. We are so glad that you're here to join us, and just a little bit about who we are: I am Joyce Escorcia, and I get to help with some Practice-Based Coaching work, and with us today, we have Ragan. Ragan, you want to say hello to everyone?

Ragan McLeod: Hi! I'm so glad to be here with you today to introduce these Coaching Competencies. I'm also with NCCDTL and have worked on the Practice-Based Coaching materials for many years now. Excited to be here.

Joyce: Yes. We are definitely excited to kind of unveil and be able to put out there and make live our Practice-Based Coaching Competencies, so thank you for being a part of this time with us today. Again, we have included in your resource widget a copy of the competencies, so be sure and download those. During our time together today, we want to introduce the competencies. We've been waiting on them a long time, and they're here. We also want to talk a little bit about how the competencies can be used to kind of support your coaching work and coaching implementation at your program.

We are just excited to dig in here, and again, be sure to download a copy of the competencies from that resource widget, and we just want to go ahead and just dig right in and get started. Ragan, can you tell us a little bit about what are the PBC Competencies?

Ragan: That is a great question, Joyce, and I am so excited that we have them here to share with you today. The research-based Practice-Based Coaching Coach Competencies outline the skills and practices needed by coaches to effectively support educators' use of teaching and home visiting practices, and this is across settings, right? These are meant to be used across infants and toddler classrooms, preschool classrooms and home visiting settings, or home-based settings with family child care – or anyone who's using Practice-Based Coaching. These are the skills and the practices you should be using, right, what we call the essential skills and behaviors associated with successful coaching. We are excited to share these with you and give you some ideas about how you may be able to use these to support your self-reflection or how others can use them to support you with your coaching.

Joyce: Well, thank you, Ragan.

Ragan: Yeah, and I just wanted to say, too, Joyce, that these Coaching Competencies are really something that we've heard a lot of people say they need, right? Through the trainings that you and I have done together, being out in the regions with grantees, with coaches. We hear people say a lot, "We need a list of kind of the skills and practices that those that are using Practice-Based Coaching need to be doing," and so we are really glad that we have this resource to give you and to help you and your programs to really implement Practice-Based Coaching well.

Joyce: Yes, definitely. It is definitely something that we have had a lot of requests for through the years, and we're so excited to be able to start this journey with the competencies now, and from what you were sharing, we know and we hope that this is a great resource to help your work within your program, whether you're a coach or whether you're someone supporting coaching. Ragan, can you tell us a little bit about how the PBC Competencies were developed? Like, how did it come about?

Ragan: Yeah. I'm sure, Joyce, that that's a question a lot of people have. Like, where did these come from, right? The PBC Competencies were developed through some discussions among the organizations that have really defined and developed materials around Practice-Based Coaching. This is really … We've had a lot of discussions from people at NCCDTL, as well as people outside of DTL that have really had a hand in creating Practice-Based Coaching and the materials around it and also delivering trainings around Practice-Based Coaching. But in addition to that, the Competencies, the Coach Competencies also take into account other Coaching Competencies.

There's a number of states that have developed Coaching Competencies, so you may be in a state where there is kind of already a state level set of competencies. We really took those into account as well and kind of looked through those at the similarities and differences and to pull in ideas. It wasn't just what we know about PBC, but what is kind of a bigger picture around coaching, and you'll see that as we kind of dig into the competencies in a few minutes.

If you look in Appendix A – so if you've already downloaded a copy of those PBC Competencies … In Appendix A, there's actually additional information about how these were developed, as well as resources and supporting literature that really serve as the basis for the PBC Coach Competencies.

Joyce: Wow. Thank you, Ragan, for that, and so now that we know where they came from, can you tell us a little bit about the content of the competencies? Like, what makes up what we know as the PBC Competencies?

Ragan: Yeah, definitely. When you look at the PBC Coach Competencies … If you've downloaded a copy, you may be looking through them, and you'll notice that they're really organized into six domains, right? We have preparation. We have collaborative partnerships, goal setting and action planning, focused observation, reflection and feedback, and professional development. Those are the six domains that we have these practices organized into.

You may have noticed – hopefully you've noticed – that these really align with the PBC model, right? You might see the overlap between particularly domains two through five with the main components of Practice-Based Coaching. Each of those domains includes competencies that address practices and skills related to that domain. They were developed really to acknowledge the kind of skills that we prepare coaches in Practice-Based Coaching to use in each of these domains to really implement Practice-Based Coaching effectively.

Let's look a little more closely at these domains. I'm not going to go through all of the competencies. That would not be a very exciting webinar, but I do want to give you kind of an overview of the organization and some examples of these competencies. This first domain is preparation. That's not directly mapped onto our PBC model, our PBC graphic, but preparation is really those organizational skills related to preparing a coach for coaching in different settings and collaborating in the context of continuous quality improvement. These are those … what we might think of as kind of foundational skills for coaches to have.

Through preparation and planning that is racially, ethnically, culturally, and linguistically responsive, that really contributes to that collaborative, sustainable, and effective partnership between the coach and the coachee. These are really important competencies to have in order to be able to implement Practice-Based Coaching effectively.

Again, I'm not going to go through all the competencies, but let me give you some examples of what these are. There are 10 competencies in preparation, and they really describe the knowledge base that a coach should have, as well as foundational, interpersonal, professional skills that the coach should have, so here's a few of them:

“The coach demonstrates knowledge of PBC components and the practices that promote fidelity to PBC. The coach demonstrates understanding of child development, settings, and diverse family systems. The coach demonstrates the ability to regulate personal emotions, thoughts, and behaviors in different situations. We know that's really important as a coach, right? And the coach exhibits professionalism by being on time, organized and prepared for each coaching session.”

You can see, again, these are not necessarily specific. Some of them are specific to PBC, but they are really those kinds of foundational skills that a coach needs to have to be a good coach. The next four domains are directly aligned with our PBC model so collaborative partnerships, shared goals and action planning, focused observation and reflection and feedback, so let's look at a sample competency in each one of these different domains. Here's a sample competency in collaborative partnerships. One of those is that the coach uses self-awareness and self-management to establish and maintain trusting relationships that promote ongoing mutual respect. Again, you can think about this and how important that practice is to having a collaborative partnership, so one of those definitely foundational practices or skills that a coach needs to really build those collaborative partnerships.

Here's an example from our shared goals and action planning domain, that the coach gathers, aggregates and co-analyzes formal and informal data to support the collaborative development of the coachee's goals, right? That's, again, kind of the heart of what shared goals and action planning are, that the coach is using that data to really have that collaborative conversation with the coachee around developing those goals.

Let's look at an example from focused observation. One of those practices is that the coach works with the coachee to create an intentional and systematic process to gather and record information that's guided by the action plan and focused on the coachee's goals. Again, really fundamental to focused observation, coming up with that process to conduct a focused observation. I do want to point out here, and what we've tried to do in these is to make them also be able to be used in a variety of different ways that coaching is delivered, so this would be a practice that a coach would use whether that is a focused observation being conducted on-site or virtually, or whether that's a focused observation that is being conducted by a peer coach or a self-coach, so there's that kind of intentional process for thinking about that focused observation. And …

Joyce: Hey, Ragan? You just brought up a great point, and so I just want to kind of bring that up. You were talking about how you could use this with different – virtual or in person or self or peer – so what you're saying is that the competencies could be used to support different delivery formats of Practice-Based Coaching. Is that what I'm hearing, whether it's one-on-one or group or in-person or virtual?

Ragan: Yes. Thank you so much, Joyce, for really pointing that out. Definitely. These are meant to be used across coaching contents, right? You've seen in many of our webinars that we've done before about how Practice-Based Coaching can be delivered in lots of different ways. It can be delivered by an expert or by a peer or by yourself. It can be delivered on-site, or it can be delivered virtually. You don't … and to an individual or to a group. These competencies are really meant to be considered in any of those contexts, just like in any of the contexts where coaching is happening, whether that's in a classroom or in a home, so we do really try … Some of these may feel more specific to one context or another … But we really try to make these connected to Practice-Based Coaching however it's being delivered.

Joyce: OK. Thank you.

Ragan: Yeah. Thanks for pointing that out. Let's look at an example competency from reflection and feedback. The coach uses various data collected from the focused observation to reflect on the practice of the coachee's goals so, again, specific to that reflection and feedback process but a skill or a practice that a coach needs to have or do in order to really be implementing Practice-Based Coaching well. That's an example of those domains that are really aligned specific to the Practice-Based Coaching model.

Our final domain, our sixth domain, is professional development. This really refers to the foundational knowledge, ongoing professional learning, and coaching practices expected of a coach. A coach should have knowledge and experience related to the settings in which they work and an understanding of and experience with the ages of children and staff they'll be coaching. A coach should also have significant training and Practice-Based Coaching, adult learning principles, and should participate and contribute to the field of coaching through their career. That's really what this domain is all about.

Let's look at a couple of the competencies just to give you some examples. One example is that the coach “completes professional development related to adult learning principles, draws parallels to coaching best practices and integrates adult-centered constructs that improve coaching practices.” Again, thinking about this almost as that kind of parallel process, so just as we're providing – as a coach is providing that support and professional development to others, the coach also needs to be focusing on their professional development to continue to be an expert Practice-Based Coaching coach or to continue to improve their own practice around coaching.

Another example: “Engages in ongoing professional development that builds knowledge about evidence-based practices and supporting diverse children and families.” We know this particular … The second half here is so important, that we're making sure we're really … Our coaching is really relevant and connected to the diverse populations that a coach will serve, either directly to the coachee or indirectly to the population that the coachee is working with. Those are some examples from that sixth domain, that professional development domain.

We have a couple more just so you can see: “participates in ongoing professional development.” Again, that improves coaching practices and supports the cultural responsiveness and reflective practice. Again, we wanted to make sure that that was really present in these Coaching Competencies. “Commits to ongoing cultural responsiveness as the professional knowledge base is continually updated to include diverse perspectives.” You can see that kind of throughout these Coaching Competencies, but particularly in professional development, that we are really thoughtful about being culturally relevant in our coaching practice. [Chatter]

Joyce: One other quick … While we're kind of talking, it's just kind of bringing up other thoughts. I know we introduced just two of the competencies, and so if you're an ed manager that's on here with us today, one of the questions could be like, "Wow, so when I'm thinking about using the competencies, do I need to use them all kind of at the same time kind of collectively, or can I focus in on kind of one at a time, like deciding on a focus?” What do you think about that, Ragan?

Ragan: Yeah. I think that's a great question, Joyce. I do think that you might choose different things depend on what's going on in your program and the coaches that you're working with as an ed manager or even as a coach yourself. We'll show some examples of this in a bit as far as what that might look like for a coach or someone who's supporting coaches, but I think it really … I'll also say that that's probably a program-level discussion, right? Are we going to focus on, as a program, this specific domain in the competencies, or are we going to focus on these specific practices across those domains that we want to make sure that all of our coaches are using?

It's really similar to thinking about what you might be doing around coaching, that as a coach or as a program, you might have this specific set of practices you want to make sure all of your education staff are using. You can think about this in the same way, that we want to say, "You know what? This year, we want to make sure all of our coaches are doing X, Y and Z. Then, as a program or as an ed manager, I'm going to focus on those practices as I'm providing support to my coaches.” That's a great question, Joyce, and I'm sure one that a lot of people in our audience are really thinking about.

Now that you've had a chance to think about these competencies and hopefully had a chance to look at them, the competencies that you downloaded, we're going to play a little game, have a little poll where we have you think about a competency and how it might connect to the specific situation.

We're going to hear about Trenna, who is a coach, and what she's doing with her coachee Alex. After I total you a little bit about this scenario, I'm going to give you a poll to think about which of the practices you heard Trenna using. Which of those competencies did you hear Trenna using? All right? Let me tell you a little bit about Trenna, and then I'll show you the possible practices.

Trenna, the coach, visits Alex's classroom – Alex is her coachee – after helping Alex develop an action plan to support his use of effective transition practices in his classroom. Trenna observes Alex as the children transition from whole group to centers. Trenna records Alex's use of several transition strategies, including some listed in Alex's action plan. Trenna also observes Alex as the children transition from whole groups to centers. Trenna records Alex's use of several transition strategies. Oh, sorry. Trenna also observes some practices that Alex has improved on since her last meeting, but she doesn't really record these behaviors. She recorded those transition strategies instead. Let's look and think about what competency does Trenna demonstrate.

Again, her coachee Alex has an action plan around transition strategies and transition practices, and Trenna observes Alex during that transition and records this use of several transition strategies. She observes some other practices that Alex has been working on throughout their time together but doesn't really record any data on these behaviors.

Which of these competencies do you think Trenna demonstrates? Here are our two competencies that you get to choose from. 4A, the coach works with the coachee to create an intentional and systematic process to gather and record information that's guided by the action plan and focused on the coachee's goals. Or do you think Trenna is demonstrating 4B? “A coach using coaching strategies that support the coachee's understanding and use of specific teaching or home visiting practices.”

We'll give you a minute to do this. If for some reason your screen is kind of small, and you're not seeing the page, you may need to scroll down to submit your response. Go ahead and choose which one you think Trenna is demonstrating. Give you just another second to do that.

If you chose 4A from that choice on our poll, then you're right! Let's think about why. In that 4A, it said that “a coach works with the coachee to create an intentional and systematic process to gather and record information that's guided by the action plan and focused on the coachee's goals.” In our situation, Trenna really focused on the practices that Alex was using that were on his action plan around transition. She saw some other great things he was doing, but she was really focused on those ones that Alex had in his action plan and was really focused on around transition. She wasn't … We didn't really hear about Trenna providing any specific strategies like modeling or providing cues during the observation. She may be doing those things as well, but in the scenario that we had, she was really demonstrating that first – that 4A versus that 4B.

Joyce: Wow. Thank you, Ragan, for kind of giving us a peek, a deeper peek into what kind of makes up the competencies and what those are about. Now that we know a little bit more about the content and how it played out, can you share with us about how these could be used by a coach?

Ragan: Yeah. That's a great question, and I expect a lot of people on with us right now are thinking about, "OK, that's great. These are a list of skills and practices that a coach should use, but how can I actually take this and use it as a coach?” Let's look at some examples of how these competencies could be used to support your coaching.

Let's meet Kelly. Kelly is a coach at Anytown Community Action Program, which is a program we made up, or ACAP. She just received a copy of the Coaching Competencies hot off the presses, and she's super excited. Kelly, like many of you might be, is getting back into coaching in person after really only meeting with her coachees virtually for the past year. She also has some new coachees due to the turnover in her program, so again, y'all may be in the same situation. She's really concerned about building those collaborative partnerships with her new coachees and rebuilding the partnership with her current coachees. She decides, "You know what? I'm going to dig in and really look at those collaborative partnership competencies and reflect on my strengths and needs related to those as I'm thinking about what I'm going to be facing in the next year as a coach.”

As Kelly looks through those competencies in the collaborative partnerships domain, she decides this year she really, really wants to focus on identifying the strengths and celebrating progress with her coachees. She knows that many of her coachees are concerned about coming back to in-person services. They're concerned about using all these strategies that they may not have been using in the last year when they were delivering instruction virtually with children and families. She really wants to focus on those … Kelly really wants to focus on their strengths as teachers, and she really wants to focus on celebrating with them this year as they are coming back to this in-person – being in-person with their children and families. She knows that with the stress of the last year and the concerns of her staff, that she really wants to be sure she's being positive and supportive with her coachees.

She, Kelly, our coach that we're looking at, works with her own coach, Andy, to write an action plan that focuses on this specific practice in the Coaching Competencies. She remembers that … Sorry. Remember that you may have a coach, or you may have someone who's supporting you. You could work with them in the same way to write an action plan and then have them observe you, or as a coach, you may have a peer that is also working on – a peer who is also a coach. Together, you could do some peer coaching of each other around these competencies too. That may look different depending on what kind of program you're in, but if you have someone supporting you to – in your practice as a coach – then you guys can use these competencies to build out some coaching cycles, similar to what Kelly and her coach are doing.

As Kelly and Andy review the collaborative partnership competencies, they both also notice that there's this competency related to coaching agreement in the collaborative partnership domain. Andy remembered that their program had developed a coaching agreement for coaches to use but that this agreement had kind of gone by the wayside in the last year and a half since they had shifted to virtual delivery of services and coaching.

Andy and Kelly decide to track down the old form and bring it to the next ACAP-wide – so that's the programwide – coaching meeting to discuss with the other coaches. They really want to make certain that it's still – that that agreement, that coaching agreement – still reflects the goals and the mission of the program, and they want it to be used again in coaching. Kelly wants to use it for her own coaching, but they want to make sure that that's being used consistently across ACAP, across the program so that coaching is that safe place for all the coachees in the program.

That's just a couple of different ways that we saw Kelly and her coach – so Kelly the coach and Andy the coach of the coach – using these competencies. We wanted to give you a second to think about this. How could you use the PBC Coach Competencies in your work? There's of course that Q&A box, so feel free to type in your ideas there about how you could use these personally as a coach.

You may be thinking that you could use them like Kelly is, so to really take and almost use a needs assessment for yourself to say, "What of these practices, what of these competencies am I using, and where might I need some support to use this practice or this competency better or more often?” You may think about it as that kind of needs assessment for yourself, a reflection tool for yourself, or you might think about that if you do have someone who's your supervisor or your coach, a coach of the coach, that having a discussion with them with this set of competencies would be good to say "I would really like some support around this competency," or even around this domain like Kelly looked at.

She really wants to focus on the collaborative partnerships domain this year because she thinks it's going to be really important for her coachees, but you may think of a different domain that you think is really important for you or for your coachees. Maybe it's around goal setting, so you want to focus in on that, or maybe it's around some of those foundational skills that we see in that first domain in our competencies. There are lots of different ways for you to think about using these or that you can incorporate them into your own development of your coaching skills. Hopefully you had a chance to add in some thoughts to Q&A – into the Q&A box – about how you could use these competencies.

Joyce: Yeah. Ragan, there's a lot of responses coming in, and we're excited to kind of talk about those in a few minutes also during our Q&A time. We talked about – a little bit about – how a coach, and we saw Kelly in the example and how she could use the competencies. Now can you tell us about how a program – so thinking about that program level – how a program could use the competencies in their work in supporting coaching?

Ragan: Definitely. Again, we know that we have lots of coaches on our Coaching Corner webinars, but we may have some other people on here like ed managers or other people who are supporting kind of coaching more widely, or we may have coaches on here that are serving kind of dual roles or working with implementation teams to support coaching across your program. Let's think about that. Let's talk about how this might – this set of competencies might be used kind of programwide to support coaching.

Programs can support – can use these to support kind of programwide quality coaching, so let's check back in with ACAP. Remember, Kelly's program. Kelly, our coach that we met earlier, and Alex, her coach – they work for ACAP. The implementation team at ACAP – so their PBC implementation team – also wanted to leverage the new Coaching Competencies to enhance the implementation of PBC in their program. What happened is their PBC implementation team reviewed those competencies and then met to talk about how they might use these to guide their coaching efforts.

Many of you might be familiar with this graphic, our management systems. ACAP really wanted to consider the different management systems and leverage the Coaching Competencies to strengthen what they already had in place around coaching, so really going back to that kind of systems-level piece and thinking at that level, "How can we use these, and how can we incorporate the Coaching Competencies into what we're already doing?”

They reviewed that systems guidelines document that you may be familiar with that really outlines kind of the different management systems and some considerations around Practice-Based Coaching in each of those management systems, some kind of guiding questions about how to think about Practice-Based Coaching and how it relates to the different management systems. They pulled out that systems guideline document and thought about which of the management systems activities the competencies could support.

One of the first things there, the first management systems they thought about that this connected to was human resources. ACAP is expanding their coaching, so they're adding more coaches. They've also … As, again, many of you may have experienced had a lot of turnover in the coaching world, they'll be hiring additional coaches for both of those reasons.

They really thought about, "How can we use those Coaching Competencies to support the development or revision of job descriptions for these new coaches?” They decided to work with their human resources manager to incorporate the Coaching Competencies into the job descriptions for the new coaches, and they also really thought about, "OK, so from a human resources perspective, let's also think about how we can use these competencies to really guide our performance reviews for coaches," and so they could use those … They thought about how they could use those to provide feedback on the strengths and needs of the coaches during those performance reviews. That was an easy connection for ACAP in thinking about how these Coaching Competencies really can support consistent, high-quality coaching in their program.

They also thought about another kind of easy or … A connection that they thought of was really around the training and professional development. They thought that they could really use these PBC Competencies as a starting point for that professional development for coachings – for coaches. They could work with their others in the training and professional development system to think about providing professional development by using the Coaching Competencies to develop a needs assessment for coaches and plan professional development activities based on the data they collect from those needs assessments.

Kind of how Kelly had used this for her own individual reflection, ACAP is thinking about kind of, "Programwide, we can use this as a needs assessment. We can …" And just like we were talking about earlier, you can think, "OK, as a program, we want to make sure that our coaches are doing X, Y, and Z. They're using this set of 10 practices that we pulled from the Coaching Competencies, and so we're going to develop a needs assessment with those 10 competencies, 10 practices that we're going to give to all of our coaches. Then, we're going to use those data to say, 'OK, we see a real need around this specific coaching practice, so we're going to plan some professional development. We're going to prepare our supervisors of coaches to provide some additional support around that. We're going to build a community practice around these practices that we see all coaches saying they really want some more support around.'"

That's a real kind of starting point. We really hope that these Coaching Competencies are a real starting point for that professional development as a program for coaches and something that maybe programs didn't have before that they could use. That's just a couple of examples of how ACAP plan to use these – and again, our kind of fictional program, ACAP – decided to use these Coaching Competencies to really guide their professional development for their coaches and, again, really thinking at that systems level about how this kind of connects with other things that are already going on around coaching in their program.

Again, we want to give you a second as a coach thinking about your program, larger program or if you're a person who's supporting coaches or working at the program level around coaching, how do you think you could use the PBC Competencies to support coaching in your program? Again, we want to give you the opportunity to share your ideas in the Q&A about how you might use it, and you might be thinking along the same lines as what ACAP was doing, right? Well, great. We've really been looking for something for our job descriptions. We know that that's something we've heard from programs over the years, that they're really looking for something to help with their job descriptions. That may be an easy lift in your program, that you can go to your HR … Think about your HR systems that you have in place and say, "You know what? We've got this new great resource that we can use to help build out our job descriptions or revise our job descriptions." Or again, if you have something in place around professional development for your coaches, this is another kind of great tool that you can use as part of that professional development.

You as your implementation team, your Practice-Based Coaching Implementation team if you have one or any kind of implementation team that you have at the program level, might want to look at these and say, "These are the practices that we definitely want to make sure our coaches are all using," and pull that out and help – use those to help guide your professional development for coaches in the next year. Those are just some ideas, and we're seeing some ideas come in, in Q&A about how you're thinking about using these, as well so, again, hopefully some food for thought there or some other great ideas coming in about how you might be able to use these programwide to support what you're doing around coaching.

Joyce: Wow, Ragan. Those were some really great ideas and a lot to think about as a program, and kind of … We've learned a lot. We've kind of seem some examples of how to use them, and I guess one of the kind of starting-out questions is for our listening audience – and maybe they had colleagues that weren't able to be a part – where can people find the competencies? Where they can find them? Where can they have access to them outside of this webinar?

Ragan: That's a great question and, again, I'm sure one that lots of people are asking. We have tried to make these readily available for you, so they are … If you're in Head Start Coaching Companion … If you have an account, or you're using Coaching Companion in your program, these are in the resource library, so you can access them there. They have also been shared on MyPeers, so you can certainly … If you're a part of the MyPeers community, then they can be accessed there. If you're not a part of the Practice-Based Coaching MyPeers community, I highly encourage you to join because it's a great resource for accessing materials, for connecting with others that are maybe experiencing the same things you are around coaching, so, but definitely a place where you can find the competencies. Then, the competencies are available on the ECLKC under our Practice-Based Coaching page as well.

Hopefully, they're easy to find, and of course, you also have the copy that you downloaded for our webinar today. That is yours to keep and share as you like. They are readily available now. We want them out there. We want them shared, so feel free to share your copy with anyone that you feel like might want a copy of it.

Joyce: Well, thank you, Ragan, and like I said, let … They're out there for us to kind of access. We're also going to put the links for MyPeers and for the Coaching Companion in the Q&A as well, so you'll have that if you want more information or want to get connected. Those will be there for you as well. We've heard about what the competencies are, had some examples. We know how to get to them. Now I'm thinking about, what are some resources to help me learn more and share with my colleagues to help them to understand what Practice-Based Coaching is and then in turn help them to better use the competencies? Any resources to support kind of learning?

Ragan: Joyce, I am so glad you asked. We are actually really excited. In addition to having these Coaching Competencies, we also this year developed – and they're readily available already – three micro learning courses on the IPD. Again, I would encourage you … If you're not already on the IPD … It's a great resource for lots of different things, but now on the IPD, we have these three micro learning courses that are all about the Coaching Competencies. One of those micro learning courses is focused on just introducing the Coaching Competencies and what they are, what they look like, the domains, example practices – that sort of thing.

The second course is really about how a coach might use the Coaching Competencies in their own practice and giving some examples of using them to develop an action plan and some support around what that might look like and examples for, again, kind of a coach using these in their own practice, so to improve their practice.

Then, the third is really focused on as a program, how might you use the competencies to kind of support your overall coaching plan in your program. They're really meant to be used by a wide audience, by coaches, by program leadership, by anyone that really has kind of a touch point around Practice-Based Coaching in your program.

Just as a reminder, in the IPD we also have those more kinds of introductory modules to Practice-Based Coaching as a model. If you haven't done those and need a refresher on Practice-Based Coaching or you have colleagues who need a refresher on Practice-Based Coaching, those are also there for you to access. The IPD is a great resource, and now we have these new, fabulous micro learning courses on the Coaching Competencies to support you and your program to use those.

Joyce: And, Ragan, a quick question about the IPD, those micro learning courses, are CEUs available for that course? I know that pre-CEUs are available for the PBC online modules. Are they also available for this course?

Ragan: That is a great question, and yes. There are CEUs attached to this. In order to get the CEUs, you must complete all three of the micro learning courses, but there is CEUs attached to that you can achieve through completing the course, so thank you so much for asking that, Joyce.

Joyce: One more even more important question: Are they free? Because you know we love free.

Ragan: Yes. They are definitely free, so all the materials on the IPD are free to those who access them. Free CEUs. There's no reason not to get on the IPD and access some of these resources, so hopefully, you get a chance to go on. Again, anyone can access those and go through these modules, access the resources on there. Feel free to share widely that this is available to not only coaches but also coaches or supervisors of coaches, program-level people who are supporting coaching. It is there for anyone who wants to go and access it.

Woman: Please do that. We love to hear from you. We will see you guys next time, and we will look forward to carrying the conversation on in MyPeers.

Joyce: Definitely. Thank you, all, for joining us today.