The Recovery Coach’s toolbox contains many useful techniques and skills designed to assist the client’s recovery process. The more often you oil and sharpen your coaching tools, the better they will serve both you and your clients.

The Recovery Coach’s main goal is to empower clients by focusing on their strengths, rather than their weaknesses. The Coach and client work together to identify the client’s interests, skills, talents and other strengths and use these assets to help the client achieve his or her goals. Although the Coach assists the client in identifying goals, it is the client that chooses them, based on their individual needs and desires.

Each professional association has published a Code of Ethics. The National Association of Social Workers, the American Association of Marriage and Family Therapists, the American Psychological Association, the National Association of Alcoholism and Drug Abuse Counselors and the American Counseling Association have all published Codes of Ethics unique to the professions that they serve. In addition, various states have published their own Codes of Ethics, applicable to licensed individuals practicing within their state.

Electronic Coaching, or eCoaching, is the wave of the future in Recovery Coaching. Advancements in technology now allow people to communicate in ways never thought possible just a few years ago. It’s both simple and affordable for most everyone to talk face-to-face over a computer using Skype or similar video chat software programs, and it’s equally easy and convenient to communicate via e-mail or text messages using a smartphone or other internet-enabled portable device. With each new day, more and more treatment centers, Recovery Coaches and counseling professionals are adding online and/or electronic access for their clients.

Action Plans And Goal Setting Skills from ccsadmin

Every long distance truck driver understands the importance of setting goals on a daily basis. For example, a driver traveling from Missouri to Wisconsin must not only use a map to plan his route, but also realizes he will pass through Chicago along the way. If the driver is wise, he’ll avoid driving through downtown Chicago during rush hour and plan accordingly. If not, he’ll be stuck in traffic for hours, wasting valuable time and fuel. As a trained Recovery Coach, you will do much the same, using an Action Plan based on setting small, easily achievable goals and removing barriers blocking the client’s path to recovery.

Advocacy meets clients and families where they work, live and interact with others – in their own backyards, so to speak - and recognizes that every client’s needs are individual and unique.

Explore the importance of culture and how it applies to coaching.

People struggling with both substance abuse issues and mental illness are classified as having a dual diagnosis. Clients diagnosed with dual diagnosis issues can be notoriously difficult to treat because symptoms of each condition tend to overlap and impact on one other. Mental health treatment providers often aren’t equipped deal with substance abuse issues, while addiction treatment centers often refuse to accept clients with severe mental health issues. Treatment methods prescribed for mental health and substance abuse issues can be quite different from one another, although both are critical to the client’s recovery. As a trained recovery coach, you will often act as a bridge for your clients, assisting them to connect with both mental health and addiction recovery services.

The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines resilience as:
1. The capability of a strained body to recover its size and shape after deformation caused especially by compressive stress;
2. An ability to recover from or adjust easily to misfortune or change.

Although the first definition applies to materials, such as a memory foam mattress, for example, the same principle applies to people. Resilience means to return to a normal, original state, whether it applies to mattresses or human beings.

"Wraparound" may sound like a new concept, but it is not. The term "wraparound" came into use in 1986, in an article by Lenore Behar*. She defined "wraparound" as a way to "surround multi-problem youngsters and families with services, rather than with institutional walls, and to customize these services." Also called "holistic," "strengths based" or "individualized," the "wraparound" approach is more a process than a service.

In 2006, state-funded recovery high schools for students with substance use disorders opened in three Massachusetts cities — Springfield, Beverly, and Boston. Designed to reduce the risks of relapse, these schools aim to provide education only to students who are in recovery. As of 2011, at least twenty more recovery high schools have opened their doors across the United States. * Imagine the impact there would be if every school around the world were to add addiction prevention classes as a required course of study before the early adolescence, which is the time children are most likely to experiment with alcohol and drugs.

This module provides a brief overview of Recovery Coaching, including the coach's role in working with clients, comparisons of other treatment providers, tips to promote your coaching services, and an introduction to other topics that will be discussed in later modules. Upon completion of this course, you will have all the tools needed to work effectively with clients in need of recovery coaching services. Recent trends suggest that the demand for trained, qualified Recovery Coaches will continue to increase at a rapid rate in the future. We welcome you to your new, exciting career as a trained, professional Recovery Coach.