Building Coaching Practices on Ethical Foundation
North Eslin started in 2017 when three practitioners realized certification programs rarely addressed the ethical dilemmas coaches actually face. We built a curriculum focused on the gray areas—client boundaries, confidentiality conflicts, dual relationships—where textbook answers fall short.
Explore Program Structure
Where Standards Meet Reality
The coaching field grew fast over the past decade. Certifications multiplied. But most training still treats ethics as a checklist—sign the code, follow the rules, avoid the obvious mistakes. That approach doesn't prepare anyone for the situations that keep coaches up at night: a client who starts dating your friend, a company asking you to report on employee sessions, discovering your methodology conflicts with a client's cultural values.
We started North Eslin because we kept seeing newly certified coaches struggle with these scenarios. They'd learned techniques and models but hadn't practiced ethical reasoning. They knew the International Coach Federation standards by heart but couldn't apply them when two principles conflicted. So we designed a program that puts those conflicts at the center—not as hypotheticals, but as the core skill coaches need to develop.
Our curriculum pulls from real situations practitioners shared over seven years. Someone realizes mid-engagement they lack expertise for what the client actually needs. Two coaching clients turn out to be business partners without disclosing it. A referral source expects preferential reporting. These aren't edge cases. They're the texture of professional practice. Learning to navigate them builds the judgment that separates competent coaches from people who just completed training.
We work with participants from eighteen countries now. The ethical frameworks look different across contexts—what constitutes appropriate self-disclosure in Copenhagen differs from Jakarta—but the underlying reasoning process transfers. That's what we teach: how to analyze situations, identify conflicting obligations, consider stakeholder impacts, and make defensible decisions even when there's no perfect answer. It's uncomfortable work. It should be.
What Drives Our Curriculum Design
Evidence Over Convention
We examine what research actually shows about coaching effectiveness and ethical practice. Where evidence is thin, we say so. Our case studies come from documented situations, not imagined scenarios. When standards conflict with what works, we explore why and help participants think through the tension rather than pretending it doesn't exist.
Context Shapes Ethics
A coaching relationship in Singapore operates under different cultural expectations than one in Berlin. Power dynamics vary. Privacy norms differ. We don't teach universal answers because they don't exist. Instead, participants learn frameworks for analyzing how context affects ethical obligations and practice making judgment calls within their specific environments.
Prepare for Discomfort
Ethical dilemmas feel bad because they should. We structure exercises that put participants in situations where every choice has costs. The goal isn't comfort—it's building capacity to reason through difficult decisions and live with the consequences. Coaches who can't tolerate that discomfort shouldn't be coaching.
How We Structure Learning
Foundation: Standards as Starting Points
The first month covers major coaching standards—ICF, EMCC, AC—not as rules to memorize but as frameworks built from specific concerns. We examine why each provision exists, what problems it addresses, and where different standards diverge. This gives participants reference points for their own reasoning rather than scripts to follow.
Application: Working Through Real Conflicts
Months two and three focus on case analysis. Small groups receive detailed scenarios based on documented situations, then must identify stakeholders, analyze competing obligations, consider consequences, and propose courses of action. They present their reasoning to the cohort, defend their logic, and explore alternative approaches. This builds the analytical muscle ethical practice requires.
Integration: Developing Personal Frameworks
The final month has participants construct their own ethical decision-making systems. What principles guide your practice? How do you weigh client autonomy against potential harm? When do you prioritize organizational interests over individual ones? They document their frameworks, test them against new scenarios, and revise based on what breaks. This becomes their working tool for navigating ambiguity.
Who Shapes This Program
Our curriculum emerges from ongoing collaboration between practicing coaches, ethics researchers, and participants who bring challenges from their own work. Liselotte directs the academic structure, but the material evolves based on what practitioners actually encounter.
Liselotte Vahter
Director of Ethics Education
Liselotte spent twelve years coaching executives in corporate environments before moving into ethics education. She holds credentials from three major coaching bodies and sat on the ICF Ethics Committee from 2019 to 2023. Her research focuses on how coaches make decisions when organizational pressures conflict with client interests.
She designed North Eslin's curriculum after watching too many coaches struggle with situations their training never prepared them for. The program reflects her conviction that ethical competence requires practice with ambiguity, not just knowledge of standards. Outside of teaching, she consults with coaching organizations on ethics policy and mediates practitioner disputes.
Liselotte runs monthly ethics forums where practicing coaches bring current dilemmas for group analysis. These sessions inform curriculum updates and ensure the program addresses challenges people actually face rather than theoretical concerns.