Intro to Working with Emotion in Coaching
Evidence-based, ethical, trauma-informed emotions coaching for professional coaches with Dr. Aprilia West, PsyD, MT, PCC
COMING IN SPRING 2025
EMOTIONS ARE AT THE HEART OF THE CHOICES WE MAKE
Helping clients be skillful with their emotions is a fundamental coaching skill. The way people relate to their emotions is core to how they experience themself, their life and how they act— especially in moments of stress, challenge and pain.
And yet, in the field of coaching there is a lack of training, understanding and agreement about the role of emotion in coaching and how to work with emotions responsibly, skillfully and ethically. As a result, many coaches avoid or struggle with working with emotion because they either don’t have the skills or they worry they might be overstepping the ethical bounds of coaching into the territory of therapy. This skills deficit and confidence gap can significantly limit what’s possible for clients in coaching.
If you want to deliver world-class coaching, learning to help client’s develop a more powerful relationship with their emotions is essential for wellbeing and performance.
As a psychologist and coach Dr. West has spent years researching emotions, neuroscience and evidence-based practices to help people step into greater emotional intelligence, psychological flexibility and resilience. She has trained thousands of coaches, therapists and clients to learn to increase their emotional efficacy.
working with emotion IS NOT OPTIONAL
Whether you realize it or not, as a coach you already “work with” your clients’ emotions. Many coaches default to what they’ve been taught in coach training courses, which is not always grounded in the science of emotions. Or, they respond to client’s emotions based on individual beliefs and behavior patterns developed from their own experience.
Unless you’ve learned the fundamentals of the psychology of emotion and concrete skills to help clients flourish it’s unlikely you are helping their clients tap their potential. In fact, an estimated 38% of coaching clients struggle with low emotion efficacy.
Learning to work with your client’s emotions— as well as your emotions about your clients’ emotions— is essential for delivering powerful coaching. Because emotions give us at times mission critical information and at other times “fake news” you need the skills to help your clients learn to experience a full range of emotions and respond in ways that are values-based and contextually sensitive.
The Intro To Working With Emotion In Coaching course is grounded in contextual behavioral science and positive psychology and was designed by psychologist and professional coach Dr. Aprilia West to help you develop an ethical, trauma-informed and evidence-based approach to help your clients optimize for wellbeing and performance.
About the Training
Learn to work ethically and safely with emotions while boosting client impact and results
In this 4-hour introductory training series you’ll learn how to help clients develop more powerful relationships with their emotions and choices grounded in the latest in behavioral psychology, neuroscience, learning theory and evidence-based skills to help your clients develop greater emotional intelligence, psychological flexibility and resilience.
Through a combination of didactic, demonstration and experiential practice you will leave with new skills to help your clients more skillfully navigate choices and moments of stress, challenge and pain with increased effectiveness. You’ll also receive materials you can use to help your clients on their journey to becoming more powerful with their emotions.
Learning
From this introductory course participants will be able to:
Distinguish working with emotion in coaching versus therapy
Describe the role of emotions in the psychology of wellbeing and performance
Distinguish emotional signals from emotional defaults
Describe the 4 core skills for expanding emotional efficacy
Develop increased confidence in evoking and processing emotion with clients
Execute ethical, trauma-informed emotion work with clients
Screen clients for emotion work that requires clinical expertise
Takeaways
Participants will receive a certificate of completion for the Intro To Working With Emotion In Coaching training.
You’ll also receive a PDF download of materials you can use for working with clients.
In addition, you’ll get access to on-demand experiential practice you can use to rehearse or use directly with clients.
Structure
This course will take place live on Zoom on December 4, 2024 from 8am-12pm PST and will be available to registrants on-demand (for one year following the training).
The course outline is as follows:
Introduction to the role of emotion work in coaching
Psychoeducation on contextual behavioral science, neuroscience and the psychology of emotions
Introduction to core emotion efficacy skills
15-minute bio break
Ethical screening process and trauma-informed guidelines for coaches
Live demo of working with emotion in coaching
Q & A with Dr. Aprilia West
Investment
$450 for live or on-demand
A rare and valuable opportunity for coaches.
If you are a coach whose clients would be interested in developing more emotion efficacy, I strongly recommend Dr. Aprilia West’s training. While there are other trainings available to coaches that are led by psychologists, few are also versed in coaching. That Dr. West does both therapy and coaching--and can really speak to coaching--makes her training a rare and valuable opportunity for coaches who want to help their clients develop a more powerful relationship with their emotions.
— Josh Hillis, Head Coach and Curriculum Design, GMB Eating Skills, author of Lean and Strong: Eating Skills, Psychology, and Workouts
About Dr. Aprilia West
Dr. Aprilia West is a psychologist, executive coach, trainer, author, advocacy campaign strategist, and digital health consultant. She has 20+ years of experience working with founders, leaders, creatives, teams, and organizations spanning U.S. Congress, tech, entertainment, Fortune 500 companies, and nonprofit advocacy campaigns.
Her extensive experience as a psychologist, executive coach, trainer, author, advocacy campaign strategist, and digital health consultant give her a niche understanding of human behavior and how to facilitate wellbeing, peak performance, and prosocial behavior change.
Dr. West's interest in human behavior and choice-making led her to study emotional intelligence, psychological flexibility, resilience and positive psychology. She went on to develop the construct of emotion efficacy— the ability and belief your ability to harness emotional experience, shift your mindset and take action aligned with your values. She explains, “emotion efficacy is what you’d get if emotional intelligence, psychological flexibility and resilience had a love child.”Dr. West designed the Emotion Efficacy Therapy protocol as part of her doctoral studies, as well as the related assessment, the Emotion Efficacy Scale-2 (EES2). She has since developed and expanded the emotion efficacy tools and trainings, including authoring the self-help book, What You Feel Is Not All There Is. She is also co-author of the clinician's guide to Emotion Efficacy Therapy.
Dr. West is known internationally as an expert in the application of behavioral science and conducts professional trainings for coaches and clinicians around the world.
