A successful mentor or coach can play a critical role in helping someone to achieve their professional goals.
The benefits of mentoring and coaching are well documented and are known to include developing leadership skills, increased knowledge transfer and stronger internal networks, as well as job satisfaction and motivation.
If you work in a learning, training, or professional development role, this microcredential will equip you with the practical skills and knowledge you need to provide crucial support to colleagues and peers.
Created by The Open University, you’ll benefit from the expertise of world-class academics who are known for their inspiring and engaging teaching, as well as their research that looks to influence practices, policies and debates – both nationally and internationally.
Discover how mentoring and coaching supports professional learning
This course explores the role of a leader in professional learning and development, encouraging you to think about leadership as a practice rather than a position of hierarchy.
You’ll reflect on the theory, research, and application of mentoring and coaching, including the differences between them, and relate this to your own work in supporting the learning of others.
You’ll also analyse and reflect on how you can become an ethical mentor or coach to others and consider your own professional development too.
Develop skills you can use straight away
Throughout the 12-week course, you’ll be supported to build your practical skills and approaches to coaching and mentoring in a structured and reflective way, including the opportunity to apply your learning to a case study in your own workplace or setting.
You’ll be encouraged to engage in discussions and provide critical friendship through constructive feedback to other learners, working together to find creative solutions to problems and challenges posed in the course materials or that you face in your working life.
From the very start, you’ll be able to apply your newly gained knowledge to make positive changes in your personal conduct and professional practice. Your learning will be relevant to a variety of contexts and settings which will help you in your current role and throughout your career.
Learn from experts at The Open University
The Open University is a leader in distance learning, with over 50 years of experience in delivering education remotely. You’ll learn from academic experts who have carefully designed a variety of engaging content and learning materials that will enable you to critically explore and develop your skills to become a more confident and effective coach or mentor who can support others to meet their professional goals.
Throughout the course you’ll take part in weekly activities to support and consolidate your learning. At the end of the course, you’ll submit an assessment which is marked and graded by subject matter experts.
