Unleashing the power of personal change through coaching has been presented to Hamilton Rotary Club by former executive director of the Centre on Philanthropy Pamela Barit Nolan, now at the helm of her own firm.

Ms Barit Nolan created Transform (Bermuda) last year directly upon leaving the Centre, a company focused on “service and community building”, she said, through coaching, consulting and community conversations.

Describing the new discipline of coaching as “somewhat unique and not as well understood or known in Bermuda”, she called it a means of revealing to clients what they already know but still struggle to realise.

“I am having meaningful conversations with human beings that for whatever reason are a bit stuck in their work, relationship, family life or just life in general,” Ms Barit Nolan yesterday told Rotarians.

“I am not a therapist — there is no diagnosis that needs to be made or condition to be cured, as I believe that my clients are whole, resourceful and creative when they come in through my door.”

Guiding clients toward seeing it comes with international accreditation, plus a conduct code governed by the International Coaching Federation.

Coaching as a profession “only came to being in the 1980s, so it is still relatively new”, she added, calling her particular style “ontological — focused on who we are as human beings”.

Ms Barit Nolan said she’s able to help people through examining “three core elements of our being — language, body and emotion — and discovering how the coherency of these three is driving our actions and getting results”.

She will further her skills in October, along with a group of other trainees from the Island, at a seminar in New Hampshire delivering full training in the “art of hosting” — a variety of methods for facilitating group conversations to overcome challenges the group faces.