The Coaching Fellowship Program

What is The Coaching Fellowship program?

Twice per year, The Coaching Fellowship selects approximately 150 young high-potential women leaders in the social impact sector to become our fellows each program. Fellows receive executive-level coaching at a massively reduced rate, so they may focus deeply on personal and leadership development, attaining their goals, and changing the world in the process. In addition, fellows join our network of 1,300+ women impact leaders around the world.

The Coaching Fellowship is a leadership development program designed specifically for women in social impact. The program offers individual leadership coaching as well as opportunities to connect with empowered women around the world.

Learn more about how we got started and why we’re doing this.

One-on-One Leadership Development Coaching

A fellow’s journey through the program is tailored to their specific needs and goals. Fellows are paired with an experienced professional leadership coach to work one-on-one toward their goals and to overcome challenges. Fellows schedule sessions with their coaches when it is convenient for both of them.

Focus areas for Leadership Development Coaching might include:

• Understanding one’s strengths and blindspots as a leader
• Clarifying values and deeper purpose for one’s work
• Identifying your authentic leadership presence and style
• Navigating conflict
• Enhancing your emotional intelligence

Small Group Opportunities

We know that growth does not occur in a vacuum. We have created several ways throughout the Fellowship Program to deepen your learning and accelerate your growth as you embark on what we hope will be a transformative experience.

Allies Pod Experience

Once in the program, signing up for an Allies Pod is one of the best ways to connect with other Fellows within your cohort who are on similar journeys to foster meaningful relationships through this shared experience.

Allies Pod are entirely self-directed, each Pod Ally is an equal designer in creating your unique experience together!

To learn more about Allies Pods check out our FAQs

Group Sessions

We also offer group sessions that focus on introducing tools, models, and practices to support authentic leadership, personal growth, and resilience. Group sessions are designed to support each fellow in being more courageous, inspired, and connected.

Focus areas for group sessions include (and are not limited to):

• Cultivating a practice of Active Hope: moving from despair, resignation, and exhaustion to purposeful, engaged action
• Exploring mindful self-compassion and self-care practices that allow women to do their work with more ease
• Understanding the power of vulnerable, authentic leadership, and being our true selves at work and as leaders

Join a Community of 1,300+ Alumnae from 80+ Countries

Since 2014, over 1,300 women impact leaders from more than 80 countries have graduated from The Coaching Fellowship. Graduation from the program is only the beginning of the leadership journey. We are committed to continue strengthening our community of women leader’s unique capabilities and help advance their impact.

As Coaching Fellowship Alumnae, leaders become part of our global community of professional peers who understand each other's challenges and needs with opportunities to:

• Deeply connect with a network of women leaders all over the world in a variety of impact sectors.
• Participate in monthly offerings of workshops, community lead sessions and meet-ups
• Access our extensive Leadership Resource Library

Our growing community of women impact leaders is paving the way for change and bringing others with them.

Are You A Nightingale Fellow?

Nightingale Fellows are women leading in roles that directly support their communities in fields such as education, healthcare, mental & behavioral health, housing, food security, and social services. These fields historically experience high rates of burnout, compassion fatigue, and vicarious trauma — compounded by the shared trauma of a global pandemic.

These women are essential to the welfare and continued well-being of our global community, yet there are limited opportunities for them to focus on themselves and their long-term growth. We have dedicated up to 40 spaces each fellowship program to supporting these courageous women.

Working directly with their professional coach and other Coaching Fellows, selected Nightingale Fellows can

• Develop practices for stress management & self-care in crisis
• Build resilience and capacity to think clearly under pressure
• Strategize approaches to deal with uncertainty and ambiguity
• Learn mindfulness and attention practices for emotional health
• Process learning and growth opportunities from crisis
• Design ways to manage caring for family while working on the front lines
• Clarify values and deeper purpose for their work now
• Envision long-term development and connect with purpose

NOTE: You will be given the opportunity to indicate that you are a Nightingale Fellow in your application.

How does the program work?

Fellows receive a total of 11 hours of intensive 1:1 leadership coaching sessions over a period of 6 months via phone/Zoom/WhatsApp with one of our highly experienced and certified coaches.

There are two parts of the program.

Part One: 8 intensive coaching sessions over 4 months

• One 60-90 minute initial discovery session to define goals, explore values and identify triggers, barriers, and purpose
• Weekly or bi-weekly coaching sessions to work towards goals and overcoming challenges (7 hours of coaching total)
• Weekly newsletter with coaching tips and recommended readings
• Three monthly group calls with other fellows

Part Two: 3 coaching sessions over 2 months

• Two hours of coaching sessions to deepen learnings and receive support to be scheduled when needed
• One hour completion session to reflect on learnings and plan for ongoing self-development
• Two monthly group calls with other fellows

Program Costs

Thanks to the generosity of our coaches and funders, we are able to offer this program at a highly subsidized rate, but not for free. In our efforts to support as many women leaders as possible, we are offering a volunteer tiered pricing system for our program fee that allows you to select the price that best works for you. For full information on our pricing options, please click here.

NOTE: The true cost of The Coaching Fellowship program is about $7,000 USD per fellow. Through the incredible generosity of our coaches, who offer their services completely pro bono, we are proud to be able to offer fellowship places at this rate. Fellows’ contributions go to The Coaching Fellowship’s operational costs, so as a 501 c 3 non-profit organization, we may continue to support many more incredible young women leaders in the future.

What do we look for in fellows?

The Coaching Fellowship is open to any young woman leader and women-identifying individuals based anywhere in the world, who are today transforming our world for the better.

We are looking for a candidate who is:

• A high potential young woman leader
• Strongly committed to changing the planet and can demonstrate existing change
• Doing something extraordinary
• Dedicated to her self-discovery and development
• Willing to speak freely about both her difficulties and triumphs
• Realistic about her goals for coaching (feasible for completion within a six-month period)
• Clear on what she can expect from coaching (see: “What is a coach?” for further clarification)
• Open to being challenged by a coach to explore outside her comfort zone
• Willing to give her coach feedback on their coaching conversation and relationship
• A strong commitment to the value of fellowship and community

Typically, our fellows earn less than $100,000 USD per year in a high potential leadership position of a nonprofit, social impact organization or public institution that has demonstrated impact in their community and the world.

Disclaimer: We have a requirement that a fellow in the TCFS program is emotionally and mentally stable before joining our program. If you have experienced significant emotional trauma, a traumatic event, and have been in recovery or treatment in the last 12 month, we recommend that you consider applying for our fellowship program after at least 12 months post-recovery.

Coaching is a wonderful process for opening up transformation and going deep, but the serious concern is that it can also trigger traumatic emotions if you are recovering and healing from trauma, and because our coaches don’t have therapeutic training to support that, it could potentially harm you, and we would never, ever want that for anyone.

If you have any questions regarding this requirement, please reach out to us at [email protected]

We are continually working hard as an organization to welcome, embrace and support all people.

The Coaching Fellowship shall not discriminate present nor future participants on the basis of race, color, religion, creed, age, national origin (ancestry), disability, marital status, sexual orientation, political affiliation, educational background, or military status, in any of our activities or operations.

What is a coach?

A coach is NOT the same as a mentor, consultant, or career counselor.

A mentor/consultant will set out to train or give you direct advice supporting the professional goal or project you are attempting to accomplish. A career counselor will help you to hone professional development skills such as creating a resume or cover letter, and give you direction on your career path.

A Coaching Fellowship coach, on the other hand, will work with you to reach your personal and professional goals. They will guide you and help you to focus on your strengths, rather than directly advising you. They will enable you to grow, motivate you and hold you accountable to your goals.

Here’s a helpful chart to further clarify what a coach is:

Your coach will:

• Guide you in your personal and professional development
• Support you in understanding your strengths and blindspots
• Help you unfold your authentic leadership style
• Hold you accountable for reaching your personal goals
• Challenge you and provide feedback on your progress
• Give you actions and inquiries to work on in-between sessions
• Discover your unique personal values and purpose
• Help you set clear goals, take action, and make better decisions
• Identify self-limiting influences and beliefs and create new pathways for success

Your coach will NOT:

• Give direct advice on a specific skill (such as strategy, fundraising, branding, presenting, or career development)
• Work with you to create a business strategy
• Work with you to develop a professional project
• Identify business development pipelines or processes
• Make introductions and help build your network
• Give advice or training on creating a resume, or interview techniques

How are Fellows and Coaches Matched?

We match a fellow with a coach as much as possible based on timezone compatibility, and also consider a coach’s experience and fellow’s needs. A coach may be in a completely different country than the fellow — so far our coaches are based in 23 countries, and we continue to expand with each program.

All our coaches are professionally trained, highly experienced in leadership development, and very dedicated to supporting our fellows. They come from very different backgrounds than our fellows, and are experts in helping our fellows help themselves. Our coaches are completely committed to our fellows’ success and growth. They are here to help our fellows gain better understanding of their strengths and blind spots, both personally and professionally.

2022 Cohort 1 Calendar

Part One (4 months)

Part Two (2 months)

NOTE: Please take note of the dates above and plan ahead carefully. If you are selected to join our 2022 Cohort 1 program, you are expected to follow and honor the program timeline.

Have more questions about our program? Check out our FAQ page for more information.