COACHING BEHIND BARs & BEYOND

After YeArs ADDressinG Crime, mentAL heALth AnD povertY, CLAre mCGreGor reALiseD the trUe potentiAL for sUstAinABLe ChAnGe Lies in heLpinG peopLe finD their oWn soLUtions.

the potentiAL Within

If you think you have no options and no hope in life, then why bother with anything at all? People near rock bottom often lack belief in their power to change anything, yet have the most potential to benefit from coaching. Over 30 brave and generous-hearted coaches have given their time and experience to the charity Coaching Inside and Out (CIAO) since 2010. We started in Styal prison near Manchester airport, where six women killed themselves in one year, and have now helped over 500 men, women and children both in prison and in the community, who have committed crimes or are at risk of doing so. We’ve discovered there is more potential than we ever imagined in the toughest of circumstances where you might think people lacked both the resources and the will to change their own lives. this is YoUr Life CIAO is entirely client-led and we work as equals without dwelling on or judging the past. We don’t ask about people’s crimes, just as we don’t ask about corporate clients’ misdemeanours. It is not a soft option but we challenge people for their own benefit, not the benefit of ‘the system’, which makes a vital difference and we often hear: ‘I’ve never told anyone this.’ Any one of us could so easily be in prison ourselves if circumstances played out differently at any point. As our very first male client in thecommunity said, ‘People do things because of the hand they were dealt: who they’re around, who they mix with and how they were brought up. Now I’m putting my cards back in the pack and giving them a good shuffle.’ Coaching allows someone to step back, consider their whole life and get to the heart of their problems, beliefs and hopes so that they can make the most of their lives, for all our sakes.

in six hoUrs or Less Within just six hours of one-to-one work a trusted CIAO coach can unlock ideas from people who are often just told what to do. As a female client said, ‘Prison makes you think a lot, but I didn’t know how to think before – I wouldn’t have got anywhere without the life coaching... I didn’t understand myself.’ Clients whose guilt and life history made them feel worthless and who’d never dared hope for anything better have takenresponsibility, come off drugs, got fit, got jobs, started their own businesses and looked for ways to give and help, as well as reduced the harm they do to themselves and others.