Executive Function Coaching

What is executive function coaching?

Executive function coaching is a structured, collaborative process that supports people to strengthen the cognitive and emotional skills that underpin learning, work, and daily life. These skills include planning, organisation, time management, emotional regulation, self-monitoring, and flexible thinking.

Unlike tutoring, which focuses on subject knowledge, or therapy, which addresses mental health, executive function coaching helps people develop practical strategies, self-awareness, and habits that foster independence and resilience.

At its best, executive function coaching is:

  • Neuroaffirmative — recognising and valuing diverse ways of thinking and learning.

  • Goal-oriented — focusing on strategies that help people meet their own goals.

  • Relational — building trust and collaboration between coach and client.

  • Protective — safeguarding people from harmful or deficit-based approaches.

How it Differs from Therapy or Counselling

Executive function coaching is practical, action-orientated, and forward-focused. It supports people to understand how their own executive function profile shows up in everyday life, and to develop strategies, routines, and environmental supports that work with their body and brain rather than against them.

Unlike therapy or counselling, executive function coaching does not focus on emotional processing or the treatment of mental health conditions. Instead, it centres on self-understanding, skill development, and applying insight in real-world contexts.

Ethical executive function coaching services recognise clear boundaries and work alongside, or signpost to, therapeutic support where appropriate.

How it Differs from Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT)

Cognitive Behavioural Therapy is a structured psychological therapy that focuses on identifying and changing patterns of thinking and behaviour, often in relation to mental health difficulties.

Executive function coaching is practical and forward-focused. It supports people to understand how their body and brain respond to everyday demands, and to develop executive function strategies, habits, and supports that build on their strengths and work in harmony with how they function.

Executive function coaching does not replace CBT. Ethical services recognise boundaries clearly and work alongside, or signpost to, therapeutic provision where appropriate.

Setting the standard

High standards are the foundation of ethical and effective executive function coaching. The 28 Professional Standards, developed by our co-founders Michael Delman and Victoria Bagnall, define what safe, effective, and inclusive practice looks like. The International Executive Function Coaching Certification (IEFCC) bases its framework on these standards, using them as the benchmark for recognising quality coaching worldwide.

The standards are organised into five core domains:

  1. Understanding Executive Functions and Human Development

  2. Communicating Relationally Through Coaching

  3. Fostering Motivation, Growth, and Behaviour Change

  4. Supporting Executive Function Skill Development

  5. Upholding Professional Integrity and Reflective Practice