Introduction

This year’s conference invites coaches to examine inherited professional boundaries, internalised beliefs, and the evolving edges of practice in complex, technologically mediated contexts.

Within this context, creativity is understood not merely as artistic expression, but as a mode of professional judgement expressed through reframing, deep listening, and disciplined inquiry. It enables coaches to exercise reflective judgement in dialogue with emerging tools and systems, and to dwell thoughtfully in questions concerning self, other, and profession as they respond to evolving social, ethical, and professional condition.

Coaching practice develops through critical engagement with familiar and established frameworks, requiring practitioners to continually interrogate how knowledge, methods, and assumptions are constructed, interpreted, and applied in practice.

Exploration Themes

1. Creativity as a dialogic practice of reframing, deep listening, and reflective discernment
2. Unexamined boundaries shaping coaching practice and professional identity
3. Personalising coaching practice beyond standardised models and prescriptive
4. Understanding boundaries as relational, dynamic, and continually negotiated
5. Examining how familiarity and perceived safety may both support and constrain learning and innovation

Conference Programme

09:00 – 09:15 | Virtual Registration and Welcome

09:15 – 09:30 | Opening Remarks

09:30 – 10:15 | Keynote Address 1: Ruth Hughes I Coaching Beyond Performance: Why Identity, Not Goals, Drives Transformation

10:30 – 11:30 | Parallel Panel Tutor Workshops

• James Woodworth & Susannah Chambers I Brave Boundaries: Negotiating Co- Created Boundaries with Coaching
• Marie Quigley & William Hargreaves I Creativity as a Dialogic Practice
• Roger Fielding & Elly Tai I Between the Model and the Moment

11:30 – 11:45 | Morning Coffee Break

11:45 – 12:45 | Parallel Alumni Presentation Sessions

• Kelley Duarte I Unexamined Boundaries in Coaching: How Hidden Assumptions Shape Professional Identity
• Paul Postema I Safe to be Second: Coaching Spaces for the Infallible
• Dina Sabry Fivaz I Creative Experimentation in Gestalt Coaching

12:45 – 13:45 | Lunch Break

13:45 – 14:30 | Keynote Address 2: Prof Meng Tian I The End of Leadership? AI, Complexity, and Human Judgement

14:30 – 15:30 | Parallel Guest Speaker Sessions

• Andy Nobes I What is Coaching in an Age of AI?
• Rebecca Larter I Working with Grief in Coaching: An embodied approach within ethical boundaries

15:30 – 15:45 | Afternoon Coffee Break

15:45 – 16:45 | Parallel Guest Speaker Sessions

• Beatrice Balfour I The Art of the Question: Coaching Through Inquiry
• Tim Lovell & Ella Jenkinson I Coaching with Creativity through High Support and High Challenge

16:45 – 17:00 | Closing Ceremony: Celebrating Excellence

• Reflections on the day
• Formal Closing Remarks