16th International Congress of Coaching Psychology, 2026
DATE: 5th to 9th October 2026, Virtual Conference.
Theme: Positive and Coaching Psychology in Action: Theory, Research and Practice
Programme
This programme page will be updated with new information over the coming weeks.
This Congress programme timetable lists the live keynotes and papers being presented on the afternoon of Thursday 8th and the morning of Friday 9th October 2025. To increase the size of the programme below click on the zoom out radio button at the top righthand corner of the PDF viewer. To download the timetable click on the download radio button at the top righthand corner next to the zoom out button. Do note that there could be last minute changes on the day.
If you have obtained your ticket to attend Day 4 and Day 5, then nearer the time you will be emailed the password to the Congress Login webpage which will have the Zoom links to each session.
Keynote: From neuromyths to neuroscience-informed practice: Why debunking brain myths matters for coaching psychology and leadership
Dr Gisele Dias (UK) & Dr Liory Fern-Pollak (UK)
Neuroscience has increasingly become a topic of interest for coaches and leaders. It offers a powerful language in coaching psychology and leadership development, giving professionals a sense of contemporary and evidence-sound practice. However, it is not uncommon to see neuroscience concepts being overly simplified, outdated or propagated in a mistaken way, and do not reflect contemporary neuroscience. The perpetuation of ideas such as “amygdala hijack”, “survival mode”, and the “emotional versus rational brain”, widely used to explain behaviour, support self-regulation, and guide interventions, has palpable consequences to individual change and organisational culture. While well-intentioned, such neuromyths can inadvertently reduce client agency, reinforce deficit-based narratives, and promote control-oriented approaches to leadership and change.
This keynote invites coaching psychologists and leaders to critically reflect on the brain stories they use in practice and why they matter. Drawing on current evidence from affective and cognitive neuroscience, network-based models of brain function, and research on stress, learning, and regulation, the session will unpack common neuromyths, explain why they persist, and explore their practical and ethical implications for coaching psychology practice.
Keynote: AI: Threat or Opportunity for Coaching Psychologists?
Aaron McEwan (Australia)
Artificial intelligence is reshaping the way we work, learn, and develop—and coaching psychology is no exception. As AI becomes increasingly capable of providing insights, feedback, and even coaching-style conversations, what does this mean for the future role of coaching psychologists? This session will explore how AI is transforming human development, the opportunities it creates to enhance coaching practice, and the challenges it raises around ethics, trust, empathy, and professional identity. Drawing on research, practical examples, and insights into the future of work, Aaron will examine how coaching psychologists can harness AI as a powerful partner while continuing to deliver the uniquely human capabilities that technology cannot replicate. Attendees will leave with a balanced perspective on AI’s impact, practical strategies for integrating it into their practice, and confidence in navigating the future of coaching psychology.
Keynote: When the Person Isn’t the Problem: Bringing Organizational Psychology into Coaching. A framework for coaching the self, role, relationships and system
Joanie B. Connell, PhD (USA)
Positive psychology has given us powerful ways to cultivate human strengths, but no strength grows independently of the systems in which a person operates. Senior leaders in organizations, for example, frequently operate in environments shaped by competing interests, limited resources, ambiguous authority, and unequal power. Yet leadership coaching often interprets political challenges as deficits in confidence, communication, or executive presence. Conversely, blaming the system can leave leaders feeling powerless and absolved of responsibility. This keynote shows coaches how to help leaders understand the systems around them, recover a sense of agency, and respond to difficult political situations with diplomacy, courage, and psychological sophistication.
The presentation integrates positive psychology, organizational psychology and research on political skills and leadership coaching in an evidence-informed framework that operates at four levels: self, role, relationships, and system. The presentation includes real examples from coaching leaders who are navigating “gray area” issues such as exclusion from decisions, territorial behavior, undermining, credit-taking, and actions that test the limits of policy violations.
Keynote: Applications of Coaching Psychology as Preventative Mental Healthcare
Ashley Ringger, PsyM, MISCP (Switzerland)
Traditional mental healthcare is largely reactive—waiting for people to become unwell before offering support. However, catching stress and burnout before they turn into clinical conditions requires a proactive approach. Coaching psychology is uniquely built for this preventative role. Grounded in evidence-based, solution-focused methods, it helps individuals move from simply getting by to truly thriving.
This presentation explores how coaching acts as early-stage mental healthcare across three key areas:
- At Work: Preventing burnout, reducing emotional exhaustion, and building sustainable work practices.
- In Personal Relationships: Strengthening communication, setting healthy boundaries, and creating strong social support systems.
- In Health and Medicine: Partnering with health coaching to support lifestyle changes, manage stress, and prevent chronic illness.
Mapping the Intellectual Landscape of Coaching Psychology: An Interdisciplinary Systematic Literature Review and Bibliometric Analysis
Christin Tan (Singapore)
Coaching psychology has emerged as an interdisciplinary field within applied psychology, integrating theoretical and methodological contributions from organisational psychology, positive psychology, cognitive-behavioural psychology, sport psychology, health promotion, and adult learning. Although coaching has become widely adopted in leadership development, executive education, employee wellbeing, and organisational change, the scholarly foundations underpinning coaching psychology remain fragmented across multiple disciplinary traditions.
Existing systematic reviews and meta-analyses have primarily examined coaching effectiveness or evaluated specific interventions. However, relatively little attention has been devoted to understanding the field itself as an evolving body of knowledge. Consequently, important questions remain regarding the coherence of coaching psychology, the relationships between its theoretical traditions, and the extent to which knowledge has accumulated across different coaching contexts. Rather than asking whether coaching works, the paper investigates how the discipline has developed over the past two decades. Specifically, what intellectual structures, theoretical traditions, and research communities characterise contemporary coaching psychology? Where do opportunities exist for greater theoretical integration and cumulative knowledge development?
Keynote: Coaching Psychology in Action: The Adult Dyslexia Coaching Service
Dr Anna Navin Young (Ireland)
The biopsychosocial model of neurodiversity posits that neurodiversity emerges from biological differences that have psychological and social impacts for neurodivergent individuals. Dyslexia is considered a specific learning difference that impacts the language centres of the brain, affecting reading, spelling, and language processing skills. Dyslexia affects approximately 10% of the population. In Ireland, dyslexia is classed as a disability under equality legislation, meaning individuals with dyslexia are entitled to protections and have the right to reasonable accommodations in the workplace and education. Dyslexia Ireland’s Adult Dyslexia Coaching Service was developed to support adults with dyslexia to address specific challenges they experience and goals they have in their lives, work, or study.
This keynote presentation offers a service evaluation of the Adult Dyslexia Coaching Service run by Dyslexia Ireland. The presentation provides an overview of the service, common topics brought to coaching, how an evidence-informed integrative coaching psychology approach is used to support individuals in the service, and feedback themes from clients sharing their experiences of coaching. This keynote provides implications for the continued development and enhancement of the Adult Dyslexia Coaching Service. Further implications regarding the benefits of coaching services to support neurodiverse adults are considered.
Keynote: Committed Action in Coaching Psychology
Dr Rachael Skews PhD (UK)
Taking a core process from Acceptance and Commitment Coaching, this session will deep dive into committed action in coaching psychology. Using theory and practice from Acceptance and Commitment Coaching, we will explore the difference between goals and committed action, and how to guide clients to explore the committed action they want to take in their lives.
Keynote: A Pre-Post Study of Coaching Self-Efficacy: Evidence from an Executive Coaching Programme
Diana Aguiar Vieira (Portugal)
According to Albert Bandura’s Social Cognitive Theory and related research, individuals with high self-efficacy are more likely to persist in the face of challenging situations, demonstrating resilience and adaptability—key aspects for successful coaching practice. The Self-Efficacy Coaching Model posits that training contributes to enhancing coaches’ self-efficacy, thereby improving the quality of their practice. The present study aims to examine the impact of an Executive Coaching Training programme on participants’ self-efficacy. The sample comprised sixteen trainees (7 male; 9 female) enrolled in a 71-hour Executive Coaching programme at a Portuguese university. Participants came from diverse professional sectors, with strong representation from Human Resources, organisational development, leadership, and consultancy roles. Adopting a quantitative approach, two self-reported measures were used: the Coaching Skills Self-Efficacy Scale (CSSES; Vieira, 2011; Vieira & Palmer, 2012), and the General Self-Efficacy Scale (GSE; Schwarzer & Jerusalem, 1995). Participants completed the survey twice: before training (T1) and five months later (T2). Results showed a significant increase in both coaching self-efficacy and general self-efficacy from T1 to T2. These findings provide further support for the Self-Efficacy Coaching Model. Given that higher self-efficacy promotes better performance, this study highlights the importance for coaching education providers to reinforce participants’ self-efficacy throughout training. Embedding structured self-efficacy-building activities from the outset of a coach’s learning journey can strengthen coaches’ professional success. Also, this study reinforces the value of evidence-based methodologies in coaching education. Future research should explore how coaching self-efficacy evolves over time and contributes to sustained professional growth.
Understanding the effects of inter-sessional activities in coaching practice: A systematic review and a pilot experimental study
Dr Qing Wang (China)
Although coaching has become increasingly established within organisational and educational contexts, the role of inter-sessional activities (IA), structured tasks undertaken by clients between coaching sessions, remains insufficiently conceptualised and empirically examined. This presentation investigates the application and effectiveness of IA in coaching by integrating evidence from a systematic review and a pilot experimental study. The first part presents a systematic review conducted in accordance with PRISMA guidelines. The review identified seven empirical studies in workplace coaching and 43 studies in therapy and counselling that met the inclusion criteria. Five themes were generated: inconsistent terminology and definitions of IA; emerging evidence of positive effects on behavioural and attitudinal outcomes; considerable variation in activity types; divergent perceptions of IA among practitioners and clients; and factors associated with adherence and completion. The second part reports a pilot experimental study examining IA within a four-week group-based cognitive behavioural coaching intervention for college students. A three-arm randomized controlled trial with four measurement points was conducted with 52 valid participants, comparing coaching with IA, coaching only, and a control condition. Quantitative findings indicated that both coaching conditions produced stronger immediate post-intervention effects than the control group. Notably, the coaching-with-IA condition showed additional advantages in goal attainment, maintenance of career decision-making self-efficacy, and reduction of employment anxiety. Semi-structured interviews further suggested that IA facilitated the transfer of cognitive behavioural skills through knowledge consolidation, personalised reflection, and goal-management practice.
Together, the review and pilot study suggest that IA may enhance coaching effectiveness by bridging in-session learning and real-life application. The presentation concludes by outlining future research directions and practical implications for embedding IA more intentionally in coaching practice.