Ensuring Long-term Success with your ILM Level 5 Coaching Programme

Many organisations invest in ILM Level 5 coaching training to build a strong internal coaching capability.

However, many struggle with three key challenges:

• ensuring participants complete the required coaching hours,

• establishing a clear structure for managing coaching internally,

• maintaining long-term coaching quality through ongoing CPD and supervision.

Without the right support, participants can fall behind, coaching efforts can lose momentum, and organisations may not see the lasting impact they hoped for.

The Common Pitfall: Coaching Hours, Not Just Training

When planning an in-house ILM Level 5 coaching programme, we start with the coaching hours requirement, not the training schedule. Why? Because while it’s relatively easy to plan workshops, the real challenge lies in helping organisations ensure that participants can complete their coaching hours (and associated portfolio) alongside their full-time roles.

Without careful planning, structured support, and regular check-ins, participants can easily fall behind, lose momentum, and even drop out, wasting valuable time and investment.

This month, I’ve spoken to several organisations struggling with this exact issue.

Their training provider delivered the workshops, but participants were left without the structured support needed to complete their coaching hours and assessments. As a result, progress stalled, and the organisation failed to develop the coaching capability they had intended.

In our courses, we organise the first coaching/client relationship within the cohort of participants, encouraging a safe learning space for the first client and ensuring that everyone has had the experience of being coached as part of their development as a coach. We then work with the organisation to support the identification of the next 2 clients for each participant, and to ensure that the timeline of coaching hours runs in parallel with the programme, so that participants have ongoing support, check-ins and development.

The Hidden Challenge: Managing Coaching Internally

Another key challenge that organisations often don’t consider is what happens after the training. Many haven’t thought through:

• Who will manage coaching internally? Without clear ownership, coaching initiatives can lack direction and accountability.

• What are we trying to achieve with coaching? You don’t need a huge organisational strategy, but you do need to why you are introducing coaching, what you hope to achieve, and how it links to key organisational objectives.
  How will coachees be selected? A structured approach to identifying coachees and then matching them with coaches is essential to ensuring coaching impact is maximised.

• How will coaching success and quality be monitored? Without a process for tracking progress, it’s hard to measure the true value coaching is bringing to the organisation.

We work directly with organisations to address these challenges - helping to set up internal coaching structures, match coachees, and provide oversight to ensure coaching delivers real results.

We also require participants on our programmes to submit a final coaching recording as part of the programme’s supervision requirements. This is a crucial quality check, ensuring that participants demonstrate effective coaching skills before they qualify. For organisations, it provides confidence in the competence and approach of internal coaches before they start coaching employees.

Building a Sustainable Coaching Culture

Another common mistake? Thinking that once the ILM programme is complete, the work is done!

 Coaches require ongoing CPD and supervision to maintain quality and momentum. Without it, coaching skills fade, and the impact of the initial training is lost.

Having managed internal coaching in a large organisation myself, I fully understand these challenges, especially when working with a limited budget. That’s why we work with organisations to build their in-house support and offer affordable, ongoing CPD and supervision, ensuring their coaches continue to grow and refine their practice.

And additionally, we provide free membership to the Association for Coaching for all programme participants. This gives them access to a wider coaching community, valuable resources, and continued professional development, helping them to sustain and enhance their coaching skills after the programme ends.

The Key to Success

To benefit from an ILM Level 5 coaching programme, organisations need to think beyond the workshops. Success requires structured support for coaching hours, internal coaching management, and ongoing CPD.

By choosing a provider that supports both individual participants and the organisation as a whole, you ensure:

• Participants complete their qualification on time – with the right support for coaching hours and assessments.

• Internal coaching is well-managed and effective – with clear objectives, and robust structures for coach-coachee matching and progress tracking.

• A long-term coaching culture is established – through ongoing CPD, supervision, and access to a wider coaching network.

If your organisation is serious about embedding coaching, choosing the right provider is crucial. The right support makes all the difference in developing confident, capable coaches who drive real impact.

If you are thinking of introducing a new ILM Level 5 programme, or your existing programme has stalled, get in touch to organise a quick chat to see if we could help. Set up a free, no-pressure meeting with Marie.