Introducing Dr. Downing

I am delighted to have earned the title of Dr. Kathryn M. Downing. Last month Middlesex University London awarded me the degree of Doctor of Professional Studies (Coaching Supervision).

I began my doctoral program in 2016 with a drive to learn more about my own coaching supervision practice and to contribute to our collective understanding of executive coaching and small group coaching supervision. Through the five years I worked with participants who openly shared their stories and experiences with me and ultimately with all of you. It took courage and vulnerability to do so and their contributions to the profession are captured in my thesis which opens the windows and doors to what actually happens in coaching supervision.

As I have been sharing my findings with groups of coaches and supervisors, a colleague asked me what my most important learning was. It is that I am enough. This found sense of myself as whole, sufficient and worthy has influenced many aspects of my life. In writing the final thesis I found my voice and developed trust in my own perceptions and meaning making. I found self-acceptance. Each of these, and a myriad of other facets of my ways of being, have brought me across the threshold to a new phase of life.