ABSTRACT
This chapter starts by briefly exploring what we mean by ethics. It includes a brief history of the development of ethical professional codes. It then moves on to look at the specifics of an ethical code for the coaching profession, offering some history to how such codes have evolved through drawing on the work of more established professions such as psychotherapy.
It identifies those ethical requirements which are shared between different professional coaching bodies. It is noted that those who provide coaching within an organisational setting may have a number of different ethical responsibilities (to client, coach, supervisor, organisation, profession body, and the world) which present the possibility of being in tension with one another. The latter part of the chapter focuses on the existential perspective on ethics which calls for consideration of the question, why be ethical? This is addressed via reference to a number of existential thinkers including de Beauvoir, Sartre, Kierkegaard, etc. The author returns to the existential concerns considered earlier in the book, identifying the main ethical issues contained in each.
