Coaching in Context

Practical Solutions to Embodying Dignity, Inclusion and Belonging for Diversity in your Coaching Practice

A Live-Online Course
Led by Nathan Naik Shara

October 6 - November 3


Are you waking up to ways that unconscious bias and assumptions are impacting your coaching clients? Are you seeking to make your practice more aligned with your values?

Embark on a journey with Lead Teacher and Somatic Coach, Nathan Naik Shara blending Strozzi Institute’s trusted coaching methodology with principles and practices of dignity, equity, and belonging.

In this course, you will clarify the values that guide your work as a coach, learning practices that support you to embody these values more consistently under pressure.

Coaching in Context is for Coaches Who Are:
  • Interested in developing greater competence coaching across differences (such as ethnicity, race, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, age, religion, and abilities)
  • Committed to transforming as a Coach and working with a broader range of clients 
  • Interested in practices that move you towards values of dignity and equity
  • Newer to conversations about power, injustice and equality, but want to learn more
As coaches, we support our clients in declaring their goals for the future, identifying and facing obstacles, and unlocking their potential to realize their dreams. But…

While some clients soar to new heights, others encounter structural barriers — the "glass cliffs," "concrete ceilings," "sticky floors," and "double binds" of today's workplaces.

Unconscious biases and historical structures make it difficult for some people to advance and easier for others.

We all embody the social norms and conditions we are raised and living in. We integrate these because of the default narratives and practices we have inherited and been “shaped” by. While these conditions may not align with what we value or even how we see ourselves, we embody them and think and act from them anyway.

Most coaches need new tools, skills, and knowledge to perceive and act on the differences between personal, interpersonal, and institutional issues and power. While many coaches may condemn racism and institutional inequities, many don't honestly know how to bring their commitment to equity and belonging into their client relationships.

When we do not understand the contexts that our clients are navigating, we run the risk of unintentionally doing harm. For example, after a female client is denied a promotion, focusing on her "inner critic" or suggesting assertiveness skills, when in fact, the company’s president is unwilling to promote a woman to C-level leadership.

Leverage our proven methodology to become the kind of extraordinary coach who inspires and empowers clients to reach their goals and achieve their dreams. 

settings
Register Now
Is it possible to meet your clients in more productive and inclusive ways? Yes. It takes commitment and that life-long journey can start here.

Coaching in Context is designed to help coaches start developing a wider lens for perceiving the social context that your clients inhabit… and that you embody as a coach. 

Using a model called Sites of Shaping/Sites of Change, we will explore how individuals, teams, and organizations embody the attitudes and behavior of the culture and society around them… even when they may disagree with these norms and stereotypes. 

This course will allow you to become more conscious of these unexamined biases, and help you to develop practices for embodying your chosen values instead. 

Here are some of the things you will experience as a result of participating in Coaching in Context training:
  • Clarify your values as a coach.
  • Ask more transformative questions and listen more deeply. 
  • Work more skillfully with a diverse range of clients.
  • Create a commitment that expresses your values.
  • Develop your capacity to hold depth and complexity.
  • Build more trust with yourself and others.
Embark on a journey that reflects your values and your commitment, especially under pressure.
Develop practices that allow your clients to bring more of themselves. 
settings
Register Now

Nathan Naik Shara

Senior Teacher, Strozzi Institute

Meet Your Teacher

Nathan Naik Shara, MSW is a somatic therapist, writer and teacher whose work focuses on the intersections of individual healing and structural transformation. Nathan has spent the last 15 years engaged in efforts to prevent, respond to, and end interpersonal and intimate violence. He has worked extensively with survivors of violence, as well as with individuals who have perpetrated harm. 

Nathan is a lead teacher and practitioner with generative somatics, bringing embodied transformation to social and environmental justice leaders, organizations and alliances. He is also a senior teacher for Strozzi Institute, offering courses on embodied leadership, somatic bodywork, and trauma, as well as leading SI’s teacher training program. Nathan maintains a small private practice in Oakland, CA. His recent essay “Facing Shame: From Saying Sorry to Doing Sorry” can be found in the anthology Beyond Survival: Stories and Strategies from the Transformative Justice Movement, edited by Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha and Ejeris Dixon (AK Press, 2020). 

Praise for Nathan Naik Shara
"Nathan is a brilliant teacher, facilitator, and healer!  His ability to somatically perceive others and provide grounded assessments in service of their commitments is outstanding! He is exceptionally supportive at pushing the thinking of participants -particularly around issues of diversity, equity, and inclusion.  He helps people broaden their perspective and understand and become more aware of their own biases -all while keeping their dignity intact.  This is an exceptional trait and one that I have not experienced in other courses or training that have addressed equity.  Nathan is committed to furthering the work of somatics and to reducing barriers so that somatic work is accessible to all." 

- Julianna Sikes ACC, Certified Somatic Coach 

"Nathan’s compassionate teaching and coaching have supported me in facIng my blind spots around diversity and inclusion.  This has allowed me to see all the subtle ways my impact was not aligned with my intentions and commitments.  I am not just a better coach but also a better human being having worked with Nathan."

- Doug Miller, MCC, Senior Director of Leadership Development In Fortune 500 Company

I've been truly privileged to have been taught by Nathan. His grace, lucid ability to explain deeper aspects of embodied leadership, and a deep sense of integrity and commitment to the work and to the teacher body have been hugely inspiring. Specifically, I know how much I've benefited from his mastery of offering assessments that are always clear and grounded as also offered with warmth and from a place of love.

- Leela, Client Manager, McKinsey & Company

Growing up in a very white, male-dominated professional background, I found Nathan's coaching unlocked key insights and compassion in me and helped me look at unconscious habits that created distance from clients who were different from me. Through Nathan's coaching, I was able to begin the deeper internal work needed to really connect with, see, hear, and support a wider range of clients and life backgrounds.

- A.J. Pape, Founder, Impact Leadership Network

Course Materials and Resources

Coaching in Context is a five-week, live, interactive online course hosted on the Thinkific learning platform. The robust curriculum introduces methodology and practices each week.

The course consists of five 90-minute live teaching sessions on Tuesdays from 8:30 AM to 10:00 AM PT. Each new session builds upon the last — expanding your understanding of the core principles and supporting you in practically integrating them into your life.

When you register for the training, you'll receive the following resources to help you integrate the principles of Coaching in Context into your practices:

  • 7.5 hours of live sessions spread over five weeks
  • Each session has one teacher and a "tech host" to ensure smooth running
  • Recordings of all webinars will be available for one week after the live session
  • Weekly course handouts, worksheets, and practices for reflection
  • Content discussions via the Thinkific online learning platform
  • Five 90-Minute Live Teaching Sessions on Tuesdays from 8:30 AM to 10:00 AM PT
Five 90-Minute Live Teaching Sessions on Tuesdays from 8:30 AM to 10:00 AM PT
1

SESSION #1 - OCTOBER 6

Intro to Coaching in Context: Connecting Personal and Social Change

Build distinctions for understanding “social context” from the individual and intimate sphere to broader institutions and social norms.

Facilitate self-awareness: how do we see our own context, as coaches?

2

SESSION #2 - OCTOBER 13

The Context of Coaching: Ingrained Habits and Automatic Responses in Coaching

What is a Conditioned Tendency? How can we understand our own conditioned tendency in conversations (or confrontations) regarding equity and inequality?

Identify our individual and collective conditioned tendencies.

3

SESSION #3 - OCTOBER 20

Deepening into Context: Powerful Questions and Being With

What competencies are needed to work effectively across differences in race, class, gender, sexual orientation, etc?

What questions invite social context, culture, identity and difference into the coaching relationship?

4

SESSION #4 - OCTOBER 27

Sharing Context: Addressing Shame and Building Connection

Shame, guilt, and centered accountability  in the context of coaching.

New practices that allow for growth and learning, in contrast to shame.

5

SESSION #5 - NOVEMBER 3

Shifting Context: Declaring New Futures

Clarify the values and principles that guide and govern your coaching practice.

Develop practices and structures to increase the integrity & accountability of your coaching offer.

Reserve Your Spot Now
From competent coaching to competent and principled coaching. 
Coaching in Context
Begins October 6

Two Ways to Register

Pay in Full
1 One-Time Payment of $497

Registration Closed

Please visit our Online Offerings page to discover other opportunities for online learning with Strozzi Institute

Payment Plan
3 Monthly Payments of $166

Registration Closed

Please visit our Online Offerings page to discover other opportunities for online learning with Strozzi Institute

Prerequisite: All participants must be a Strozzi Institute Coaching Certification program graduate or current student, a graduate of Coaches Rising's POET course, or a practicing coach with a minimum of 100 coaching hours. 

What people say about training with Strozzi Institute
"Strozzi Institute offers the most comprehensive and soulful application of somatics that we have come across. Their commitment to empowering leaders, coaches, and teams across the globe is an inspiration. They consistently deliver impactful training and programs."
- Coaches Rising, Largest Global Online Coaching Community
"Strozzi Institute Somatic Coaching Certification was a transformative journey personally and professionally as a coach. My ability to sense myself and others widened and deepened tenfold. Everyone in the program was held with so much care and rigor. I know I made professional friendships that will last a lifetime."
- Shen Weiss, Engineering Development Specialist
"I'm much more present to and clear about the need for dignity, safety, and belonging, and how to feel for this in my body and to support it in others."
- Mary Stewart, Charlottesville, VA    
"What I've learned about myself through somatic practices has had a direct effect on my identity. Through these changes, I have changed my outlook: the world is a safe place, and I am a powerful player."

- Maria Connolly, Somatic Coach, and Trainer, Ashland, OR    

Stay Connected:
© 2026 Strozzi Institute
[bot_catcher]