Deepen Your Craft. Simplify Your Credential.
One home for every ICF credentialing and renewal pathway, whatever stage you're at.
Your ICF credential is the floor, not the ceiling. We believe in presence over performance. You'll move at your own natural pace, inside a community of peers and seasoned mentors who care about who you're becoming as a coach. The hours, the mentor coaching credits, the diploma: those just follow from the depth of your practice.
Our faculty is already ahead of the ICF's newest MCS mentor coaching requirements, so you know that ground is already covered.
100% ICF Accredited. Verified pathways across Level 1, Level 2, and Level 3.
Faculty who are already ahead of the curve. All our mentor coaches hold PCC and MCC credentials and are in the first waves of coaches receiving the ICF's Mentor Coach Specialization that is rolling out in the coming months.
Room to breathe. In addition to your mentor coaching, you'll have access to live group supervision circles, skills and business building workshops, coaching demos, and ongoing access to our resource library.
This is for you if...
You have some coach training and need ICF-accredited mentor coaching hours for your first credential, a renewal, or an upgrade.
You're staring down the "portfolio path" and want a team who can turn your certificates into a clear plan.
You want mentor coaching to mean more than compliance. You're hungry to go deeper into the Core Competencies and make them your own.
You want a mentor coach who's already ahead of the ICF's newest requirements, so you can trust that ground is covered.
You want to belong to a global community of coaches who take this work seriously, and take themselves lightly.
How We Partner Best With You
We partner with coaches ready to show up fully: bringing the same trust, curiosity, and radical acceptance to their own growth that they offer their clients. Live supervision, human connection, and relational practice sit at the center of everything we do.
New ICF Mentor Coach Specialization (MCS) requirements? Our faculty already meets them. Read what's changing here on our blog or watch the video below.
Which Path Is Yours?
Wherever you are in your credentialing journey, there's a path through it here.
First ACC Pathway
For coaches working toward their first ACC credential
10 mentor coaching hours toward your initial application.
NOTE: this path must include three 1:1 mentor coaching sessions
ACC Renewal Track
For coaches who hold an ACC and need to renew.
10 mentor coaching hours + a certified log of your coach training hours hours toward credential renewal.
PCC & MCC Renewal Track
For PCC or MCC holders who need their 40 hours of professional development.
A certified log of your community hours, gathered at your own pace. In your 40 hours, you'll include at least 24 Core Competency hours, of which 3 are in ethics.
10-Month PCC Bridge
For coaches with 60+ hours of ICF or non-ICF training.
65 coaching education hours + 10 mentor coaching hours + a Level 2 certificate.
PCC Pathway
For coaches with 110+ hours of coaching education, anywhere, who need their PCC mentor coaching hours.
10 mentor coaching hours + 5 self-assessment hours, Level 2 attestation and certificate.
MCC Pathway
For experienced PCCs stepping into MCC.
Level 3 Spain immersion + advanced MCC mentor coaching.
"Being part of the Mentor Coaching Membership at Awaken was deeply meaningful. Even having completed another certification, this felt different. There was a holistic, caring approach which focused on truly seeing and honoring the whole person, rather than 'fixing problems.' The holistic and somatic elements brought incredible depth, and the community offered warmth, variety, and rich perspectives from multiple mentor coaches. The space felt loving, supportive, and authentic. I'd highly recommend this to any coach wanting mentorship rooted in humanity, presence, embodiment, and heart."
LeeLee Genovese, MA, ACC, Leadership & Transition Coach, Oregon, USA
Your Pathway, In Detail
The First ACC Pathway
Your first ACC. Built on presence.
You've done the training. Now it's time to be witnessed in the room. Over 5 months, you'll join an intimate cohort of up to 10 peers for group mentor coaching, plus 3 private 1:1 sessions with an ICF-registered mentor coach from our international faculty of experienced coaches. You'll submit a recording in advance, assess your skills with depth, receive rich, honest feedback on your actual coaching, and walk away with the 10 mentor coaching hours your initial ACC application requires. Alongside that, you'll have access to our monthly skills and business-building sessions, coaching demos from master coaches, and group supervision circles.
Build your path:
Join the Community Membership, €86 / $100 per month, 5-month minimum
Add the Individual Mentor Coaching 3-Pack, €800 / $920
The ACC Renewal Track
Renew your ACC, and keep deepening into the coach you're becoming.
Your mandatory 10 mentor coaching hours happen over 5 months: a small community of up to 10 peers for group mentor coaching, where you'll get to know coaches who are just as spiritually deep, brave, and loving as you are, plus 3 private 1:1 sessions with a mentor coach from our international faculty, where you'll receive rich, honest feedback on your actual coaching. Alongside that, you'll have 5 months of live community access, plenty of room to gather up to 30 professional development hours through monthly skills and business-building workshops, coaching demos from master coaches, and group supervision circles, at whatever pace fits your life.
Build your path:
Join the Community Membership, €86 / $100 per month, 5-month minimum (rolls to ongoing €86 / $100/month after month 5)
Add the Mentor Coaching 3-Pack, €800 / $920
The PCC & MCC Renewal Track
Gather your 40 professional development hours at a steady, sustainable pace.
If you hold a PCC or MCC, gather the professional development hours you need for renewal at a pace that fits your life. Join our monthly live masterclasses, coaching demos, and supervision circles on your own schedule, and receive an itemized Community Hours Log and Certificate for the hours you complete, ready for your ICF submission.
Build your path:
Join the Community Membership, €86 / $100 per month, and stay until you complete your requirements
Optional: add the Mentor Coaching 3-Pack, €800 / $920, if you want extra 1:1 development (not required for renewal at this level)
Optional: add the Beyond the Markers Self-Study Course, €395 / $450, for 20 hours toward your professional development requirement.
The 10-Month PCC Bridge
Bridge what you've already learned into a full Level 2 PCC certification.
Built for coaches with 70+ hours of foundational training, whether that's ICF or not (EMCC, NBHWC, BCC, and independent schools all count here). You'll complete a [20]-hour self-study core, 20 hours live in community (meeting ICF's synchronous/asynchronous balance), 10 hours of PCC-aligned mentor coaching, and 5 hours of self-assessment homework, 55 hours in total. Combined with your existing training, that completes your 125-hour Level 2 diploma.
Build your path:
Join the Community Membership, €86 / $100 per month, 10-month minimum
Add the Individual Mentor Coaching 3-Pack, €800 / $920
Add the Beyond the Markers Self-Study Course, €395 / $450
Your first step is to reach out to communitycare@awakencoaching.com. We'll map your training against the ICF Core Competencies so you know exactly where you stand.
The PCC Pathway (125+ Hours Completed)
You've put in the hours. This completes your PCC application.
If you've already put in 125+ hours of training, anywhere, you just need your 10 PCC mentor coaching hours and an accredited Level 2 attestation. Over 5 months, you'll join a small community of up to 10 peers for group mentor coaching, spent getting to know coaches who are just as spiritually deep, brave, and loving as you are, plus 3 private 1:1 sessions with a mentor from our international faculty. You'll also have full access to our live community calendar, including monthly skills and business-building sessions, coaching demos from master coaches, and group supervision circles.
Build your path:
Join the Community Membership, €86 / $100 per month, 5-month minimum
Add the Mentor Coaching 3-Pack, €800 / $920
The MCC Pathway
Unlearning technique. Becoming presence.
Our spiritually rich, immersive retreat in Spain gives you the space to walk through Awaken's Level 3 accredited coach training. You'll sink deep into presence along the Camino de Santiago, observed by master coaches as you go. Your mentor coaching happens inside this same community, in sessions led by master coaches throughout.
Investment: $13,000| €11,200 total.
You'll be learning with coaches who've walked this path.
You'll learn alongside our international faculty of PCC and MCC mentors. Every hour you log with us is mentored by someone already ahead of the ICF's MCS standards, so you can put your full attention on your craft.
Christi Byerly, MCC
The Soulful Strategist
Christi blends deep spiritual direction with global nomad expertise. Her style is a masterclass in grace-filled accountability, helping you build coaching skills rooted in universal love while navigating the complexities of multi-cultural and multi-lingual environments.
Rishi Rongala, MCC
The Mindful Intellectual
Rishi bridges the gap between high-stakes corporate leadership and inner stillness. If you want to move past calculating and thinking through your coaching sessions and instead tap into a state of profound presence and neuroscience-backed clarity, Rishi will help you uncover the wisdom that lies beyond conditioned thinking.
Fran Bruning, PCC
The Human-First AI Expert
Fran believes that at the heart of every transformational coaching conversation is a deeply human connection rooted in trust, empathy, and presence. While Fran possesses a research-informed understanding of the evolving landscape of coaching technology, her philosophy remains "human-first".
Ben Byerly, PhD, PCC
The Depth Explorer
Ben provides depth coaching and spiritual accompaniment to executives, academics, and entrepreneurs across several continents. He mentors coaches in integrating advanced depth modalities, including IFS (parts work), family constellations, interpersonal neurobiology, and contemplative spiritualities.
Stacy Crawford, PCC
The Holistic Healer
Stacy’s unique strength lies in the intersection of Mind-Body Medicine and strengths-based coaching. She offers a deeply safe, therapeutic space for mentees who want to integrate wellness and trauma-informed care into their professional identity, ensuring your coaching is as sustainable as it is impactful.
Valeyne Grotrian, PCC
The Inner-Power Champion
Valeyne is an expert at helping coaches stand in their own power, and invite that same power in their clients. Her style is a blend of psychology-backed leadership and curious play, perfect for the coach who wants to shed imposter syndrome and meet their clients with a bold, authentic, and soul-centered presence.
Bob Armour, PCC
The Strategic Practitioner
Bob offers a no-nonsense holistic approach that is direct, structured, and intensely results-oriented. He is the go-to mentor for those looking to bridge the gap between being a certified coach and a commercially successful practitioner, without losing their personal integrity along the way.
Andrew Simpson, PCC
The Creative Catalyst
Andrew brings a playful, nature-inspired encouraging energy to the mentoring process. Drawing from 35 years of international experience, he uses deep listening and creative sparks to help you find your voice, gain momentum, and approach the ICF core competencies with a sense of wonder and deep-rooted confidence.
How it Works
Start with Community
Every pathway here begins in the same place: the Awaken Coaches Community. Group mentor coaching, live supervision circles, skills and business building workshops, coaching demos, and a room full of coaches who are spiritually deep, brave, and loving, committed to mastery and depth. You'll be witnessed here, seen in your full humanity as you grow into the coach you're becoming.
Add what your credential calls for
Most coaches add a Mentor Coaching 3-Pack, three private sessions that give you the mentor coaching hours your ACC or PCC requires. If you're still gathering foundational training hours, the 15-Hour Self-Study Core builds that ground beneath you.
Track your own path, simply
You'll keep your own record as you go: live sessions, workshops, recordings watched. When you've arrived at what your credential calls for, submit your tracker and we'll verify it. What comes back is one certificate, the only document you'll need to upload to your ICF application.
If you're ready to get going sign up here
You'll have immediate access to the calendar of events to get shaping your next season of growth and be able to choose any other elements to strengthen your pathway.
Each Tuesday you'll receive an email from us with the upcoming sessions. If you need a more customized route to upgrading your coaching education to an ICF-accredited pathway, or if you have any questions, just reach out to communitycare@awakencoaching.com.
Your ICF hours are the floor, not the ceiling
The Awaken Coaches Community membership forms the base of your mentor coaching pathways. Here's what you'll get access to:
Individual Mentor Coaching
Three individual 60-minute sessions with your assigned mentor coach. You'll submit a recording and transcript in advance, complete a self-assessment against the PCC markers, and arrive ready for rich, honest feedback on your actual coaching. You'll receive credit for your homework hours.
Group Mentor Coaching and Supervision
2–3 live sessions per month with MCC and PCC coaches who hold ICF assessor training. This is where your coaching is witnessed, not just evaluated. Sessions contribute directly to your ICF core competency hours. Mentor coaching sessions are capped at 10 participants. Supervision groups are capped at 5 participants.
Skills Deepening Sessions and Workshops
Monthly sessions designed to stretch and refine your coaching craft, exploring deeply beyond the ICF Core Competencies, practicing techniques in real time, and building the kind of nuanced awareness that separates a good coach from a truly transformational one.
Business Building events
Practical, honest support for building a coaching practice you can actually sustain. Real questions, real answers, from coaches who are doing it.
Peer Coaching
Give and receive coaching with fellow members and Awaken alumni. The best way to understand a competency is to experience it from both sides.
A global community of coaches
One of the things we hear most often from Awaken coaches is that they didn't expect the community. They came for the hours and stayed for the people. Our members span four continents, bring wildly different backgrounds, and share one thing in common: a commitment to coaching that goes deeper than technique. This is the room where that kind of coach belongs
Awaken Coach Institute exists to make the world a braver, more loving place.
We train coaches to listen deeply, to awaken to the power of their own presence, and to be more loving and accepting than they've ever been before.
Awaken Coach Institute is recognized as an ICF-Accredited Level 1, Level 2 and Level 3 coaching education provider.
What You'll Have When You're Ready to Apply
You already have a lot going on, building your practice, running it, or making the leap into coaching. We keep your credentialing process simple. Here's what that looks like.
Your hours, documented and ready to submit. Every session logged, no scrambling at the end.
Evaluation built on the PCC Markers, whether you're working toward your ACC or your PCC. We teach PCC-level presence from day one, so you build it once instead of learning ACC and unlearning it later. We use the same standard ICF is making central to every application from 2027 onward.
Mentors who already hold or are in process for the ICF's new Mentor Coach Specialization, the qualification ICF will require of every mentor coach starting January 2027.
A community of spiritually deep, rigorous coaches, holding you as you grow into who you're becoming.
Have questions? We have answers
What do I need for my ICF credential application?
Every level (ACC, PCC, MCC) asks for coach-specific training hours (60 for ACC, 125 for PCC, 200 for MCC), coaching experience hours with real clients, and 10 hours of mentor coaching completed over at least 3 months. ACC and PCC candidates currently also submit a recorded performance evaluation, though that's changing (see below). Our pathways are built around exactly these pieces, so you're never guessing what still stands between you and your application.
What do I need for my ICF credential renewal?
It depends which credential you're renewing. An ACC renewal requires 10 hours of mentor coaching, the same as your first ACC application. A PCC or MCC renewal doesn't require mentor coaching hours at all: instead you'll need 40 professional development hours, including at least 24 core competency hours and up to 16 resource development hours, completed at whatever pace fits your life. Our Community Membership generates both kinds of hours through group mentor coaching, supervision, skills workshops, and business-building sessions. Your ACC Renewal Track folds your mentor coaching hours in alongside.
Are sessions recorded?
Business-building masterminds, coaching demonstrations, and skills deepening sessions are often recorded, with participant permission. That means that you can still get credit for these sessions by watching the recordings in the community library, and filling out your attendance tracker.
Group mentor coaching and group supervision sessions are held live, without recordings.
How many coaches are in group sessions?
Group mentor coaching sessions are capped at 10 participants. Supervision groups are capped at 5. This is intentional; Awaken has always believed that real growth happens in an intimate community, not in a crowd.
I trained outside the ICF ecosystem. How do I get credentialed?
If your training came from a non-ICF program (EMCC, NBHWC, BCC, or an independent school), you can still earn an ICF credential. Traditionally, this runs through the ICF's portfolio pathway, an additional documentation and assessment process for coaches trained outside accredited programs. Our 10-Month PCC Bridge offers a more direct road: send us your certificates, complete a 15-hour self-study core, and your existing 60+ hours convert into an accredited Level 2 diploma, the same standing as training that started here. Read more about avoiding the dreaded portfolio path here.
Is Awaken accredited by the ICF?
Yes. The ICF (International Coaching Federation) recognizes Awaken Coach Institute as an Accredited Level 1, Level 2, and Level 3 coaching education provider. Our mentor coaching membership is structured to meet ICF's requirements for ACC and PCC credentialing and renewal. You'll find us in their listings here.
What if I miss a live session? Do my hours still count?
Please let us know in advance if you can't attend, so we can offer your spot to another participant. Mentor coaching and supervision sessions must be attended live, which is why we offer them at different times of the day, the week, and the month.
You can attend other sessions by watching recordings from our growing library of workshops.
What time zones do your sessions accommodate?
Awaken participants tend to range from the West Coast of the Americas all the way to East Africa, India, and beyond. Our faculty hails from four continents.
Can I join at any point, or is there a start date?
Enrollment is rolling, you can join when the time is right for you. Once you join, you'll be connected to the community and the upcoming session schedule immediately.
What if I need more than three hours of 1:1 mentor coaching?
You can buy another 3-pack of mentor coaching sessions whenever you like. Contact communitycare@awakencoaching.com to arrange.
Is the ICF performance evaluation being phased out?
Yes, for ACC and PCC. Beginning January 1, 2027, the ICF is retiring the recorded-session performance evaluation for these two levels. In its place, your mentor coach's structured, ongoing observation becomes the primary way your coaching competence gets validated, documented through standard forms submitted with your application. Your mentor coaching relationship carries more weight than ever, which is exactly why the coach guiding you through it matters.
What is the ICF Mentor Coach Specialization (MCS)?
The MCS is a new ICF credential for mentor coaches, rolling out in the second half of 2026 to set a shared global standard for what quality mentor coaching looks like. Beginning January 1, 2027, ACC, PCC and MCC candidates need a mentor coach holding the MCS at the appropriate level, and by April 1, 2027, that mentor coach's documentation replaces the performance evaluation for good.
Do I need an MCS-qualified mentor coach for my credential?
Yes, starting in 2027, for every credential level. Our faculty holds active PCC and MCC credentials. We already hold or are in process to receive the MCS, so you're held by mentors who meet today's standard and the one arriving next year.
Can I cancel, or is there a refund policy?
You can cancel your Community Membership at any time; there's no lock-in. If you're on a payment plan and you've used 1:1 mentor coaching sessions, you'll continue payments until those sessions are covered, since that's coaching time already delivered. Once you've started a Self-Study Core, it's non-refundable. Once everything's settled, your subscription ends, and no further payments are due.
To cancel or ask about your specific situation, email communitycare@awakencoaching.com.
You don't have to do this alone
And you don't have to choose between your credential and your growth.
Come do both with us.