Teaching the “real tools”: Reviewing Wellcoaches’ health coach certification

Health education specialists, which includes health coaches, earn median annual salaries of $62,860, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. While it notes many in the field have at least a bachelor’s degree, certifications are a large part of health coaching—which brings good and bad news. The number of ways to earn the necessary skills to succeed in health coaching, but the market remains largely unregulated.

Fortune sought to clear the air for some prospective students by releasing a list of the best health coach certifications for 2024. Among one of the top programs, especially for mentorship and skills assessment, is Wellcoaches.

Founded in 2000, Wellcoaches has trained over 15,600 individuals in the field of health coaching. The organization’s chief coach officer, Erika Jackson, says its program emphasizes that coaching is a “way of being.”

“A coach is an expert, but not in delivering content, a coach is an expert in the psychology of behavior change and in developing deep relationships with their clients, so that their clients can uncover their motivation, their strengths, and their own vision without us telling them what to do,” Jackson tells Fortune.

If Wellcoaches has piqued your interest, Fortune has answers to some of the questions you may have.

Wellcoaches program overview

Wellcoaches’s core program—its certified health and well-being coach—is one of the most popular in the field. It consists of multiple modules: 

• 1: Core coach training ($1,785)
• 2: Deepen knowledge and practices ($215)
• 3: 1-1 Mentorship and skills assessment ($845)
• 4: Lifestyle Medicine Coach certification ($275–$435)

Students receive their certification from Wellcoaches after completing the first three modules, although all four modules must be taken if they’re seeking the official National Board for Health and Wellness Coaching (NBHWC) board certification coach.

While parts of the modules are self-paced, students are required to attend the live class sessions.

“We really are strict and having folks adhere to attending class live,” Jackson says. “This is not a skill set that you can learn, just by reading or watching—you have to get in there.”

In total, the training may take anywhere from six to 18 months, but Jackson notes that the students who take their time and truly try to understand the course material are the most successful ones in the end.

In order to join the program, individuals must have at least an associate degree or 4000 hours of work experience. Over 90% of Wellcoaches students have at least a bachelor’s degree or higher.

Wellcoaches’ curriculum and instructors 

Wellcoaches is one of the leaders when it comes to the health coach curriculum. The organization’s textbook, Coaching Psychology Manual, is the guiding course material not only for Wellcoaches’ programming, but also by other organizations offering health coach certifications as well as university classrooms. In fact, the University of North Texas’s master’s in lifestyle health sciences and coaching integrates Wellcoaches’ modules one through four directly into its program.

Jackson says overall, the curriculum is constantly being updated with new and relevant ideas. Plus, the development of the third edition of the manual is in the works.

Preparation materials for each live lesson can also be downloaded, allowing students to learn on the go.

All of Wellcoaches’ faculty are NBHWC certified—and many have advanced degrees and years of experience in health coaching. Additionally, Wellcoaches utilizes a team of medical and research advisors to guide its curriculum development.

Finally, Wellcoaches also notably updates a job board for students to find opportunities, especially those that desire those with a Wellcoaches certification.

Wellcoaches’s transparency 

The team at Wellcoaches is accessible and encourages individuals to pick the health coach certification program—if that’s the route they are heading down—that’s best for one’s own goals. If there are questions that are not answered on its website, Wellcoaches provides accessible email and phone number contacts to its team. (Fortune received same-day responses to inquiries).

For prospective students, the organization hosts occasional information sessions where individuals can ask questions directly. One-on-one meetings are also an option.

The primary audience of Wellcoaches has transformed over the years. Jackson explains while in the early years fitness professionals were largely enrolling in the programs, they’ve seen an increase in physicians and nurses. Overall, students are across the age spectrum—from 20 to 90 years old—and differ largely in terms of career goals, whether that’s starting their own practice, working in a corporate office, or working in a clinical setting.

At the end of each live lesson, the program requires students to complete a feedback survey in order for students to reflect on their learning and allow Wellcoaches to improve their teaching.

Wellcoaches’s student experience and outcomes 

Cathy Dunford is a Wellcoaches alum—of both its core and advanced training programs—and the founder of her own practice, TrueCoaching4U. She was impressed by Wellcoaches because of its customer services, affordability, and thorough curriculum.

She initially enrolled in a different health coach certification at a different organization, paying two to three times more, and learned little about real coaching.

“Wellcoaches taught me real tools to put in my coaching toolbox—like motivational interviewing, appreciative inquiry, nonviolent communication, internal family systems, I use a lot of that all day, every day,” Dunford says.

The instructors at Wellcoaches, Dunford says, were also a major part of what made the experience life- changing—not only are they knowledgeable in the field, but they also made learning interesting.

The one piece of advice she wished she had known before starting out in the health coach education world is to start by looking through the NBHWC-approved training program list, which she says is an easy way to make sure its reputable and potentially worth the investment.

For Iris Fernández Valdéz, attending Wellcoaches was a major career change. After studying computer science at Brown University, she decided to shift to health coaching and later found Abetter Way, an organization at the intersection of justice and coaching.

“They wrote the Bible on health and wellness coaches (that) everyone uses to study for the board exam. So I was like, let’s go to the source,” Valdéz says.

After also engaging in the core and advanced training programs, she says Wellcoaches was a transformative experience and led to profound personal growth. One of the most important skills Valdez says they learned was listening skills—both how to listen to others as well as oneself. 

“Wellcoaches really has always had that heart about what it means to be and to hold presence as a coach,” Valdéz explains.

Is Wellcoaches’s health coach certification worth it?

For those that are interested in applying health coach practices into their lives—whether it be as part of an existing career or as part of a new journey in the health and wellness world, Wellcoaches is a very safe choice. Not only is it on the more affordable side of things when it comes to cost, but the program has figured out how to well balance flexible and engaging learning. 

There are live class sessions, allowing students to build human connections with their instructors, peers, and the content as well as ask questions on the spot. Students also have self-paced materials to work with, and the leaders at Wellcoaches have proven their willingness to work with students and be transparent.

Wellcoaches is also very widely known and respected in the health coach space. It should say a lot that the founder of Wellcoaches, Margaret Moore, also is a co-founder of the NBHWC; moreover, their thorough textbook curriculum is not only utilized by Wellcoaches itself, but also other certification programs and college classrooms.

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