4. Embedding Feature: Implementation Coaching
What is Implementation Coaching?
Implementation Coaching is a practical support feature offered to schools, programs, agencies, and communities that are embedding the IMPACT approach within their local context. It is delivered by a dedicated “Community Lead”, who works side-by-side with the organisation or community to align and embed IMPACT content with local goals, priorities, and expectations.
This coaching provides wrap-around, hands-on support, creating a collaborative process between the LBI-appointed Community Lead and local leaders. Together, they focus on building confidence, capability, and shared ownership for the ongoing use of IMPACT.
Implementation Coaching is designed to guide and empower communities to apply the IMPACT program in ways that fit their unique needs and aspirations. Through a partnership founded upon ‘shared intent’, it helps ensure IMPACT becomes a meaningful and sustainable part of everyday practice across the community (or a way of thinking and being).
Intent
Implementation Coaching is designed to ensure that the following core intents are consistently delivered throughout the agreed capacity-building cycle:
Deep understanding of local context – The goals, expectations, and needs of each community are actively explored and understood at every stage, ensuring that implementation is grounded in real local priorities.
Clear alignment, not addition – The IMPACT program is intentionally positioned within existing services, programs, and solutions—enhancing and strengthening what already works, rather than becoming an added layer or separate silo.
Shared intent and transparency – There is always a shared What-What-How® understanding between LBI and the community about the implementation journey:
What is currently happening and how it aligns with community goals,
What is important to focus on in terms of implementation.
How actions are being taken and shared between LBI and the community.
Local ownership and sustainability – Practical strategies are developed to build community ownership, broaden engagement, and extend participation (e.g., across school networks or community partners).
Embedding IMPACT thinking and practice – Over time, IMPACT’s meta-cognitive skills and core content become increasingly integrated into local systems, policies, procedures, and programs.
Role of Community Lead
The specific role and focus of the Community Lead is negotiated and agreed with each partner community. Core responsibilities typically include:
1. Building Shared Intent and Direction
Co-develop an agreed What-What-How® Implementation Plan with community leaders and local IMPACT Trainers that defines:
What is currently happening across the community’s implementation journey (or current context).
What the important goals or key capacity-building intents are.
How these will be achieved through coordinated actions.
2. Communication and Positioning
Work with community leadership to create a clear communication plan and a positioning plan to align IMPACT with local values, language, and systems.
Where appropriate, support the development of a ‘whole-of-community’ framework that integrates IMPACT within broader wellbeing or trauma-responsive initiatives. Sometimes this will lead to the co-design of a community owned ‘wellbeing’ or ‘therapeutic’ framework.
Strengthen community understanding of the why behind IMPACT, ensuring alignment and purpose from the outset.
3. Ongoing Review and Adaptation
Facilitate regular What-What-How® review conversations with community leaders and IMPACT Trainers to track progress, reflect on learning, and adjust plans as needed.
Ensure communication and actions remain transparent, aligned, and responsive to evolving community priorities.
4. Coordinating Capacity Building
Plan and coordinate delivery of IMPACT Foundational Training, Clinical Coaching, and other Embedding and Deepening Modules as needed.
Support the establishment of local Communities of Practice to encourage collaboration, skill sharing, and peer learning.
5. Evaluation and Reflection
At agreed milestones, coordinate and support a participatory evaluation process to capture impact and learning.
This may include using Most Significant Change or other collaborative evaluation methods, alongside formal review processes where agreed.
Implementation Coaching and the IMPACT Capacity Building Cycle
The IMPACT Capacity-Building Cycle
A feature of IMPACT is the “Learn-It, Live-It, Apply-It, Coach-It, Train-It” capacity-building cycle. This cycle provides a clear and practical roadmap for how individuals and communities grow their capability and confidence over time. It reflects a gradual, supported shift from learning to ownership, and from understanding to sustained practice.
- Learn It – Community members are introduced to the core science and principles of wellbeing, resilience, growth, and trauma-responsive practice. They begin by building shared knowledge and language across the team or community.
- Live It – Individuals start to personalise and internalise the content—making sense of it in their own language, roles, and experiences. This phase is about walking the talk: applying the ideas to self and team before extending them to others.
- Apply It – Community members begin to use the IMPACT concepts and tools in their daily work—whether that’s in classrooms, leadership practice, family engagement, or service delivery. The focus is on consistent, visible application.
- Coach It – With growing confidence, participants start to intentionally coach others—students, colleagues, or families—through guided, side-by-side conversations. This helps strengthen relational practice and embed IMPACT principles more deeply.
- Train It – Finally, community members are able to explicitly train or lead others in the IMPACT approach, sharing expertise and supporting broader community reach and sustainability.
How the Cycle Guides Implementation
This cycle shapes the intent and focus of Implementation Coaching delivered by the Community Lead. It provides a shared framework to reflect on:
What is currently happening in the community’s learning and practice.
What is most important to focus on next to build momentum and confidence.
In practice, early capacity-building work focuses on the “Learn-It” and “Live-It” phases—helping individuals and teams to understand, own, and connect with the IMPACT content. Over time, communities progress into the “Apply-It” and “Coach-It” stages, where practice becomes more visible, shared, and intentional.
The Community Lead uses this cycle as both a conversation tool and a planning guide, ensuring that capacity building is practical, progressive, and matched to each community’s readiness and goals.