When a Client Dies: A Guide for UK Coaches

Introduction

The death of a client represents one of the most challenging experiences a coach can face. Unlike other helping professions that might more regularly encounter this, it is something that may happen rarely, if ever, during the course of our work, which means that we can often find ourselves unprepared for the complex emotional, ethical, and practical considerations that follow.

The death of a client can happen in many ways, each carrying its own emotional weight, whether sudden, unexpected or as a result of a long illness. Each scenario brings its own challenges, from navigating shock and disbelief to processing feelings of unfinished work and unspoken words.

I am writing this article, having faced the death of two of my clients in recent years. One, a client who I had finished working with a couple of years prior to their death, and one who died while we were working together. Different circumstances, and at different stages of the coaching relationship, it was nonetheless a challenging, upsetting and difficult time in my practice that took me a while to process, work through and get to the point of being able to write this to hopefully help other coaches who may unfortunately find themselves in the same situation. I have included a few different case studies in Appendix B.

Immediate Response Checklist

When learning of a client’s death, follow these steps:

✓ Personal Stability

• • Ensure your own emotional stability before taking any professional actions

• • Take time to process the immediate shock

✓ Professional Support

• • Contact your supervisor if you are working within an established supervision relationship

• • If you have an emergency supervision agreement, activate it

• • Consider emergency sessions if not in an established supervision relationship

✓ Insurance and Legal

• • Contact your professional indemnity insurance provider if appropriate

• • Understand any reporting requirements or coverage considerations

• • Some policies have specific protocols for client deaths, particularly involving mental health factors

✓ Organisational Notifications

• • If working as an associate: inform the lead organisation immediately

• • Discuss practical, financial, and emotional considerations

• • Follow any organisational policies regarding client death

• • Request supervision or a discussion with the coaching lead discussion if appropriate

✓ Media and Social Media Considerations

• • Be mindful of any reports of the death in the media or social media

• • Do not make comments that would expose the coaching relationship

• • Avoid disclosing any session-derived information

Emotional Issues

The Nature of Professional Grief

The coaching relationship exists within specific boundaries and timeframes, creating a unique emotional landscape when processing a client’s death. You may have known intimate details about your client’s dreams and struggles while maintaining professional distance. This may create “disenfranchised grief” which refers to loss that is not widely acknowledged or validated by society. When a client dies, the grief a coach feels may not be recognised in the same way as the loss of a friend or family member. Because coaching is a confidential and private relationship, there may be very few spaces where a coach can express their grief freely. This can interfere with the grieving rituals we may use in personal relationships, which can leave coaches feeling isolated in their grief, unable to openly discuss their loss, why it might be impacting on them or seek support in traditional ways.

The client-coach relationship differs from any other personal or professional relationship. It’s important to accept that you may have feelings, sometimes strong feelings, for your clients. Following their death, you may experience guilt, questioning whether you could have done more or depending on the nature of the death or noticed any warning signs. Anger might surface at the circumstances, the unfairness, or possibly even at the client for leaving unfinished work. These reactions are normal and part of the human response to loss, especially when it’s unexpected.

Processing Your Own Grief

You may find yourself asking: How do I grieve this loss? How do I honour this client’s memory? Where do I turn for support? Are my feelings normal? How am I supposed to behave?

Understanding Your Response

Your personality, personal history, culture, and other experiences may influence how you perceive and react to the loss of your client. The details of the relationship and circumstances surrounding your client’s death may also play a part in how it affects you.

Professional Support Networks

Seek support from those who might understand. Your friends and family may be able to be generally supportive, but also limited in their ability to understand the complexity of your feelings about the death of your client as there will be very little you will be able to share about your client or the nature of your relationship.  

UK-Specific Support Options:

• • Contact coaching peers through AC, EMCC, or ICF UK Chapter networks

• • Work with your supervisor to process over a longer period

• • For group supervision: contact the supervisor outside sessions to discuss boundaries and support needs

• • Consider group supervision guidelines around client confidentiality and emotional impact on other members

When to Seek Additional Help

You may need to pause your practice temporarily if needed. Talk to a therapist or grief counsellor if over time, your grief feels overwhelming and impacts your ability to work with other clients, especially if:

• • This is your first experience with a client’s death

• • It’s reminding you of previous losses

• • It’s negatively affecting your daily activities

UK Support Resources: See Appendix A

Creating Closure

Consider whether you want to attend funeral services or memorial events and whether this would feel or be appropriate. There is no hard and fast rule, and exploration with your supervisor can be helpful in working through the decision. It may be inappropriate to attend, if there is a chance that it may compromise the confidentiality of your client.

Some coaches find closure in saying goodbye as part of a public ceremony, while others may prefer to maintain the professional boundary even in death. Honour your own needs while respecting the family’s wishes, if you are aware of them. Your decision may be influenced by a wider or ongoing relationship you have with a client’s organisation or colleagues.

Private Memorial Options

If appropriate, consider creating a private ritual or memorial for your client. This might involve:

• • Writing a letter you’ll never send

• • Taking time to reflect on their impact on your work

• • Reflecting on what you learned from working with them for future practice

• • Making a charitable donation in their memory (without naming the coaching relationship)

Supporting Other Clients

If you work with multiple clients who knew the deceased client, perhaps as part of an organisational coaching assignment, you will need to consider this as part of any ongoing work. Consider how to manage any grief you are experiencing alongside working with others going through their own process.

Individual Client Considerations

Some clients may want to process their grief during sessions, while others prefer to maintain normal coaching boundaries. Follow your clients’ lead while being prepared to refer them for counselling if needed. You may also need support from another coach for this work, to take a break, to address in supervision, or to manage a handover if circumstances make it difficult to continue.

Group Coaching Challenges

Group coaching programs face particular challenges when a member dies. The remaining participants may struggle with their own mortality or feel guilty about continuing without their peer. Consider:

• • Bringing in a grief specialist or bereavement counsellor

• • Temporarily shifting the group’s focus to accommodate healing

• • Offering individual sessions for group members struggling with the loss

Self-Care and Self-Compassion

Good self-care is essential, ensuring that you get enough sleep, exercise, and eat well. Taking a few days away from your practice may feel helpful, too.

Depending on the nature of the death, you may have thoughts about whether you could have done more, provided or referred the client to different support. Reflecting on this yourself, and within the safe container of a supervision relationship, can help you work through what you did and whether there is anything else you could have done, enabling you to practice self-compassion.

Helpful Strategies May Include:

• • Consulting with coach colleagues who’ve experienced a client’s death

• • Journaling about your experience and feelings

• • Quiet reflection and mindfulness practices

• • Reading the obituary and news articles about the death (if appropriate)

• • Thinking about the client’s strengths and what you learned from them

• • Allowing your emotions to be expressed through crying, talking, or creative outlets

• • Using music or other therapeutic activities

Practical Issues

UK Legal and Ethical Framework

Data Protection and Confidentiality

Client confidentiality doesn’t end with death. Under the UK GDPR and Data Protection Act 2018, all session notes, recordings, and communications remain protected information. The UK GDPR specifically addresses the data of deceased individuals, stating that while data protection rights generally don’t apply after death, there may still be legitimate interests in protecting the deceased’s data.

Depending on the circumstances, family members or colleagues may approach you seeking insights about the deceased client’s final months or state of mind. While their grief and need to find information is understandable, maintaining professional boundaries is crucial.

Legal Reporting Requirements

The only situation in which you may be required to provide information from sessions might be in the case of an unexplained death, for example death by suicide, where you may be required to provide information to:

• • A coroner (in England and Wales) under the Coroners and Justice Act 2009 or Northern Ireland under the Coronors Act (Northern Ireland) 1959  

• • A procurator fiscal (in Scotland)

• • An inquest or fatal accident inquiry

• • Court proceedings where disclosure is legally mandated

Professional Standards

The International Coach Federation’s ethical guidelines, along with those of the Association for Coaching (AC) and European Mentoring and Coaching Council (EMCC), emphasise that confidentiality refers to the coach’s duty to not disclose any information obtained during the course of the coaching relationship without the express permission of the client. In this situation, as clients cannot provide such permission, coaches must err on the side of protecting client information. Being consistent with respect to your professional standards is essential.

Record Management Under UK Law

While the exact timeframe varies by jurisdiction, seven years is a reasonable retention period for deceased client files, aligning with UK tax and business record requirements.

Secure Disposal Process

• • Digital files should be permanently deleted using secure deletion software

• • Physical materials must be destroyed confidentially (consider using a certified document destruction service)

• • This process can feel final and may trigger additional grief – plan support around this

Sample Contract Language for Future Clients

“In the event of the client’s death, the coach will maintain confidentiality of all session materials and communications, unless there is a need to provide information as part of legal proceedings. Session records will be retained securely for seven years before confidential disposal.”

Learning and Professional Development

A loss of this nature, especially if unexpected, may lead to reflections on your practice and your own thoughts about life and death. Some coaches find they become more intentional about helping clients appreciate the present moment. Others develop greater ease in discussing life’s fragility if it naturally arises in sessions.

Practice Review Considerations

The death of a client may lead to you evaluating your knowledge and skills and, over time, seeking additional training or reviewing existing supervision arrangements.

Consider updating:

• • Client contracts and professional agreements with death clauses

• • Refund policies for interrupted coaching relationships

• • Emergency contact procedures

• • Professional will arrangements for your own practice

Remote Coaching Considerations

Given the prevalence of online coaching post-COVID, consider:

• • How would you learn of a client’s death if you work remotely

• • Emergency contact arrangements for online-only clients

• • Technology security for client data if you become incapacitated

Moving Forward

Returning to work after losing a client requires patience with yourself and your remaining clients. You may feel different in sessions, more aware of life’s fragility or more urgent about helping clients pursue their goals. These shifts are normal parts of integrating the experience.

Consider discussing the loss with a supervisor who can help you process how it affects your coaching practice. They can provide perspective on whether any changes you’re considering are healthy adaptations or grief responses that might need more time to settle.

You may also want to explore any feelings about your client and how the relationship ended in 1-1 therapy, focusing on your responses and anything that feels as though it is causing ongoing difficulties for you emotionally.

Conclusion

The death of a coaching client represents a significant professional and personal challenge that requires careful attention to ethical obligations, emotional processing, and ongoing professional development under UK legal and professional frameworks. We must allow ourselves the space and support to be our human selves with our range of emotions and processing needs as individuals, alongside the professional obligations of our coach selves.

There is a view that the coaching relationship endures, even in death, meaning there is a responsibility to honour the relationship and maintain confidentiality of anything that formed part of that relationship, as would have been the case had the client been alive. If a coach would not have disclosed information when a client was alive, then they should not disclose that information in death, aside from being legally directed as part of official proceedings.

The death of a client reminds us that coaching, like all human relationships, exists within the broader context of mortality. While difficult, these experiences can deepen our appreciation for the profound privilege of accompanying others on their journeys, however brief they may be.

In the words of John O’Donohue, ‘Be excessively gentle with yourself…’ This grief is real, and just as we encourage our clients to allow space for their emotions, we, too, deserve to hold ourselves with compassion.

Sarah Clein, ICF PCC, Coach and Coach Supervisor.

http://www.sarahclein.co.uk

 

Appendix A

UK-Specific Resources and Support

Professional Bodies

• • Association for Coaching (AC): www.associationforcoaching.com

• • European Mentoring and Coaching Council (EMCC): www.emccuk.org

• • International Coaching Federation UK: www.icf-uk.org

Legal and Insurance Support

• • Professional indemnity insurance providers:

• • ICO (Information Commissioner’s Office): Guidance on data protection and deceased individuals

• • Citizens Advice: General legal guidance

Mental Health and Bereavement Support

• • Samaritans: 116 123 (free, 24/7 emotional support)

• • Mind: 0300 123 3393 (mental health information and support)

• • Cruse Bereavement Support: 0808 808 1677

• • BACP (British Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy): Find a therapist directory

• • NHS: Mental health services and crisis support

Emergency Support for Coaches

• • Many supervision providers offer emergency sessions

• • Consider establishing peer support networks through professional associations

• • Employee Assistance Programmes (if employed) often provide immediate counselling support

Grief and Trauma Specialists

• • British Psychological Society: Directory of trauma and grief specialists

• • UKCP (UK Council for Psychotherapy): Find qualified therapists

• • Private healthcare providers: BUPA, AXA, Aviva often cover counselling

For immediate crisis support, always contact emergency services (999) or Samaritans (116 123).

 

 

Appendix B

Case Study Examples

Scenario 1: Sudden Death of Current Client

A 45-year-old executive client dies unexpectedly of a heart attack during your coaching engagement.

Immediate Actions:

• • Contact your supervisor as soon as possible 

• • Inform the employing organisation’s HR director

• • Review insurance policy for reporting requirements

• • Prepare standard response for family inquiries: “I’m very sorry for your loss. Due to professional confidentiality requirements, I cannot discuss any details of our professional relationship.”

Scenario 2: Suicide of Former Client

A client you worked with 18 months ago dies by suicide, and you’re contacted by the coroner’s office.

Required Actions:

• • Cooperate fully with coroner’s investigation under legal obligation

• • Provide only factual information requested

• • Seek immediate supervision support

• • Consider whether other clients need support if the nature of the death becomes public knowledge

Scenario 3: Family Seeking Information

The spouse of a deceased client contacts you wanting to understand their partner’s “final state of mind.”

Template Response: “I understand this is an incredibly difficult time for you, and I’m deeply sorry for your loss. While I worked with [Name] professionally, I was bound by strict confidentiality requirements that continue after death. I cannot share any information from our professional relationship.”