From Vision to Practice

The Playbook for Embedding Coaching in the Music Industry

We’ve explored why coaching matters, how artists benefit, the role of managers and labels, and the systemic responsibility of funders, educators, and policymakers. Now it’s time to bring it all together: turning vision into actionable practice.

This playbook is a step-by-step guide for embedding coaching across the music industry, ensuring it becomes standard, sustainable, and measurable — not just a “nice-to-have,” but a strategic investment in the industry’s long-term health and creative output.

  1. Define the Purpose of Coaching

Before implementing any program, be clear on why coaching exists in your context:

  • For artists: build resilience, confidence, clarity, and sustainable career practices.
  • For managers and labels: protect roster health, reduce risk, and optimise creative output.
  • For funders and educators: ensure long-term industry sustainability and support systemic development.

The case: Artists without coaching risk burnout, stalled projects, and early exits. Coaching reduces these risks, protecting both talent and investment.

A shared understanding aligns stakeholders and sets the foundation for measurable impact.

  1. Map the Key Stakeholders

Identify who benefits and who supports the coaching process:

  • Artists: primary recipients of coaching.
  • Managers & Labels: integrate coaching into project planning and budgets.
  • Funders & Policy Makers: incentivise and embed coaching as standard practice.
  • Educational Institutions: prepare artists for the pressures of professional careers.

Mapping stakeholders ensures accountability, momentum, and cultural buy-in across the ecosystem.

  1. I Established a Coaching Framework

My framework reflects a diagnostic-led, structured approach tailored to what artists need to thrive in the industry:

  1. Assessment & Awareness – identify strengths, interference points, and development needs.
  2. Targeted Coaching – develop mindset, resilience, decision-making, and creative focus.
  3. Integration & Application – apply skills in real-world scenarios: tours, releases, studio work, and high-pressure moments.
  4. Review & Progress Tracking – measure impact on confidence, creative output, and wellbeing, adjusting support as needed.

This creates a consistent, measurable, and adaptable pathway, while programs remain artist-centred, focusing on what each individual needs to thrive.

Economic rationale: Coaching improves retention and creative productivity, reducing costs linked to stalled careers, missed deadlines, or project failures.

  1. Embed Coaching into Processes

  • Contracts & Budgets: Include coaching in funding applications, label agreements, and development programs.
  • Milestones & Cycles: Align coaching sessions with key career events — album releases, tours, marketing campaigns, and performance deadlines.
  • Institutional Adoption: Integrate coaching into education, training, and policy frameworks, not just as an optional add-on.

Cultural rationale: Embedding coaching signals that the industry values people as much as product, moving away from the myth of the “self-sufficient artist.”

  1. Build Partnerships

Collaboration strengthens reach and quality:

  • Coaches & Artists: tailor programs to individual creative needs.
  • Labels & Coaches: align coaching with roster management priorities.
  • Funders & Institutions: create pilot programs and shared frameworks to scale impact.

Partnerships also foster a shared language and best practice, increasing adoption and credibility.

Evidence-based rationale: Industries such as sport and corporate leadership show that structured coaching improves performance, engagement, and long-term success. Music can follow the same model.

  1. Measure & Demonstrate Impact

Track both qualitative and quantitative outcomes:

  • Artist metrics: confidence levels, resilience scores, creative output, career satisfaction.
  • Manager & Label metrics: project delivery reliability, artist retention, ROI of coaching investment.
  • Institutional metrics: adoption rates, career outcomes for graduates, sector-wide impact.

Strategic rationale: Evidence strengthens buy-in, helping to scale coaching from pilots to industry standard.

  1. Foster a Culture of Coaching

Embedding coaching isn’t only structural — it’s cultural. Encourage:

  • Artists: to request coaching as part of their professional toolkit.
  • Managers & Labels: to normalise coaching in project planning.
  • Funders & Institutions: to treat coaching as essential infrastructure.

When coaching is expected and celebrated, it becomes a standard practice across the music ecosystem, making resilience, clarity, and confidence core values, not optional extras.

A Call to Action

The question is no longer “Should we offer coaching?” — it’s: “How fast can we implement it effectively?”

  • Artists: include coaching in your next project, tour, or funding bid.
  • Managers & Labels: integrate coaching into workflows and budgets today.
  • Funders & Educators: embed coaching in grant criteria, programs, and curriculum.
  • Policy Makers: recognise coaching as essential industry infrastructure.

By acting together, we can move from vision to practice, from pilot programs to industry standard, and from conversation to a music ecosystem that truly supports its creatives.

The stakes are clear: Without coaching, the industry risks losing talent, reducing creative output, and undermining long-term sustainability. With coaching embedded, artists and the wider ecosystem thrive, innovate, and endure.