SVC Privacy Policy

Data Collection

SVC collects data for three classes of people:

1. Subscribers who sign up to receive the SVC newsletter.  These newsletters generally convey messages of interest to people who want to become better leaders, managers, and influencers.
2. Individuals coached by SVC coaches.  Generally these are people for whom SVC has been contracted to provide coaching services by its client companies, although some are individual clients.
3. Individuals considering SVC coaching. We keep limited information about potential coaching clients. Some have approached us directly about coaching services.  Others are names given to us by our client companies. Usually we keep the information to match the individual with the appropriate coach.
   
   

Visitors are welcome to all the information in blogs and videos on the SVC website without identifying themselves. No information (other than cookies) is kept about casual visitors to this site.

Cookie Policy

See the cookie policy, since even casual visitors may receive cookies from this site.

SVC Data Handling

What data do we collect for subscribers?

We collect name and email address. We do not share this information with anyone else. Every email sent to a subscriber includes a link to unsubscribe, should a person decide to do so.

What data do we collect for individual coaching clients?

Initial Data

Data collected initially for a particular coaching individual may include some or all of the following data collected to support the coaching engagement.  Individuals always have the option not to answer.

• Contact information, such as phone, geography, company email
• Individual preferences concerning coaching style
• Individual goals for coaching
• Individual answers to questions relevant to coaching.

Self-Assessment Data

If the coaching follows an internal training program, the client company may share with SVC the results of self-assessment inventories used during the training, such as:

• Hermann Brain Dominance Indicator
• VIA character strengths inventory
• StrengthsFinder

Coaching Experience

In addition, depending on the agreement between SVC and the client company, SVC will ask the individual to fill out surveys for measures both before the coaching begins and after it ends. These measures allow a before and after comparison of coaching.  

What data about individuals gets shared with the client company?

In general, only aggregate data about client outcomes and coaching themes gets shared with client companies. The coaching conversations and specific goals are between the coach and the individual client.

A client company may request that SVC share individually identifiable information, such as comments about the coaching experience, with other members of the client company. When this happens, either SVC or the client company obtains explicit permission from the client to share the data. In any forms that SVC uses to collect the data, clients will be reminded about what can be shared and that they have the right not to respond.

Why do we collect data about coaching clients?

We have four primary purposes for collecting and maintaining data about individuals that we coach:

• To support good matches between individuals and coaches taking into account the needs and style of the particular individual.
• To coach effectively.   To support their coaching, coaches often maintain notes in order to refresh their memories before coaching sessions.
• To support our own continuous improvement by observing what works and what could be even better.  The before and after data particularly helps us see how well things are working.
• To demonstrate to client companies the return on their investment in coaching.

How do we protect data?

Subscriber Data

Data about subscribers is kept in a secure email subscription tool that is only accessed by SVC administration. This data is not shared with anyone outside SVC administration and only used to email updates.

Coaching Data

SVC keeps all other data about client companies and individuals in a single secure database that is used for administration and reporting. Access to the data associated with any particular individual is restricted to the coach involved and the administrative staff, who use it to monitor and support the coaching engagement.

The specific information that coaches collect during coaching calls is not shared with the administrative staff.  The coaches follow coaching ethical guidelines to maintain the confidentiality of this data and protect it from exposure to anyone besides the individual. In particular, this specific information from coaching sessions is never shared with any other member of the client company.

Client companies ask for general data about what their employees are coached about.  We ask the coach to match a particular individual’s goals to one of a small number of themes.  Thus the client company gets only information in an general and aggregate form. The coach does not share the specific goals of the individual that emerge during coaching with anyone, including SVC administration.

SVC does not share the email addresses in the database with anyone outside SVC, and only within SVC on a need-to-know basis.

How do we collect data for coaching clients?

We initially receive the names and email addresses of potential coaching individuals from our client companies, who have selected them to receive coaching as a client company benefit.

We then send an individual an email with a link to a form requesting information that will facilitate the coaching engagement, as described above.

This form includes several statements that the individual must agree to in order for coaching to occur.

For individuals that do not respond, SVC may remind them of the coaching opportunity within the first six months.  After that, we keep their name and email so that we can respond to queries from the client company.

We sometimes augment our records with publicly available information from LinkedIn.

Coaching Client Rights with Respect to Personal Data

If you have ever received emails from SVC concerning coaching, you may be in our database as a past, ongoing, or potential coaching individual.  You have the following rights:

• To see the data about you that appears in our database
• To request changes in the data
• To request that your data be de-identified, that is, that your name be disassociated with the data
• To request that your data be omitted altogether
  
  

To make these requests, please use the following form. If a client company sponsored your coaching, be sure to give its name.