| Home |
| About OFI & ADDCoach.com™ |
| Meet the Founder |
| About the A.C.T. Program |
| A.C.T. FAQs (Frequently Asked Questions) |
| What Associates Say about their Training |
| A.C.T. Answers Info & Registration |
| A.C.T. Program Enrollment |
| About
the Challenges Inventory™ CURRICULUM |
| --------- |
| Classes and Consults |
| Event Calendar |
| The Bookstore |
| ADD Resources |
| Downloads |
| Articles |
| Contact OFI |
About OFI and ADDCoach.com
The Optimal Functioning Institute™ is a virtual training firm, a pioneer in the distance learning format, that offers classes from the ADD Coaching perspective in a variety of ADD-focused topics.
Small by design to allow for excellent training with a high level of personal attention, OFI began developing ADD Coaches in 1994, the first coach training organization to focus specifically on the skills necessary to coach individuals with attentional differences.
After an eighteen-month reorganization finalized at the end of 2003, OFI has been redesigned allow us to support an increasingly larger number of people in an increasingly large number of ways, without losing the advantages that our small size gave us for our first decade.
If the shoe doesn't fit, don't blame the foot!
OFI's motto sums up the approach of both companies to ADD and to ADD Coaching.
Please refer to the OFI Vision Statement.
ADD mandates a different approach to life and its tasks, not a substandard one. ADD requires a different approach from coaches, managers, partners and parents too, if they expect to be successful with ADDers.
Facility with ADD Coaching technique and ADD-targeted listening and languaging skills requires a great deal of knowledge about Attention Deficit Disorder and brain-based coaching methods - as well as a thorough understanding of the implications of "deficits" of the attending mechanism to the tasks of goal setting and actions for follow-through, cornerstones of coaching overall.
ADDers don't need to be "fixed" - they are NOT broken!
Many ADDers struggle with low self-esteem from years of hearing comments from the "What's WRONG with you?" point of view, but science is finally beginning to be able to prove what many of us have maintained all along:
ADD is a DIFFERENCE in "brain wiring."
That difference is outside the paradigm of the majority of the world, those with the kind of wiring that tends to gravitate toward the administration of the world's institutions. If ADDers were in the majority, those with what is now considered "neuro-typical" wiring would be labeled with OFD - Over Focusing Disorder, and would find similar difficulties working within the kind of world ADDers would create. Since ADD wiring is in the minority, those of us who are "wired for flexibility" must find a way to accommodate like strangers in a strange land, approximately 12-18 million individuals in the US alone! "Disorders" of the attentional spectrum must be accommodated and compensated for before self-esteem can be restored to a point where an ADDer's MANY areas of strength can become apparent to all.
Repeat: ADDers don't need to be "fixed" - they are NOT broken!
Only after that point has been reached is an ADD Coach able to assist them as they fashion a life that builds on strengths rather than compensating for "deficits." The focus of early efforts must be on identification, education, and compensation strategies toward success in an OFD world.
OFI and ADDCoach.com™ provide training and education designed to make a difference - systems, strategies and solutions for success. Our restructure and expansion will allow us to target our trainings specifically: for coaches, parents, educators, ADD and mental health professionals, managers and ADDers themselves.
Copyright 2005, The Optimal Functioning Institute
http://addcoach.com
Last Modified