ABOUT INBGC
About the Independent National Board for Grief Coaching
The Independent National Board for Grief Coaching (INBGC) is an independent certification body for grief coaching. It sets published standards, certifies qualified practitioners through examination and verified practice hours, defines ethics and scope of practice, and gives grief coaches a professional home built on accountability.
As more practitioners enter this work from coaching, healthcare, ministry, and counseling, clients and referral partners need a clear way to know who is qualified, what grief coaching includes, and what standards guide the field. INBGC exists to answer that question with a verifiable credential rather than a self-applied title.
The organization
What is the Independent National Board for Grief Coaching?
An independent certification board for grief coaches. INBGC sets published standards, certifies qualified practitioners through examination and verified practice hours, defines ethics and scope of practice, and gives grief coaches a professional home built on accountability.
Its primary role is to set standards and certify that an individual meets them, distinct from a training program, which teaches skills. INBGC does offer an optional curriculum to prepare candidates, but that curriculum is kept separate from the credentialing decision.
The board verifies competence through eligibility review, a proctored examination, verified practice hours, ethics commitments, and annual renewal. A grief coach who earns the credential has demonstrated a defined standard, not simply completed a course.
Who it serves
A professional home for serious grief coaches
INBGC serves professionals who take grief work seriously and want to belong to a more accountable, better-defined field: clinicians who also coach, healthcare professionals, clergy, coaches, facilitators, and practitioners from other backgrounds whose work regularly supports people through grief, loss, and major life transitions.
Grief coaching is an emerging profession. Training programs, terminology, and approaches vary widely, and many capable practitioners have no recognizable credential that tells clients and referral partners what they do or how they are held accountable.
Licensed clinicians
LPCs, LPCCs, LMFTs, LCSWs, psychologists, and other licensed mental health professionals who also work in a coaching frame.
Healthcare professionals
Nurses, chaplains, social workers, hospice workers, palliative care staff, and hospital-based professionals.
Coaches and practitioners
Established coaches, facilitators, and practitioners serving clients through loss, transition, and identity change.
Career changers
Professionals entering the grief field from another career, often with lived experience and no clinical background.
Already certified elsewhere
Coaches with prior grief training seeking an independent board credential that verifies what they already hold.
Clergy and pastoral caregivers
Pastors, chaplains, and pastoral caregivers extending grief support beyond a faith community.
The board's role
What an independent certification board does
INBGC sets the standards for grief coaching practice and verifies that individual coaches meet them through examination and verified practice hours. There are two ways to qualify, and both lead to the same credential.
Professionals with grief-related education and experience may apply for certification using the training they already hold, and sit the Board Examination without repeating coursework.
Professionals who want structured preparation first may complete INBGC's optional curriculum, then enter the same certification process and sit the same examination.
The board certifies. The curriculum supports.
The curriculum is preparation, not the credential. It is one optional path to readiness, useful for those who want it, required of no one, and kept separate from the examination. That separation between training and testing is deliberate. It keeps the credential reading as an independent standard rather than a course people buy.
See how certification works and the published eligibility requirements.
The problem
Why grief coaching needs standards
People seek grief support during some of the most vulnerable seasons of their lives. They deserve practitioners who understand scope of practice, ethical boundaries, and the difference between coaching, counseling, spiritual care, and clinical treatment.
INBGC was created in response to a real gap. A grieving person looking for help has had no reliable way to tell trained, accountable practitioners from those simply using the title.
Through published standards, certification, verified practice hours, annual renewal, and continuing education, INBGC helps grief coaching mature into a profession that clients, clinicians, and institutions can trust.
This commitment also shapes how practice is verified. INBGC relies on documentation and professional attestation rather than client session recordings, protecting client confidentiality while still holding coaches to a verifiable standard.
Governance
How is the board governed?
Authority over the standard rests with the INBGC Advisory Board, composed of experienced professionals across grief-related disciplines. Application review and day-to-day administration are handled separately by Program Administration, led by Rita Suzanne, Executive Director.
Built with expertise, not personal opinion
INBGC is designed to be larger than any one founder, teacher, or method. That structure matters because grief support touches multiple disciplines. A credible board should reflect the insight of clinicians, coaches, healthcare professionals, chaplains, and other experienced leaders who understand both the depth of grief and the need for clear professional boundaries.
Advisory Board
Holds authority over the standards INBGC certifies against. It does not review individual applications.
Program Administration
Handles application intake, eligibility review, examination administration, credentialing, renewals, and records.
Published policies
All standards, eligibility requirements, and examination topic areas are published and accessible to candidates and the public.
Independent of training
The board that sets the standard is separate from any training program, including INBGC's own curriculum.
Approach
Stewardship over spotlight
INBGC approaches leadership as stewardship. The work is not to center one person, but to build a fair, durable, transparent structure that serves practitioners and protects the public.
In practice, that means clear standards, honest communication, appropriate scope, reliable credentialing, and governance that can evolve as the profession grows, supported by a single Advisory Board that brings in experienced voices from across grief-related disciplines.
Frequently asked questions
Get started
Become board certified
Applications are open and reviewed on a rolling basis. Creating your account takes about a minute and does not enroll or charge you. You choose your pathway in the next step.