Legal
Intellectual property & protections
What is protected, how, and what you are free to do with it. We have stated each item at its actual stage rather than at its most impressive-sounding one — a provisional application is not a granted patent, and we do not describe ourselves as patented.
What is protected
Reference LC-2026-ASL-001. Covers the adaptive situational assessment method: scenario selection, multi-dimensional signal mapping, and the derivation of an imprint from behavioural choice patterns rather than self-rating. A provisional application establishes priority; it is not a granted patent and we never claim otherwise.
© 2026 LightningCoach. Every scenario, response option, scoring rationale, imprint narrative, domain definition, rubric and report template is an original literary work protected by copyright from the moment of creation, in India under the Copyright Act 1957 and internationally under the Berne Convention. No registration is required for these rights to exist.
The effectiveness keys, dimension weightings, band thresholds, discrimination calculations, validity checks and grading rubrics are confidential and are never transmitted to a browser. Taking an assessment exposes the questions; it does not expose how they are scored. This is enforced in software, not merely by policy.
Common-law rights in the name, the six imprint names as applied to leadership assessment, and the Certified LightningCoach Practitioner credential, asserted through commercial use. Registration has not yet been granted, which is why we use ™ and not ®.
The compiled corpus of responses, timing data and derived norms is a protected compilation. Individual results belong to the individual; the aggregate structure and the normative data derived from it belong to LightningCoach.
Only practitioners we have certified may describe themselves as a Certified LightningCoach Practitioner or display the credential. Every certificate carries a reference verifiable at /verify. Misuse of the credential is trademark infringement and we will pursue it.
Conversion of the provisional application to a complete specification is in progress within the statutory window.
Why taking the assessment does not give you the assessment
The questions are the visible part and the least valuable one. What makes this an instrument rather than a quiz — the effectiveness keys, the weightings, the band thresholds, the discrimination calculation, the validity checks and the grading rubrics — never leaves our servers. It is not obscured in the page or hidden in a script; it is simply not sent. A complete transcript of every question would not let anyone reproduce a single score.
You are free to
- ✓Take any assessment we publish, as many times as our retake policy allows.
- ✓Share your own result, imprint card or share link anywhere you like — it is yours.
- ✓Quote short extracts of our public writing with attribution and a link.
- ✓If you are a certified practitioner: run the assessment with your own clients under the terms of your licence.
You may not
- ✕Reproducing, adapting or republishing scenarios, response options, rationales or report content in any instrument, product, course or dataset.
- ✕Systematic scraping, bulk downloading, or automated collection of assessment content.
- ✕Reverse engineering the scoring model, or attempting to derive the keys by repeated submission.
- ✕Building a derivative or competing assessment from our content or structure.
- ✕Using our content to train, fine-tune or evaluate a machine-learning model.
- ✕Presenting yourself as certified, accredited or affiliated when you are not.
How we handle infringement
- ·We keep dated records. Every scenario, rubric and revision is version-controlled with timestamps, and the provisional application fixes a priority date. Establishing what existed when is straightforward.
- ·We look. Assessment content is excluded from search indexing, and we monitor for reproduction of our scenarios and imprint framework.
- ·We start with a conversation. Most reuse we have seen anywhere in this industry is careless rather than deliberate. A note usually settles it.
- ·Then we escalate. Takedown notices, platform complaints, and legal action where the reuse is commercial and deliberate.
Think something of ours has been reused? Tell us at admin@lightningcoach.com. Want to license the methodology legitimately? Same address — that conversation is easier than you might expect.
This page describes our position in plain language and is not legal advice. It does not limit any right we have at law. © 2026 LightningCoach. All rights reserved.