Coaching Diversity
The concept of coaching diversity has constantly evolved over the last couple of decades. It initially focused on race and later expanded to include women, people with disabilities, and the LGBTQ community. Today, diversity has been expanded to include physical characteristics, family backgrounds, military status, and age. On a basic level, workplace diversity doesn’t have a specific label and it should not be seen as a risk mitigation exercise. It is more about embracing the uniqueness in each of us and that we can all come together to work cohesively while servicing the needs of a diverse customer base.
In This Article:
The Sample Scenario
Certified coaching tips: Elements and Difficulties
It’s not unusual for global businesses to face progressively complex cross-cultural challenges. How do big companies make an international merger a success? How can a member help teams spread globally on other countries and continents better collaborate? To deal with these, many companies are turning to coaches who specialize in helping diverse teams deal with cultural tripwires. Seems like a smart solution, right?
The Sample Scenario
Scene 1:
Emmanuel, the assigned team manager was assigned in choosing his team for an upcoming project. The project will have tight deadlines and will require the team to work late hours. He first chooses two team leads, Austin and Bryan and asked them for suggestions on the other team members. When the two leads has come up with the list, Austin realizes that they have not included women from the teams. When he asked about it, he found that both of the team leaders were not keen on considering women for projects that require late working hours.
Scenario 2:
A project team of 15 members includes two members of the Muslim community. The team sets to meet every day for a 10-minute discussion on progress on the project. But every Friday, the two Muslim members tend to miss the discussion as the meetings usually clash with religion’s prayer timings. Their absence is causing dislike among the other members, and the group plans to penalize the two for absenteeism.
Certified coaching tips: Elements and Managing Difficulties
Yes, cross-cultural coaches can assistst on bridging differences ( this is assuming that you’ve chosen a capable one). But you need to remember in mind that the coaching relationship goes both ways— therefore it is not enough that a coach is culturally neutral, the coache must also be open to be culturally neutral.This is how the coaching-client relationship can be equally created with cultural tripwires.
So how can it work?
The following are the elements to consider in making a harmonious cross cultural coaching:
- First, consider the coach-client dynamic.
This is an important aspect to consider. A diversity coach must be qualified and armed with enough appropriateness in language, gestures, means of relaying their message. Even if a coach is culturally neutral a coachee may have culturally imbibed behavior and thinking that a coach must first learn to tread and address before taking them on under his wing.
Some might assume that the coach is a knowledgeable and approachable mentor who can offer small talks of wisdom as he or she guides you. This is culturally neutral for those in U.S., and perhaps in other Western cultures, but if you will consider using this approach in East Asian cultures, this is where a divide happens.
East Asians relationship with mentors are often far more hierarchical and less interactive. Coaches share knowledge but East Asians don’t necessarily engage in a “dialogue” or a “partnership” (which is common in the U.S). In fact, if ever an American coach will tell an Asian client that she/he really wants to “learn” from them, the client might immediately doubt the skill and experience of the coach rather than take the gesture as an invitation of sharing perspectives and engaging in mutual learning.
2. Second, look at how feedback is given in the coachee’s culture.
Mostly in Western cultures it’s perfectly acceptable to provide critical or challenging feedbacks to their coach. But in other East Asian cultures like Korea, or China, or Japan, that is considered to be highly inappropriate.
This goes the same with coaches giving critical or corrective feedback to their clients. If you are aware that in the U.S., it’s quite typical (in fact, it’s often an important part of the process), as long as it’s delivered in a constructive manner. This can differ like in cultures of Germany, the critical feedback is even more direct and they don’t’t really mind and think about softening it at all. In contrast, if you are coaching a client from Korea or another culture, keep in mind that direct feedback can cause a loss of face. Thus it can be a little bit more difficult and complex in getting the message across as it can inadvertently — and potentially irreparably — damage the relationship.
There have been a number of cases where these cultural misunderstandings and miscommunications played out in information sharing, listening, goal-setting, and even the payment process. With these then how can organizations and coaches make sure that the coaching practice be able to manage working around these difficulties?
- First, the coaches themselves need to emphasize the fact that the concept of cultural differences that they’re helping their clients with can be the same reason that can hamper and interfere with the coaching process. Too often coaches can become so focused on the “external problem” —what the client is struggling with in his/her work environment —that they forget to work on the coaching dynamics.
- Second, use the coaching process can be regarded as an avenue for noticing and working with cultural differences. Let’s say a client struggles with authority, make them reflect on how that plays out in a relationship (even in the coaching relationship). If the problem is making small talk, the session can be an opportunity to practice it as well. The point is, the coaching session itself can and should be an chance to both point out cultural differences and to practice developing skills for managing diversity.
- Third, coaches should make sure that the coaching process itself is regarded as valid and legitimate. For some (specially those from Western cultures), there are obvious benefits to the idea of building personal skills.
But that’s not essentially the case for others who may feel that it’s unfitting or self-indulgent to just focus directly on improving one’s own personal welfare. A tacticused by a coach handling Koreans was that they reinterpret the coaching goal through a more collectivistic manner, as Asians are more likely to be with a collective mindset. Instead of regarding coaching as an individualistic process for self-improvement, it can be framed as a tool for building around relationships and community, which, for some, is a far more pleasant goal.
Cross-cultural coaching can bring great benefits to your organization but you need to select the right person for the job — an expert who can help clients with their challenges on the job, and also leverage key opportunities within the coaching relationship itself to achieve this objective.
I understand that affecting behavior change within an organization at scale can seem a tall order. People are who they are, and it’s difficult to change habits and mindsets. This can be a huge obstacle when trying to revamp company culture and encourage inclusion and acceptance.
But we have to start somewhere, to engage employees and bring out their best.
Coaching diversity leaders and learning leaders have the opportunity to shape a people strategy that educates employees to better understand and harness our differences to drive business results. Now is the time for leaders to look into life coach certification programs or hire diversity coaches.
