In her keynote, Jackee Holder, leadership coach, coach trainer, coach supervisor and creative writing facilitator offered a personal lens on diversity and challenged delegates to question their own assumptions around clients’ and their own stories.
By Ros Soulsby
Delegates were invited to name diversity rather than pretend it’s not there, and to challenge how we generalise about each other as coaches and clients. Holder shared her experience as first-generation UK Caribbean, living in London’s Brixton area. She highlighted how perspectives differ with the example that the Brixton ‘riots’ of the 1980s were to her, and her community, a political and social movement.
As a coach supervisor, when she’s in a relationship with a coach client their story is really important. She proposed that “who you are is how you coach”, that we all have a story of difference in our history and it is important to think about where you are coming from and what your journey is. Then, when coaching, you can think about how to create spaces where you can bring the whole person into the conversation and about how we bring our own stories into the relationship.
Holder quoted statistics from London NHS Trusts highlighting how while one in eight employees are black and minority ethnic (BME), only 8% of board members are BME (down from 9.6% in 2006). Two of five London NHS trust boards have no BME representation at all. She urged delegates to look at the ‘hidden figures’, saying much diversity is invisible. She urged delegates to consider the amount of talent that leaves an organisation due to not seeing people around them that are like them.
Holder asked delegates to consider the impact of diversity and the current situation for us as coaches. Is it something distant? Or is it something we can work with? She asked how we can have the courage to challenge organisational statistics to become more inclusive because “When you look up close you see more colour than when you stand back and that’s what makes a difference to organisations and helps make and shape change”.