Peter Jackson highlights recent research observations that suggest constructive ways of thinking about how we work with diversity in our coaching practice
In a recent chapter (Jackson et al, 2023) I noted a growth of coaching research on dealing with diversity.
Special issues of the International Journal of Evidence Based Coaching and Mentoring feature post graduate student research and are a great resource for highly practice-oriented insights built on robust research. This year’s special issue (No. 17) featured three papers, each of which highlighted what seem to be some extremely helpful considerations in relation to working with diversity in coaching.For this month’s column, I explore some key observations that emerge from those three papers.
Siobhan Lynam (2023) focused on rapport in cross-ethic pairings, specifically looking at the scenario of a white coach working with people of colour. Summarising existing literature, she suggests that “micro-aggressions, the politeness protocol and colour-blindness” can affect the development of rapport. Lynam identifies a major theme in her action research as “allowing space for ethnicity discussions”. Her description of this theme is carefully crafted to reflect something more of an attitude of openness, curiosity and humility, rather than a “tick list of broaching behaviours”. This is important because, as Lynam notes, “The control of the ethnicity discourse needed to remain with the coachee. They were the experts of their own experience.” This is reflected in the paper’s central conclusion of, “the importance to dyadic rapport of maintaining an equitable power balance. The White coach’s behaviour should be driven by this awareness and attempt to rebalance the outside world’s uneven distribution of power.”
Mat Daniel (2023), exploring where being gay may or may not be significant in the particular coaching agenda, also drew on the concept of broaching from the counselling literature. He suggests a positive approach to broaching, but done with sensitivity. This includes an awareness that the coach’s own perception of what is relevant may not resonate with the client. This can be the case whether the coach is gay or not.
Furthermore, broaching is built on top of two important stepping stones. First, the coach having explored their own values, beliefs, assumptions and language in relation to working with gay clients. Second, having established “conditions where gayness could be discussed”. Daniel recommends that broaching is then “the end result of a process that includes relationship building, assessment of relevance of gayness, and statement of intent.”
Christine Vitzthum’s (2023) focus on contracting emerges from a wider study of coaching for gender equality in organisations. This identified that common approaches to supporting women’s careers through coaching can put the responsibility for change on individuals rather than on the system that constrains them in the first place. (Almost, I would suggest, pathologising gender.) Vitzthum concludes: “Coaching with gender-sensitivity can be considered a more political approach that recognises the complexity, intersectionality and implications of gender (Acker, 2006), requiring coaches’ gender competence and awareness of social contexts to examine, bring to the fore and address underlying structural challenges.”
In this context, dealing with the tensions and paradoxes of contracting is seen as central. Vitzthum recommends clear contracting, including explicit examination of confidentiality. This needs to take account of the client’s expectations and trust in the coaching process, at the same time as engaging an organisational feedback mechanism to ensure that observation on systemic issues can be drawn to the organisation’s attention.
As regards goals and goal achievement, different coaches have different ways of managing the relationship. Vitzthum here references Dima Louis and Pauline Fatien Diochon’s analysis of power relations between organization and coach.
Louis and Fatien Diochon (2018) identify three modes: treating the client’s agenda as separate from that of the organisation, requiring either ‘isolating’ one from the other or ‘integrating’ the two perspectives; giving primacy to the organisational agenda, acting as an ‘instrument’ or ‘moderator’; or becoming enrolled in a parallel process of the psychodynamic relationship between organisation and coachee.
Louis and Fatien Diochon’s paper demands a focus of its own, but what it highlights in Vitzthum’s study is that clarity through contracting for the relationship with the organisation in these terms would be useful in avoiding unconscious collusion with disempowering systems, or rejected or ‘failed’ assignments.
Adopting a qualitative research approach, these studies are not seeking to establish universal truths; rather, deeper insight.
In three different domains, these researchers, in different ways, all indicate the central function of power, rapport, and expectations with a recommendation in each case that implies a degree of reflexivity.
It is interesting and informative to reflect on the connections between these contexts and between these recommendations. The papers also amply illustrate how robust and carefully considered qualitative research can raise legitimate and valid questions which we can apply in our practice: to what extent could I be using this information with my client?
Or, as we might ask our clients, who may themselves have a different experience of the world, would this be helpful for you?
About the author
Peter Jackson is a coach, supervisor and is co-director of the International Centre for Coaching and Mentoring Studies at Oxford Brookes University Business School.
References
- M Daniel, ‘How could coaching help gay men with gay aspects of their professional lives?’, in International Journal of Evidence Based Coaching, Special issue 17, 122-134, 2023
- P Jackson, A Fillery-Travis and E Cox, (2023) ‘Researching Coaching’, in E Cox, T Bachkirova, and D Clutterbuck (eds), The Complete Handbook of Coaching (4th edn). London: SAGE Publications Ltd, pp510-526
- D Louis & P Fatien Diochon, ‘The coaching space: A production of power relationships in organizational settings’, in Organization, 25(6), 710-731, 2018
- S Lynam, ‘An action research study on the development of a coaching model with optimises rapport in cross-ethnicity dyads’, in International Journal of Evidence Based Coaching, Special issue 17, 32-48, 2023
- C Vitzthum, ‘A pawn in the game? The significance of contracting in coaching with gender-sensitivity’, in International Journal of Evidence Based Coaching, Special issue 17, 3-17, 2023