Intercultural Coaching: The next big thing

Intercultural coaching is defined as “utilizing culture as a force of change to unleash the coachee’s potential”. Both the coach and the coachee will take a look at the cultures that might be involved (national culture, organizational culture, social class, professional affiliation, etc.) and consider how to take them into account for the realization of the coachee’s objectives.

Different worldviews

Traditional coaching has a tendency to assume a worldview that is very Western. This worldview however, does not translate universally across different cultures. People instinctively approach situations in business with their own ‘worldview’ (I.e. personal and cultural perspective). In contrast, in the intercultural coaching process it is important to be aware of the various worldviews that are in play.

When worldviews clash

Consider the following example taken from a coaching session run by Zarine Jacob, a well-established intercultural coach. Her coachee, David, a white British man, described a particularly difficult management situation that one of his managers, Peter, brought to him. Apparently there had been increasing friction between two female members of Peter’s team: one from Nigeria and the other from the Caribbean. One day he heard crying and raised voices in the office. Peter was informed that the Nigerian woman was convinced that the Afro-Caribbean woman had put a spell on her. Peter, also a white British man, told David that he thought the situation was ridiculous, especially since both women are highly educated, experienced, and had worked in the UK for over five years.

As David recounted this story it was apparent to Zarine that Peter was judging the situation with his own worldview, (a worldview in which spells and witchcraft don’t exist). If Peter had intervened with his current perspective/ worldview, he would inevitably be denying another worldview, one where spells and witchcraft do exist. Peter would have been taking an ethnocentric approach if he approached the situation this way. An ethnocentric approach denies cultural differences. These are ignored and the impacts they may have are completely neglected. This position may severely impact on him creating a positive outcome and may possibly lead to further issues. When it comes to worldviews therefore, validity is a key issue. Peter might find it more effective in dealing with the situation by approaching it from the standpoint that the Nigerian woman’s worldview is valid (for her), and acknowledge her concerns before moving towards a solution that will work for everyone involved. With support that had come out of the coaching session, David was able to help Peter shift his perspective and change his ethnocentric approach.

Balancing worldviews

However, it is not just the worldviews of the coachee and those the coachee manages that need to be taken into account during the coaching process. The worldview of the coach also needs to be observed. Since multiple worldviews in an intercultural coaching session need to be considered, it’s not surprising that worldviews can clash. One of the challenges intercultural coaches face is trying to balance the different worldviews in a way that is respectful.  

Intercultural coaches need to be aware of whose worldview is in play at any one time. They should also be clear that they can hold their own worldview without letting it have a negative impact on the coaching session. As Zarine Jacob says, “an intercultural coach embodies great coaching skills within the context of intercultural understanding”. As organizations have increasingly become more global, business coaches will need to take into consideration different cultural perspectives and worldviews in order to become more effective and for business to remain profitable. Let’s now look at a number of different cultural perspectives (worldviews) and see how they affect the intercultural coaching process.

Different Perspectives in the Intercultural Coaching Process

Intercultural coaching takes into account the different worldviews, needs, values and expectations that people from different cultural backgrounds can bring to the coaching process. These expectations can be of the coach and of the coaching process itself. In an intercultural coaching session it is important for the coach and the coachee to consider some of the following. What worldviews are in play? How will they impact the various stages of the coaching process? What changes will I need to make in my coaching style in order to be effective?

What cultural differences can impact the various stages of the coaching process?

Differences between worldviews can be understood by looking at commonly used cultural dimensions. They help us to understand differences by placing cultures along a continuum. One such continuum would have hierarchy at one end and egalitarianism at the other end. This would be one way to compare the coach’s culture or worldview with that of the coachee. Below are some of the most important dimensions that relate directly to the coaching process:

• Direct communication versus indirect communication (verbal communication style)
• Expressive versus reserved (the role of emotions in communication)
• Hierarchy versus equality (the role of status and respect issues in the process)
• Single-focus versus multi-focus (the way we relate to time, deadlines and priorities)
• Individual versus group (the way we interact with others, in teams and on tasks)
• Task versus relationship (the way we approach business objectives and view trust in a business context)
• Order versus flexibility (How we make plans and respond to change)   

It is important to keep in mind that we are all individuals and your coachee may or may not be typical of their culture. A good intercultural coach does not just assume that their coachee is the way they are strictly because of their national background. While national culture is a prominent influence, personality and corporate/professional cultural factors can always be involved. This is why it is important for intercultural coaches to learn as much as they can about their coachee’s and the cultures that influence them.

When different worldviews meet

In the following case study a UK manager was sent to manage the expansion of a UK company’s stores across Malaysia. The UK manager has engaged a coach to support him in his role and explains in the first session that he has come to rely a great deal on his ethnic Malay assistant. This assistant always manages to deliver quality work - but never quite within the time frame agreed in the initial discussion. It is always a day or two after the delivery date but there is never an open acknowledgement that the delivery is ‘late’. When the issue is raised the assistant simply smiles and murmurs an apology. This has become so common that the UK manager began to build in a false delivery time in order to guarantee that he got what he needed on time. Despite this extra safeguard however, a recent piece of work was even later than usual resulting in an important project milestone being missed.

What intercultural issues are in play?

Two different worldviews are present in this situation. The UK manager’s focus is on the Malaysian assistant’s performance within agreed time frames. For him, clarity, honesty and openness are important and form the basis of all verbal communication. The Malaysian assistant’s focus, on the other hand, is on a number of things including wanting to please his manager, not cause him to lose face and get the job done at the same time.

Using cultural tools to understand the worldviews

The most apparent cultural difference in this situation is the approach to time. How the UK manager and the Malaysian assistant manage time, tasks, and relationships differs considerably. The Malaysian assistant habitually balances the various business objectives, shifting priorities as the situation changes – possibly on a daily basis. Here the general attitude is that time and deadlines need to be flexible to accommodate changing circumstances, that many activities (multi-tasking) is the norm and as many options should be kept open for as long as possible.  

In contrast, the UK manager is more single-focused, which means he prefers to complete tasks by completing each stage systematically before moving on. He believes there is only one critical path to achieving his objectives. Deadlines, for the UK manager, are applied rigorously and are binding in a contractual way that is very different from the Malaysian culture.  

The other cultural difference in play is hierarchy; this potentially has the most impact on the boss/subordinate relationship between the UK manager and his staff. The UK manager comes from a culture that values equality in the broadest sense. Company organization and decision-making comes more from mutually agreed goals than solely personal authority on its own. This changes how the UK manager communicates with others. He expects his Malaysian assistant to provide constructive disagreement and other ‘upward feedback’. The assumption is that decision-making requires the flow of key information to all the parties involved and therefore there is more information available to a wider range of individuals in these organizations than in traditional hierarchical organizations. In hierarchical organizations information equates with power and is therefore shared only at the very top of the organization in the fuller sense. At lower levels there is much less sharing as decision-making itself is only done in a much more autocratic manner.  

The Malaysian assistant’s attitude is that ‘the boss is the boss’ because respect for the position is vital to maintaining company organization. Deference to superiors is considered appropriate. The Malaysian assistant will avoid giving ‘upward feedback’ especially if it is negative to save his boss from loss of face.

You now have some key cultural difference information, how would you proceed with coaching the UK manager?

Basic Pre-work

Our suggestion for best practice in this area of intercultural coaching is that the above cultural research be part of your basic pre-work before the initial coaching session. By the time you meet for your first session with your coachee, you should have a basic understanding of their culture as well as of the cultures of the other people your coachee works with. This cultural information must include both business practices (normed behaviors), as well as key cultural values and how they manifest in the workplace.

Transparency

To start the coaching sessions it is important to provide a transparent overview of your approach to coaching; how you are going to communicate, your expectations of the coachee and so on. It is important to have a shared understanding with your coachee about what will take place during your coaching sessions. In those cultures where loss of face and a hierarchical management style is common, and reading and writing English skills are better than their speaking skills, it may be wise to have a one-pager on this approach sent to your coachee prior to the initial coaching session and then use it as a discussion document. Be sure to highlight key vocabulary that might be used during sessions. This is especially important if your coachee and you do not share the same mother tongue. If you regularly deliver coaching in a particular culture and you do not share the same mother tongue you may what to make a glossary in the local language of key coaching terms and vocabulary.

Sharing the cultural knowledge

After the pre-work and both in the initial coaching session and afterwards in subsequent sessions with the UK manager, you need to broaden his perspective interculturally by looking at the issues in the wider frame of this cultural information. When doing this, however, it’s important to remember that your cultural information consists of broad generalizations about the culture and that the individuals involved in your coachee’s situation may or may not conform to all or some of these generalizations. This requires a dialogue between you and the coachee where you together explore some of this key cultural information to see if it is in play and to what extent it impacts the situation. Cultural information of this nature, when used appropriately, can strongly support the coaching process and assist in the movement towards a positive outcome for the coachee and others involved in the situation.

Exploring and contrasting the different worldviews

With your coachee you then explore and contrast the two cross-cultural perspectives in the situation. It is important that the coachee accepts that both of the two perspectives are equally legitimate, regardless of what the final outcome and proposed solution is. The next step would be to reconcile these two different perspectives within the framework of improving people performance. You and your coachee should brainstorm solutions using the Multicultural Adaptation Model (MAM).

The Multicultural Adaptation Model

The MAM illustrates four possible outcomes when reconciling different cultural approaches to a particular situation or problem. There is your way of doing things, their way and then a combined way involving some of your way and some of theirs. This is what most people think of as a culturally synergistic approach. However, if you reach a place where none of these three methods work, there is a fourth way. In this case, a completely new way needs to be thought up. The key criteria here is, as always, to choose the method that will generate the desired outcome.

The desired outcome

So the combination of carefully applied cultural knowledge and a solution-focused approach will generate new options and possibilities for the UK manager, which he will then start to apply and negotiate with. As the coaching process continues towards a satisfactory conclusion the UK manager will be better at understanding and managing in the Malaysian culture and see improvements across his reports whilst meeting his objectives and targets.

How would you proceed if your coachee were the Malaysian assistant?

You would start the initial process of coaching the same way as with the UK manager, by providing a transparent overview in your initial session. This is even more important to remember with the Malaysian assistant because he comes from a hierarchical culture and may not be as familiar with coaching processes. You might have to spend more time explaining concepts such as open communication, positive and negative feedback, attitudes towards time and task and how hierarchy is managed and its implications. You would try to widen the Malaysian assistant’s perspective interculturally and look at people performance within this specific cultural context. Then you would share the two cross-cultural perspectives in the situation and see if the Malaysian manager sees and accept the two perspectives as legitimate. Finally, you would brainstorm solutions keeping your broader goal of improving people performance in mind.

The coach as cultural bridge

A key principal of coaching is to provide opportunities for coachees to apply the concepts and input to his own cultural situation. Most likely the Malaysian assistant will view you as his superior because of your knowledge and experience with coaching. Hence, he will expect you to tell him what to do and will most likely not feel comfortable providing feedback. Your coachee may not understand how to react when increased participation is indicated. You might have to be more directive in your coaching with the Malaysian assistant than you would have had to be with the UK manager. Be conservative, and then shift to a more interactive design or approach as appropriate. The key point here is to build trust between yourself and your coachee. This will have a more ‘personal’ feel to it than it might have in other cultures. As the Malaysian is in a hierarchically inferior position it will be important to explore the issue of actual and perceived power with him. The purpose of this is to move towards self-empowerment albeit within a hierarchical context.

General guidelines and principles for adapting coaching to coaches from other cultural backgrounds

When you are coaching, it is important to negotiate a settlement about being open and transparent. This is imperative when you are working with coachees from other cultural backgrounds. You need to find a method of working with your coachee that is respectful and productive. What this might look like, depends on the context and the people involved. Here are some other general guidelines that can help: 

1. Be empathetic to feedback from coachees. Successful cross-cultural communication may be difficult in cultures that shun criticism or that ensure the comfort of participants through hospitality.
2. Look for opportunities to take advantage of cultural difference. For example, show how a certain concept is implemented in the coach’s culture and discuss the possible differences either in concept or implementation. It may then be possible for the coachee to develop more culturally appropriate ways for the concept to be introduced.
3. Be sensitive to a culture’s method of learning and working. Some cultures may stress memorization, lists, logic or cooperation. Be aware that Western European and North American coaching approaches may seem quite alien and produce discomfort in other cultures. A coach who does not understand a culture’s learning styles will meet considerable frustration.
4. It is important to remember that, as an outsider, the coach will probably never fully understand at a deep level the communication styles, methods, constraints and assets of the culture. Hence, it’s imperative that the coach avoids judging something as ‘wrong’ simply because it is different.

Reference

• Philippe Rosinski and Geoffrey Abbott in their article, “Intercultural Coaching”,