Coaching is supposed to help our clients make sense of what is happening around them – to reflect their actions and reactions to developments in their organizations. Many coaches like to use the image of an iceberg to illustrate how this “making sense” often occurs when we look at what is going on beneath the surface. One way we do this (shhhh, trade secret) is asking ourselves and our clients the following question: “What discussion is it you do not have?”
One of the things I routinely pay attention to during the first encounter with a client, organization or group is the “room temperature”. More specifically, walking down office hallways or corridors, I check whether I hear laughter and/or an animated discussion about a job-related matter. This is one of my favorite things to take in — and I did not learn this at the Harry Pooter Hogwarts School for coaching. I learned this method from a mother who tried to find the right elementary school for her young children.
The “Mom-Methodology”
As she walked down the school’s hallways, she trained her ears on the class rooms and where possible the teachers’ lounge. No laughter from either set of rooms and “stakeholders” (i.e. students and teachers) and that school was struck off her list. For some reason, this “mom methodology” struck a core and it has stayed with me over the years. I even stopped pursuing a job opportunity after visiting the site and discovering it failed the laughter test.
Before you now assume I am just interested in fun factories and who can play the best prank on their colleagues, that is not what I am after at all. On the contrary, the ability to laugh and smile and the level of engagement I see in a lively conversation – maybe even a passionate disagreement – tells me more about an organization’s culture than any poster on the wall about goals, achievement, purpose, etc. In my experience smiles and active discussions about job projects are two indicators for a trusting atmosphere that transcend even different types of organization.
You Can Fake a Lot — Genuine Smiles and Laughter Not So Much
For example, for years, I worked with a niche consulting company. Like most managers, I had a little office while employees were seated in a larger space inside the office floor. We managers could see and hear them. What I saw and heard was relaxed conversations among the different teams and there were smiles. Someone would crack a joke. Mostly, however, the content was work related. That told me several things about the team and the company. I believe we all agreed “we were in the same boat and took our clients’ needs seriously”. I believe this because our arguments did not get personal and they were usually about how to make things better. They also occurred in a respectful tone. In addition, we addressed frustrations about things to the relevant persons and not to other colleagues behind their backs. The outcome was not just great work for the most part. It also meant the managers generally knew no one tried to goof off. In addition, the employees on the floor felt safe enough to have a relaxed conversation within earshot of practically every manager. They actually enjoyed working for our company.
The same applied to a museum I used to work for when I still harbored ambitions of becoming a top level historian. The museum’s theme was warfare and I was part of the team that was tasked with getting the holocaust exhibition off the ground. You get the picture: serious stuff, nothing to joke about as we were not exactly dealing with the finer things of the art world. Still, there were smiles and laughter and boy, would we have animated discussions about the holocaust. You can smile and still respect the institution and the purpose of what you do. Neither organization had posters on the wall. They did not need them.
How Do You Talk About the Latest Business Buzz?
Another thing to watch out for is the latest hot topic that makes its way into the water cooler conversations and the executive management meetings. We have had the gender pay gap, working from home (WFH), more recently diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) and by the time this article has been published we may well have moved on to the next topic. As important as these topics are, they also provide organizations with a perfect excuse to have plenty of meaningless meetings and discussions to shirk the actual challenges. For example, do people just complain and blame “the higher ups” or do they engage in a constructive discussion about how to bring about a positive change without fear of being overheard by manager or other colleagues?
If you happen to be part of an organization that haggles about the number of days employees can work from home or whether quota for minority groups will help you improve on your DEI rankings, ask yourself whether this is the real conversation that needs to happen.
In many organizations this is really a power struggle that pitches management against its employees. If the argument is reduced to how many WFH days, or whether two more non-white and non-male executives will finally make the organization a great place to work, spare a thought for the following question: Is what really plays out a purely transactional power struggle? This is important because power struggles end up with a loser. As of 2024, in many Western countries, that may well be management. If only for the simple reason that the labor market is currently tilted towards employees.
Discover the Real Issues
We forget the losing side (and in a few years that may be employees) and the winners are part of the same organization. In the end, the organization loses and with it every one. The call for more WFH days, transparency about unequal pay for men and women and/or minority employees, and more diversity is an invitation to explore the underlying issues. For instance, what does it really mean when the conversation is not about what is best for the organization but what managers are prepared to give and what employees want? If it is really a power struggle as described above, managers should take note. In my opinion, arguing over the number of WFH days, the number of minority candidates in management positions, etc. is often a superficial discussion about deeper issues around organizational culture.
If instead your organization engages in a discussion about symptoms, take a step back and ask yourself whether this is not a premature move addressing a detail that is not yet relevant. Before addressing how to do any of the topics listed above as examples, management and employees can ask themselves simple questions to gain an understanding of deeper issues.
- What problem exactly is an increase in WFH days or minority representation in management going to solve in your organization?
- Whose problem is it going to solve?
- How are these fixes going to solve these problems?
Can your employees really define what they value about the supposed fixes? Equally important, what about the temporary physical absence of your team members makes management really uncomfortable? What are the reasons there are far too few minorities represented in your organization’s management? Whatever it is, simply increasing WFH days and/or the number of minority representatives might not fix it. It will only allow managers and employees to temporarily avoid the conversation that should really take place.
This can be a scary prospect for an entire organization, department or maybe just a team because it can expose insecurities and dissatisfaction about the job, the team, the organization and one’s own performance. However, done right, it is also a tremendous chance to achieve a transformation that will improve the team, the department and even perhaps the entire organization.
Coaching Is Designed to Create the Space to Achieve a Transformation
Coaching can help organizations get it right. As described above, it is the coach’s job to help make sense of things beneath the surface. Part of how a coach does this is to create the space where this is possible to do in a psychologically safe way. A psychological safe space is not to be confused with a cozy comfortable space. Rather, it is a space where the coach and the coachees discover the underlying issues together. That psychological safe space allows people to bring them out in the open without judgment.
For example, on an individual level, the superficial power struggle over the number of WFH days can point to insecurities of a manager who wants to have control. On the other hand, it can also be an indicator for employee dissatisfaction about work related issues. Now imagine a shift in the discussion from what “I want” to for example, what would it take for people - both managers and employees - to enjoy coming to the office. What would it take to come up with a working environment that meets the needs of the organization which in turn may lead to a (re-)discovery of the organization’s mission and vision? Will this be fixed only by adding two more women to the management team?
From Power Struggle to Win-Win
After these steps, you can talk about symptoms and how to address them. Maybe your organization does not even need more policies. Instead you can have a solution-oriented talk that takes into account the organization’s needs as well as the individual employees’ and managers’ needs. That’s a win-win and not a power struggle. Lastly, if you suddenly find these conversations take place around the water cooler without concerns of being overheard and with a little laughter here and there, it might even tell you that the coach you engaged to address such issues was worth the investment.
The original article was first published in German on February 2, 2024 on crimalin.com.
