Coaching Culture

Background

“White Rose” has successfully implemented a coaching culture over the last five years. Why hasb it been successful.  

Stakeholder Theory

Stakeholder Theory defines the interests of different groups in an organisation’s activities. A stakeholder is defined in Carroll (1996, p.74) as “any individual or group who can affect or is affected by… the organisation”. Typical stakeholders include shareholders, staff and government.     

Traditional Stakeholder Theory may be described as “corporate-centric” (Steurer, 2006, p.55). It implies that each stakeholder is independent, suggesting that management’s role is to satisfy stakeholders’ needs, making trade-offs where those needs conflict. Goodpaster (1991, p.54) goes farther, describing a “stakeholder paradox”; managers must promote the interests of the corporation and its owners whilst simultaneously having ethical responsibilities to other parts of the community.

Buchholtz and Rosenthal (2005) offer an alternative, suggesting that stakeholders and the organisation are not independent entities, but that the corporation is “constituted by the multiple relationships in which it is embedded and which give it its very being” (p. 147). Steurer’s 2006 paper draws on much other research, advancing a theoretical typology to address these multiple relationships. He approaches stakeholder relation management (SRM) from three points of view: corporate (traditional); stakeholder (how stakeholders try to influence corporations) and conceptual (relating to the way that concepts such as sustainable development modulate the relationship between organisation and stakeholders). Each standpoint has three aspects: normative (establishment of a standard); descriptive (actions taken) and instrumental (effects). In total therefore he advocates nine approaches to research in this area. I structure the Discussion using this typology.      
 
Learning Culture

The culture of an organisation may be defined as its “moral, social and behavioural norms.” (Yemm, 2006, p35).

Smircich (1983) suggests two ways of viewing culture:

1. As “critical variable” - crucial for performance and manageable - an essentially positivist approach. Chehade et al (2006) are among many arguing that management can manipulate culture.           

2. As “root metaphor” – a natural spontaneous culture that is not necessarily what managers want. Meek (1988) suggests “culture… (is)… something that an organisation ‘is’, not… something it ‘has’: it (cannot) be created, discovered or destroyed by... management” (p470).  

Senge (1990) popularised the concept of the learning organisation suggesting that it enables organisations to outperform in changing environments. A learning organisation may be defined as “one in which the environment is structured in such a way as to facilitate learning as well as the sharing of knowledge among members or employees” (Chunharas, 2006, p652).

Much research has found that a learning orientation has a more beneficial impact on performance than an overt focus on performance itself. For example, Egan, Yang and Barlett (2004) found in a study of IT employees that a learning culture was associated with greater job satisfaction and a lower propensity to change jobs, whilst Beck, Rorrer-Woody and Pierce (1991) discovered that a performance focus negatively correlated with US college students’ Grade Point Averages.     

Corporate Coaching Implementation

The practical aspects of implementing coaching such as contracting, session frequency and meeting recording are well documented. See for example Downey (2001, pp 81 – 99). 
  
Despite the importance suggested in the literature, the ground is less firm when considering the relationship of organisational values and culture to coaching implementation. For example Zeus and Skiffington (2002, p. 64) say that the coach should “gather information on the organisation” as part of a “coaching needs analysis”. O’Neill, (2002, pp 10, 11) says that the coach must take account of the client’s “ecosystem”. In neither case is it clear how these factors affect coaching implementation - a common weakness in the literature. 

A practical approach that implicitly incorporates culture into implementation is found in Huse (1966). This early work discusses “Work Planning and Review” - a process of mutual review, problem solving and planning. Although not described as coaching, this chimes with more modern definitions of coaching. Huse identified two necessary factors for success in implementation: support of top executives and changes in the manager being made before expecting change in the subordinate. 

White Rose’s Key Stakeholders and Learning Culture

Buchholtz and Rosenthal (2005, p. 147) state that “A truly harmonious relation between a corporation and its stakeholders… requires that the corporation internalize the (stakeholders’) perspectives into its… perspectival network”. From this viewpoint it is impossible to separate an organisation’s stakeholders from its culture (“perspectival network”).  

Empowerment 

Several of White Rose’s values show its intent to empower people.  White Rose’s intent is realised by its actions. Staff and clients are actively encouraged to contribute to changes in the organisation’s operations, both individually and as a group.

Rushmer et al. (2004) submit that empowerment of staff is a necessary condition for a learning organisation to work. White Rose’s values and actions show that it not only encourages communication proactively from stakeholders, but is set up to learn from this communication; empowerment is an integral part of its learning culture.   

Learning

White Rose is also committed to providing ongoing personal and professional development to its people. This combines with the values of empowerment outlined above resulting in White Rose’s learning culture. 

Notwithstanding White Rose’s commitment to empowerment of users and staff, management apparently regards culture as a “critical variable” (Smircich, 1983) that it can influence, actively promoting the learning agenda. There was initially some resistance to the establishment of a learning culture, with some staff members “just wanting to do their jobs and go home”. Whilst this still does occur, such staff are now in a minority. This kind of reaction has been reported elsewhere. For example, Brooks (2003) in a study of the NHS identified a positive correlation between empowerment of staff and levels of anxiety.    

This resistance can lead to a tension between the establishment of a less hierarchical learning culture and the use of the hierarchy to promote it or, in Smircich’s sense, between culture as root metaphor and critical variable.

Implementation of Coaching

Factors that foster and contribute to White Rose’s learning culture include:

• Person centred approach
• Empowerment
• Participative team working, encouraging questioning and contributions up the hierarchy as well as down.

One-to-one coaching is part of a substantial programme of initiatives, including training, team development work, supervision and appraisal. Whilst individuals have specific goals, the overall organisational aims of the coaching spring directly from the intention to promote the above factors throughout the organisation. The one-to-one coaching was initially taken up by White Rose’s Chief Executive, before spreading to most other directors. One-to-one coaching is now also being offered to other staff members, particularly “high fliers”. Both of Huse’s success factors (p6 above) are present here. External coaches deliver the coaching.

To discuss the effectiveness of White Rose’s coaching implementation, I discuss a number of Kinlaw’s “criteria for successful coaching” (1999, pp24-25).

Achieves positive work relationships

The programme clearly meets this criterion. Contributors said:

“The result was fantastic – the team embraced participative working”.
“I use a coaching approach with my own team now – it’s much more effective.”

In addition, participants reported that their line managers now use coaching in supervision and appraisal, clearly meeting Huse’s second success factor outlined above. 

Communicates respect 

Grove (2004) submits that respect is shown when “all… are… valued for the contribution that they bring in their own giftedness…” (p.36). One-to-one coaching at White Rose meets this criterion with directors saying that as a result of coaching, they “involve, include and give responsibility to staff” and welcome questioning and suggestions from staff at any level. However, staff who are accustomed to a hierarchical structure may find this difficult. This respect clearly extends to the client base (see Commitment to performance (improvement) below).  

Commitment to performance (improvement)

White Rose is strongly committed to performance improvement. The empowerment of staff and meetings with clients show a clear flow between one-to-one coaching as part of the learning culture, which promotes the influence of staff and clients on the organisation, and the positive development of the services delivered.      

Successful performance change

Monitoring and evaluation of coaching is challenging - it is difficult to measure successful performance change. Nevertheless, White Rose addresses this area in a three ways:

1. Qualitative 360˚ assessments of individuals being coached at the beginning and end of programmes.
2. Quantitative measurement of “hard” targets such as revenues or costs, carried out as the coaching programme continues.
3. Assessments of effectiveness of the coaching by the individuals concerned to give an indication of the cash return on investment. 

These approaches consistently show strong positive benefits from the coaching.

Is change orientated

As already noted, the overall thrust of the coaching is to enhance White Rose’s capabilities as a learning organisation. Whilst great steps have been made in this direction, change continues.

In summary, White Rose largely meets Kinlaw’s “criteria for successful coaching” discussed here.

Discussion

Here I consider the interactions between White Rose’s key stakeholders, its learning culture and one-to-one coaching. I use Steurer’s typology (see above) to examine this through stakeholder theory, considering the normative, descriptive and instrumental aspects of the organisational, stakeholder and conceptual perspectives.

Organisational

White Rose’s normative view is plain – one of its tenets is “person centred working”. It believes that it should deal with stakeholders by respecting them and responding to their views. Moving to the descriptive type, one-to-one coaching is an important organisational behaviour reflecting this normative view. It has a direct impact on staff members that receive it, and indirectly on other staff and clients. It therefore is instrumental in White Rose’s SRM which both promotes and forms part of its organisational objectives.       

Staff Stakeholder

One-to-one coaching has a direct link to the perspective of the staff stakeholders. Although it is received by relatively few staff, the effects ramify throughout the organisation, encouraging participative working and being instrumental in giving staff a clear route to influencing and achieving their aims.       

Conceptual

I select just one concept from White Rose’s values - “all staff should feel empowered to make changes”. Considering just the instrumental aspect of this concept suggests that through its SRM, White Rose realises this concept to a great extent, as described above. One-to-one coaching is again crucial in this.

Summary

Approaching White Rose with a holistic view shows that its SRM is a fundamental part of its activities. White Rose’s approach to stakeholder empowerment is reflected in its relationship with staff. The learning culture both contributes to and is a manifestation of this attitude, exemplified by White Rose’s one-to-one coaching - an important part of its training and development programme. Coaching begins at the top and is percolating down the organisation, fulfilling Huse’s (1966) principles for successful implementation. It also meets Kinlaw’s “criteria for successful coaching” (1999). The monitoring and evaluation of the coaching shows a strong positive influence on the performance of both individuals and the whole organisation.    

References

Beck, H.P., Rorrer-Woody, S. and Pierce, L.G. (1991), “The relations of learning and grade orientations to academic performance”, Teaching of Psychology, 18 (1), 35 – 37. 

Brooks, I. (2003), “Systemic exchange: responsibility for angst”, Organization Studies, 24 (1), 125 – 141.

Buchholz, R.A. and Rosenthal, S.B. (2005), “Toward a contemporary conceptual framework for stakeholder theory”, Journal of Business Ethics, 58, 137 – 148. 

Carroll, A.B. (1996), Business and Society: Ethics and Stakeholder Management, Third Edition, Cincinnati: Southwestern.  
 
Chehade, G., Mendes, D. and Mitchell, D. (2006), “Culture change for the analytical mind”, Strategic Finance, 87 (12), 11 – 15.

Chunharas, S. (2006), “An interactive integrative approach to translating knowledge and building a ‘learning organization’ in health services management”, Bulletin of the World Health Organization, 84 (8), 652-657.

Downey, M. (2001), Effective Coaching, London: Texere.

Egan, T.M., Yang, B. and Barlett, K.R. (2004), “The effects of organizational learning culture and job satisfaction on motivation to transfer learning and turnover intention”, Human Resource Development Quarterly, 15 (3), 279-301.

Goodpaster, K. (1991), “Business ethics and stakeholder analysis”, Business Ethics Quarterly, 1 (1), 53 – 73.

Grove, M. (2004), “The three r's of pastoral care: relationships, respect and responsibility”, Pastoral Care in Education, 22 (2), 34-38.

Huse, E. (1966), “Putting in a management development program that works”, California Management Review, 9 (2), 73 – 80.

Kinlaw, D.C. (1999), Coaching for Commitment; interpersonal strategies for obtaining superior performance from individuals and teams, San Francisco: Jossey Bass/ Pfeiffer.
 
Meek, V.L. (1988), “Organizational culture: origins and weaknesses”, Organization Studies, 9 (4), 453 – 473.

O’Neill, M. B. (2002) Executive Coaching with Backbone and Heart, San Francisco: Jossey Bass.

Rushmer, R., Kelly, D., Lough, M., Wilkinson, J. and Davies, H.T. (2004), “Introducing the learning practice – iii. leadership, empowerment, protected time and reflective practice as core contextual conditions” Journal of Evaluation in Clinical Practice, 10 (3), 399-405.

Senge, P.M. (1990), The Fifth Discipline. The Art and Practice of the Learning Organisation, London: Random House

Smircich, L. (1983) “Concepts of culture and organizational analysis”, Administrative Science Quarterly, 28 (3), 339 – 358.

Steurer, R. (2006), “Mapping stakeholder theory anew: from the ‘stakeholder theory of the firm’ to three perspectives on business – society relations”, Business Strategy and the Environment, 15, 55 – 69.
 
Yemm, G. (2006), “Does your culture support or sabotage your strategy?”, Management Services, 50 (1), 34 – 36.

Zeus, P. & Skiffington, S. (2002) The Coaching at Work Toolkit, Roseville, NSW: McGraw Hill Australia.