PROFESSIONALISM: Leadership and Right Action

Russ Volckmann, PhD

Doctors, lawyers and probably Indian Chiefs have a set of beliefs about what it means to be professional. Add to that childcare providers, software developers, social workers, managers and – yes – coaches among many, many others. In fact, there are very rigorous and legalistic definitions of professionalism that include factors such as the existence of a professional association, an articulation of a set of professional standards and ethics and – in some cases – the existence of a set of regulations and requirements in law for professional behavior.

In this look at professionalism I point out that professionalism emerges from a number of variables. Some, such as educational and training requirements, can be measured pretty carefully.

Others, such as integrity, may be subject to considerable subjectivity. In the case of integrity, defining that concept may be subjective or objective. There is a difference between integrity as “honesty and honor” and integrity as attunement of professed standards and actual behaviors.

Some interesting work on professionalism has been done at The Center for Innovation, National Board of Medical Examiners. They have identified seven behaviors of professionalism that are elaborated at http://ci.nbme.org/professionalism/:

  Altruism,

  Responsibility and Accountability,

  Leadership,

  Caring: Compassion and Communication,

  Excellence and Scholarship,

  Respect, and

  Honor and Integrity.

Each of these topics deserves thorough treatment. Here I will focus on the relationships among some of them, particularly as they apply to professional executive and business coaches. I encourage you to review the elaborations on the NBME website.

Leadership

As professionals we exercise leadership within the profession and in relation to the people we coach. Lest you quickly jump to a heroic notion of leadership with the coach riding a big white horse, let’s take a moment to appreciate the idea of leadership as an emergent phenomenon.

In any system – organizational or coaching relationship – leadership emerges from individual and system dynamics, including the interplay between these. For example, in the coaching relationship leadership emerges in the field infused by the beliefs and capacities of coach and client and may shift from moment to moment. (Additional writing on this subject may be found at www.leadcoach.com/archives.)

It is in this shared field of leadership that altruism, responsibility and the other variables identified by NBME arise. Consequently, the professionalism of the coach shows up in this shared field of leadership. But one might ask, leadership toward what? It is here where Mike Jay’s notion of  RightAction™ is useful.

Right Action

Professionalism is about emergent leadership producing RightAction™ and involves

            the right people,

            doing the right thing,

            at the right time,

            in the right way,

            for the right reasons,

            with the right results.

What constitutes “right” in a coaching relationship is discovered through emergent leadership. It is about “right” emerging from both coach and client in such a way that each perspective for “right” engages, thrives and evolves in that relationship with corresponding action by both coach and client.

Notice that what is “right” is internal to coach and client. It is a standard, a judgment, a value or an inkling of attunement and alignment in the relationship between behavior and results. What is right for the client may or may not be right for the coach. Professionalism on the part of the coach is about holding right action for the coaching relationship while not letting one’s own standards of right action get imposed on the client.

Such a perspective shifts a bit our notion of professionalism in coaching. It touches on responsibility and accountability. In the coaching relationship that is held by the client. But does that leave the coach irresponsible and unaccountable? Not likely.

The Professional Relationship

The coach is responsible and accountable for sustaining a professional relationship with the client. This means bringing respect, honor and integrity, knowledge and excellence and/or caring into the relationship to support and not impede right action on the part of the client.

Coaching right action then is about creating right results for the client by the client and for the client. Coaching professionalism supports this.

Note this advice on professionalism:

"It is the attitude and ability to make things go right regardless of circumstances.

“Let's us look at what this means:

“It means you, as a personal attitude always look at ways to make happen what you want to make happen, rather than look for excuses which others might accept.

• The professional is not only professional in one area of life but in most or all areas of life.

• Professionals spend time to make sure she [sic] understands the purpose of an undertaking.”

This interpretation was offered by Niels Kjellerup in Hong Kong in 1999 as part of a training program for Chinese who were beginning work in a call center: http://www.callcentres.com.au/Coaching%20note1.htm. If we allow that the purpose is about right action it seems that this could apply pretty well to coaches, too.

The professionalism of executive and business coaches means engaging in the emergence of leadership in all areas of our lives and supporting client right action through their emergent leadership.