Executive Coaching in a Cross-Cultural Context
A Critique The article reviewed discusses the topic of cross-cultural interaction within the context of executive coaching. This combined topic article consists of three different sections: “The Role of Culture” (hypotheses), “Coaching across Cultures,” and the theoretical “Development Pipeline.” These three sections help the reader to understand the writer’s two points: one that cross cultures do not play as such a significant factor in individualistic business transactions, such as executive coaching, as one might expect and second, that understanding cultural differences may actually enrich the coaching experience. After reading this article my position would have to be placed within the sphere of agreement with the author that cross cultures do intend to play a significant role in the group context, but within an individual context, play a lesser role (yet still existent). I believe I have come to this conclusion on the basis of the concept that both supports and contradicts cultural assimilation—environmental influence. It is easy to understand that being in a certain environment influences the way in which certain cultures emerge and thrive differently, which is why we have such concepts like “high and low context cultures.” However, environmental influence also can be applied on an individual level which might influence separate people, even within the same culture, to behave differently. Article author, David Peterson gives a living illustration of this principle in action in the situation of a workshop where there where an audience of “American, British, and Japanese human resource executives” was discussing amongst themselves. Peterson observed that while Americans are culturally known for being outspoken and Japanese being culturally known as being reserved, “the individual who most dominated the