All posts by : admin

Bakhtiar Khawaja
Executive Coach & CEO
Coaching Resolve

1. An Introduction to Executive/Leadership Coaching

In these challenging times and a rapidly changing business environment, high performing leaders, who can empower, inspire and connect people, are in short supply. In response, high performing organizations systematically invest in their leadership development programs. More and more of them consider Leadership Coaching as a high leverage strategic investment, which strengthens and empowers their leaders. Organizations routinely invest heavily in leadership development. Much of this investment goes towards traditional learning and development efforts. During the last few years, many organizations have started to use one-on-one coaching, either on its own, or in conjunction with learning interventions.

“In a recent study, training alone improved leadership skills by 22%. When combined with Executive Coaching, improvement jumped to 77%.” Fortune

What is Executive / Leadership Coaching

Executive Coaching and Leadership Coaching are generally used to mean the same thing. However, there is a fine difference. Leadership Coaching is a wider term, which includes owners of small to medium sized businesses, senior management of non-profit organizations, corporate leaders, administrative and political leadership. Executive Coaching generally refers to senior management of large corporations.

It is also important to differentiate between Counseling, Consulting, Mentoring and Coaching. We sometimes confuse these terms, leading to a misunderstanding about which of the interventions is called for in a given situation. Counseling (or therapy) is for people with deep-rooted behavioural issues, which only a trained psychologist is qualified to conduct. We commonly hear about managers counseling their errant employees. What they are probably doing is training or advising them on appropriate behaviours.

Consulting is done by capable and experienced consultants ‘in a specific line of business or area of organizational work’. Based on their expertise and experience they analyze an organization’s current situation and chalk out strategies for the future, usually with active involvement of company subject specialists.

Mentoring is usually done in-house, by senior leaders within the organization. These leaders primarily share their own experiences and guide younger professionals towards higher levels of performance. Taking advantage of their senior positions, ‘Mentors’ can also be instrumental in opening doors for their ‘Mentees’.

Coaching is unique in that it proposes to empower the ‘Coachees’ by helping them unleash their own creative powers, leading to sustainable learning and behavior change. Coaching often leads to transforming Coachees to become more balanced and productive employees.

Executive & Leadership Coaching produces extraordinary results with high performing leaders, as well as with those who need to bridge performance gaps. If called for, coaches employ a range of diagnostic tools to provide the person being coached with the insight and awareness needed to create a meaningful Personal Development Plan with measurable goals. A mutually agreed combination of face-to-face and Skype-based coaching sessions is helping aspiring leaders from around the world build a path to success without the high cost of travel or absence from the office. Executive Coaches help leaders transform themselves into great leaders. They also assist today’s managers become tomorrow’s leaders by working with them individually to build skills, resolve daily issues and integrate new behaviors. Leaders undergoing coaching often remark how great it is to have a knowledgeable and trustworthy coach in their corner.

Executive Coaching not only delivers results but it also prevents problems. It brings about positive behavior change over time. We support this change in a safe and confidential environment. Executive gain new insight into the key capabilities necessary to achieve their desired results. The one-on-one coaching relationship is designed to encourage proactivity, purposeful dialogue, create new insight, develop new knowledge and skills, and spur personal growth.

By becoming proactive, executives can confidently explore their vision, bring projects to completion and investigate new opportunities. Sharing with someone from outside the organization offers a strictly confidential venue for you to receive an objective perspective. Since coaches have no personal agenda, you gain a true partner in helping you achieve what is most meaningful.

In order to benefit from executive coaching, YOU as a leader have to:

• Be willing to change and give it your 100%
• Be open to constructive criticism
• Listen and discover yourself by welcoming honest feedback

An executive coach helps you take charge of your reality: not dance around it. We require that you ask yourself difficult questions like ‘who are you’ and ‘what do you want’. This requires time and it all depends on how eager you are to change.

The central question for CEOs and HR/OD departments is: “How to find a knowledgeable and qualified coach in whose care you can entrust your company’s most prized assets – members of your leadership team”? Coaching is a relatively new leadership development system, and is largely unregulated. Any number of people can start calling themselves ‘Coaches’ and start offering coaching services. Some of them may actually be doing a reasonably good job! But how can one be sure? It must be challenging for companies looking for coaching services to find the right coach. Despair not – help is on the way. I’ll try to make things simpler for you.

‘Coaches’ Without Systematic Training and Accreditation The only issue with such coaches is that you can never be sure of what they are offering. In all probability, they are offering a combination of training, consulting and coaching. Not a bad combination, you may think. The problem here is that, when coached by these coaches, the sustainable development, empowerment, self-discovery and behavioural change that ‘coaching’ can bring, may elude your leaders. Solution: Find a coach whose expertise you can trust because he/she is properly trained, certified and credentialed by reputable and renowned coaching institutions.

Training and Certification

You are in luck! There are a large number of coach-training institutions offering a variety of training options for would-be coaches. Predictably, the quality and duration of these training courses varies from one institution to another. When a coach-training institution offers a three-day training course (or two-day, or even one-day), it will issue a certificate of ‘attendance’ or ‘successful completion’ of the said course. With this certificate in hand, the course participants earn the right to call themselves ‘certified coaches’. Two more questions arise:

• Is there a way to find out about the curriculum, teachers and overall quality of the training institution?
• Are three days enough time for a participant to learn and practise the art of coaching to qualify for your attention as a coach for your leaders?

Unlikely! This brings us back to square one.

Approved / Accredited Training Institutions by a ‘Coaching Body’

Brilliant! Let’s find a supra-coaching body – an association or federation, which oversees the work of coach training institutions, giving them some measure of credibility. There are many – all claiming to be torch bearers for a noble cause. The question that arises here is about the standing of the coaching association itself. Don’t take me wrong – they may be doing a good job. But a lingering doubt remains. More questions:

• What subject matter should be taught during training?
• What is an appropriate duration of coaching training?
• How much experience should a coach have to qualify for your attention?

Enter the International Coach Federation (ICF)

Now we are talking. Don’t take me wrong. I do not represent ICF in any way – but it IS the largest, one of the oldest and the best organized coaching body. ICF has over 30,000 member coaches. (Criteria for becoming a member are quite stiff). It sets standards, accredits and monitors coach-training institutions. It has put together a list of 70 core competencies it wants its accredited institutions to teach, plus a Code of Conduct it wants all member coaches to adhere to. That is why certificates issued by institutions accredited by ICF have a greater value and credibility. However, some questions remain – how much training and experience should a coach have? Who is to decide?

Let’s Go One Step Further! ICF Credentials

The questions raised above have been answered by ICF. Its top decision makers have made things easier for corporate HR / OD departments. Coaches who have successfully completed a coach training programme of a duration of 125 hours or more, and have completed a total of 100 (or more) hours of documented coaching, qualify to apply for ICF’s ACC (Associate Certified Coach) credential. However, this credential needs to be renewed after completing additional mandatory training. It doesn’t stop here – there are higher level credentials. After amassing 750 hours of coaching experience, you qualify for PCC (Professional Certified Coach) credential. The ultimate credential is the MCC (Master Certified Coach), which requires 2,000 hours of coaching experience, 200 hours of approved training, 10 hours of Mentor Coaching and a couple of other performance evaluation measures.

So, if your selected coach has earned an ICF credential, you can be assured that he/she has undergone required training, supervision and has passed a standardised practicle exam. Plus a minimum level of coaching experience has also been verified.

Other Coaching Bodies

To be fair with other coaching associations, many of them have also set standards and criteria for membership and credentialing process, though their following is in no way comparable to ICF. The more prominent of those (that I have discovered so far) are:

• International Association of Coaching
• Association for Coaching
• Association for Professional Executive Coaching and Supervision
• European Mentoring and Coaching Council

Experience and exposure of Coaches:

Having settled the matter of coach-training, certification and credentials, let’s move on to the matter of experience and exposure of coaches. Unlike a consultant, who is an expert in his/her particular field, and prescribes standardized solutions based on his/her knowledge and experience, coaches are primarily experts in coaching skills. (We already know how to verify approved coach training, certification and credentials).

Coaches believe that clients are the real experts in their respective fields. What a coach does is to empower them, support and guide them to crystalize their solutions and then helps them implement those solutions. This he/she does by removing real or imaginary barriers, by clarifying a client’s beliefs and by helping him/her discover and modify disempowering underlying beliefs. From this point of view, a coach doesn’t need to have technical or professional knowledge or skill of a client’s industry or trade. However, it helps if a coach has professional experience and life exposure to match that of a client. For instance, take Mr. A, a certified and credentialed coach with long corporate experience, who is being considered for coaching a senior corporate executive. He will definitely have an edge over other coaches if he has ‘been there’, by way of having worked in senior level corporate assignments during his professional experience in the past. Mr. B, a young and relatively inexperienced, yet certified and credentialed coach, may be able to do a good job of executive coaching. However, it may be too much to expect that he will command the same level of credibility, trust and success, as Mr. A does.

(Bakhtiar Khawaja, ACC, is Senior Executive Coach ↦ CEO with ‘Coaching Resolve’)

The anomaly of high number of votes and low number of seats Can it be removed, or at least minimized?

‘Electoral Reform’ is in the air in Pakistan, albeit with a narrow focus of minimizing electoral fraud. While in the reform mode, I would emphasize expanding the scope of reform to include three essential elements:

1. Moving towards a Proportional Representation system, thus ensuring that votes cast by the ultimate sovereign – the voters, do not go waste, and that proportion of votes gained by a party translates into proportionate number of seats won by them. Other benefits of PR system are explained on page 4 under ‘Benefits of PR’.
2. Bring in technology to enhance security, speed and convenience of the voting process, leading to digital voting and real time tabulation of results. Our talented IT professionals will be delighted to provide required hardware and software solutions and IMF and ADB would gladly finance the reform process.
3. Eliminating (or at least minimizing) electoral fraud – before, during and after to elections. Technology can play an important role here as well.

Our focus in this article will mainly be on Proportional Representation – something which is not getting the attention it deserves.

It is imperative to honour the voting public’s decision regarding their choice of candidates and political parties. Divergence between votes gained and seats won, as well as wastage of millions of votes needs to be done away with as soon as possible. The wastage of votes consists of votes cast for losing candidates and surplus votes bagged by winning candidates over and above the number they needed to win. Both signify a huge disrespect to voters and to the electoral process.

Proposals for tackling all related issues will no doubts be debated thoroughly before being finalized and passed on for framing legislation. Those who have benefitted from the present system should not be allowed to dominate the debate. If necessary, experts should be hired from mature European democracies to benefit from their long experience with proportional representation.

The bar chart below (courtesy daily Dawn) illustrates the disconnect between votes cast for a political party and the percentage of seats the party won. PML won 35% of votes cast and 45.2% of seats. PPP won 15.7% of votes, but only 11.8% of seats, while PTI won 17.8% of votes, but 9.6% of seats.

The writer has calculated this discrepancy in another way by interpreting data on total number of votes and seats won by the three parties:

Total votes cast for the three parties: 29,465,276. Total seats won by them: 246

PML-N needs to keep in mind that in the future, when they participate in elections for national assembly as an opposition party, under the present electoral process, they will suffer the same disadvantages that PPP and PTI have suffered – proportionally more votes than seats.

The discrepancy works both ways. In Sind, for example, PPP won significantly more seats than their vote bank warranted, while PML-N gained less seats than they could have under a more equitable system. PTI got totally wiped out in Sind, although they gained 7.7% of votes cast and deserved a 7.7% share of seats there. Similarly, in KPK and Baluchistan, PML-N might have gained more seats under a PR regime.

In Punjab, both PPP and PTI suffered major setbacks, while PMLN gained at their expense. The charts below (courtesy Dawn News) quantify this phenomenon clearly for the national assembly and for provincial assemblies of Sind and Punjab.

These discrepancies are really a slap on the face of voters, who took all kinds of troubles to register as voters and then present themselves through long waits and discomfort of the voting process – only to find out later that their candidate lost and the thousand of votes cast for their candidate and his party have gone waste. This is really painful to realize that had they voted for the next best candidate on their list, he would have won. The end result of this is a feeling in the mind of the voter that the system is unjust and unfair, and there is nothing one can do about it. This in many cases leads to apathy towards the political process and frustration against politicians in general.

What is the way out? The multi-party electoral reform commission constituted must start working on a wider reform agenda than just focusing on fraud and corruption in the electoral process. A prime candidate for inclusion in the agenda is ‘proportional representation’. Moving away from the current single seat constituency (with its first-past-the-post system) and towards a ‘proportional representation’ system has many benefits as elucidate below.

Proportional Representation (PR) System
The basic principles underlying proportional representation elections are that all voters deserve representation and that all political groups in society deserve to be represented in our legislatures in proportion to their strength in the electorate. In other words, everyone should have the right to fair representation.

Benefits of PR
The strongest argument for PR is that it is better able to produce a representative legislature. For a new democracy like ours, the inclusion of all significant groups in the legislature is an essential condition for democratic consolidation. If both minorities and majorities do not have opportunities to gain representation through a fair electoral system, they may attempt seeking power through illegal means, or totally opt out of the system. This sows seeds of discontent and feelings of victimhood among those who win sizable number of votes but few seats – making for a poor quality national polity where diversity is not only not encouraged, but effectively suppressed.

PR systems in general are praised for the way in which they:

1. Faithfully translate votes cast into seats won, whereby small parties can have their voice heard in the legislature.
2. Encourage or require the formation of political parties or groups of like-minded candidates to put forward lists. This may clarify policy, ideology, or leadership differences within society.
3. Give rise to very few wasted votes. This increases the voters’ perception that it is worth making the trip to the polling booth at election time, as they can be more confident that their vote will make a difference to the election outcome, however small.
4. Facilitate minority parties’ access to representation. This fulfills the principle of inclusion, which can be crucial to stability in polarized societies like ours.
5. The incentive under PR systems is to maximize the overall vote regardless of where those votes might come from. Every vote, even from areas where a party is electorally weak, goes towards gaining another seat.
6. Restrict the growth of ‘regional fiefdoms’. Because PR systems reward minority parties with seats that they deserve, they are less likely to lead to situations where a single party holds all the seats in a given province or district. This can be particularly important to minorities in a province, which may not have significant regional concentrations or alternative points of access to power.
7. Lead to greater continuity and stability of policy. The West European experience suggests that parliamentary PR systems score better with regard to governmental longevity, voter participation, and economic performance. They discourage ideological polarization of the first-past-the-post system, which makes long-term economic planning more difficult. Broad PR coalition governments help engender a stability and coherence in decision making which allow for national development.
8. Make power sharing between parties and interest groups more visible and offer a better hope that decisions will be taken in the public eye and by a more inclusive cross-section of the society.

Criticism of PR is generally based around the tendency of PR systems to give rise to coalition governments and a fragmented party system. The arguments most often cited against PR are that it leads to coalition governments, legislative gridlock and fragmentation of the party system. The fact that most European countries, with long history of stable democratic tradition, use some form of PR system indicates that the benefits of PR systems far outweigh these perceived flaws. Recent events in Islamabad have also demonstrated that a majority in parliament with disgruntled opposition parties who see the electoral system as unfair, has led us nowhere.

How Proportional Representation Elections Work

We in Pakistan are used to our single-member constituencies, winner-take-all style of elections. We’ve become accustomed to a system where we elect members of our legislatures singly in relatively small areas, with the winner being the candidate with the highest number of votes cast in that constituency. This system seems so “natural” that proportional representation (PR) elections may at first appear a bit strange to us. Adding to the potential confusion is the fact that there are several different kinds of PR systems in use around the world. But in reality, the principles underlying proportional representation systems are very straightforward and all of the systems are easy to use.

The Basic Principles of PR
The basic principles underlying proportional representation elections are that all voters deserve representation and that all political groups in society deserve to be represented in our legislatures in proportion to their strength in the electorate. In other words, everyone should have the right to fair representation. Primary characteristics of PR systems are:

1. In order to achieve this fair representation, all PR systems have certain basic characteristics that set them apart from our current election system. First, they all use multi-member constituencies. Instead of electing one person in each constituency, as we do here in Pakistan, several people are elected in mega-constituencies (or electoral districts). These multi-member constituencies may be relatively small, with only three or four seats, or they may be larger, with ten or more seats.
2. The second characteristic of all PR systems is that they divide up the seats in these multi-member constituencies according to the proportion of votes received by the various parties or groups running candidates. Thus if the candidates of a party win 40% of the vote in a 10 member constituency, they receive four of the ten seats, or 40% of the seats. If another party wins 20% of the vote, they get two seats, and so on.

That, in a nutshell, is how proportional representation works. But while all PR systems have the same goals of ensuring that all voters receive some representation and that all groups are represented fairly, various systems do have different ways of achieving these goals. So it is helpful to see how different kinds of PR systems work in practice.

Types of PR Systems

1. Party List Voting
Party list voting systems are by far the most common form of proportional representation. Over 80% of the PR systems used worldwide are some form of party list voting. It remains the system used in most European democracies.

How It Works
Legislators are elected in large, multi-member constituencies. Each party puts up a list or group of candidates equal to the number of seats in the constituency. On the ballot, voters indicate their preference for a particular party and the parties then receive seats in proportion to their share of the vote. So in a five-seat constituency, if PML-N wins 40% of the vote, they would win two of the five seats. The two PML-N candidates would be chosen according to their position on the list.

There are two broad types of list systems: closed list and open list.

Closed Party List Ballot
In a closed list system, the original form of party list voting, the party fixes the order in which the candidates are listed and elected, and the voter simply casts a vote for the party as a whole. Voters are not able to indicate their preference for any candidates on the list, but must accept the list in the order presented by the party. Winning candidates are selected in the exact order they appear on the original list. So if PML-N won two seats, the first two candidates on the pre-ordered list – Mr. X and Ms Y- would be elected.

Open Party List Ballot
Most European democracies now use the open list form of party list voting. This approach allows voters to express a preference for particular candidates, not just parties. It is designed to give voters some say over the order of the list and thus which candidates get elected. Voters are presented with unordered or random lists of candidates chosen in the party’s internal election process. Voters cannot vote for a party directly, but must cast a vote for an individual candidate. This vote counts for the specific candidate as well as for the party. So the order of the final list completely depends on the number of votes won by each candidate on the list. The most popular candidates rise to the top of the list and have a better chance of being elected.

Actual Allocation of Seats to the Parties – the Largest Remainder Formula
A variety of different formulas exist for accomplishing the actual allocation of seats to the parties. One of the simplest seat allocation formulas is the called the “largest remainder formula.” In this approach, the first step is to calculate number of votes necessary for a candidate to get elected. After the first allocation of seats is complete than the remainder votes for parties are compared and the parties with the largest remainders are allocated the remaining seats.

2. Mixed-Member Proportional Voting

Mixed-member proportional representation goes by a variety of other names, including “the additional member system,” “compensatory PR,” and “the German system.” It is an attempt to combine a single-member constituency system with a proportional voting system. Half of the members of the legislature are elected in single-member constituency contests. The other half are elected by a party list vote and added on to the constituency members so that each party has its appropriate share of seats in the legislature. Proponents claim that mixed-member proportional voting (MMP) is the best of both worlds. It provides the geographical representation and close constituency ties of our current system, along with the fairness and diversity of representation that comes with PR voting.

3. Single Transferable Vote Or Choice Voting

This system of proportional representation is known by several names. Political scientists call it “the Single Transferable Vote (STV).” It is also known by the name “Choice Voting.”

How It Works
All candidates in a multi-seat constituency are listed on a single ballot paper. Instead of voting for one person, voters rank each candidate in their order of choice – from number1 onwards, in priority order of candidates. You can rank as few or as many as you want.

Choice Voting Ballot
As the name “single transferable vote” implies, this systems involves a process of transferring votes. In the first step Candidates who win the first choice minimum required votes are declared elected. Any excess votes these winners have, are then transferred to the second choice candidates as marked by the voters, rather than being wasted. Further, candidate with least chance of winning are also eliminated and their votes also transferred to voters’ second choices. This counting process continues until the required number of winners emerge.

Ballot Count and Transfer Process
This transfer process is a bit complicated, so why does it exist? The transfer process was invented primarily to reduce the problem of wasted votes  – votes that are cast but do not actually elect anyone. Our current system routinely wastes large numbers of votes and this is why they are prone to such problems as party misrepresentation, and the underrepresentation of political minorities, racial minorities, and women. This also leads to a sense of betrayal experienced by the electorate, which may be partly responsible for the ‘Dharna’ in Islamabad in August-September 2014. STV system acknowledges that there are two kinds of wasted votes: votes for candidates that stand little chance of winning, and votes in excess of what a winning candidate needs. Transferring these votes to their next ranked choice makes it more likely that they will actually contribute to the election of a candidate.

For the Voting Public, PR Systems are Simpler Than They Look
Again, to Pakistani eyes, the various PR systems often appear at first to be complex and confusing. And while the mechanics of seat allocation can sometimes be complicated, the actual voting process is not intimidating at all and can be easily utilized by the average Pakistani citizen. Voting is done only once and the calculation process is done subsequently – preferably by automated computer systems. Voters need not understand all the mathematics of these systems to use them effectively.  To use an analogy:  you don’t have to understand how all the electronic components in your cell phone work in order to use it to make calls.

The party list system, the mixed-member system, and the choice vote have all been used for decades in Western democracies. Voters in these countries have had no trouble using these systems, as indicated by the very high voters turnout rates that these PR countries enjoy. Certainly we could expect that Pakistani voters would easily master the use of these systems as well.

References:

1. How Proportional Representation Elections work, by Douglas J. Amy
2. Wikipedia
3. Dawn News (Archives)
4. The News (Sunday Aug.31 & Sep.7, 2014)