Creating a 'speak-up' culture

Sports organisations – like all types of organisation – recruit the best talent they can. But there is no guarantee that those talented people can work together effectively. Like any workplace, our organisations depend on good relationships between people as the lubricant in sometimes complex systems of managing performance and results. 

There are always going to be moments of strain and difficulty in working relationships, and possibly even more so in competitive, performance-focused environments. 

When difficult relationships are allowed to become the norm, go unquestioned and take root in the prevailing culture, then performance over time is always going to be adversely affected — even if some types of behaviour seem to be delivering better results in the short-term, this is likely only storing up bigger, unsustainable problems for the future.

Yet, far from nipping problems in the bud, organisations often fail to have in place mechanisms for redress and allow issues to escalate, compounded by a climate that gives little confidence to their people as to how serious concerns will be received. In a survey of 40,000 employees, US workplace consultant Emtrain found that 83% of respondents would not report harassment if they saw it and 41% did not feel confident that management would take seriously a complaint of this nature. Many problems needn't get this far.

 

Clearing the air

There has to be a positive culture of good communication, understanding and rapport. And on a day-to-day level this is based around open conversations between people, where everyone, at every level, feels able to speak up and talk about their concerns, about any issues with relationships — without feeling there is a threat of consequences in terms of their standing or reputation in the team or organisation more widely. 

Speaking up needs to be a ‘normal’ part of the way an organisation works. In other words, a grown-up culture with informal channels of support, where people can clear the air and move on without having to resort to formal grievance procedures, whistleblowing or legal interventions.

There are obvious challenges to making this kind of culture a reality. Take performance coaching in our sector as an example. Coaches themselves often come from sports backgrounds and may not have all the skills required to handle difficult conversations. Sometimes, they can merely replicate the culture that they themselves were brought up in as athletes, and so the system is perpetuated. Athletes are often young, without the experience to necessarily know what is and is not acceptable in the context of their sport, and without any experience of where they should start in terms of speaking up. They might feel uniquely vulnerable, with their current and future standing contingent on the favour of those about whom they wish to raise an issue. This power imbalance is problematic. As a result, there might be fear of what might happen, what talking about problems means for their prospects. While selection policies, for example, will be based on objective data and weighting based on performances, there will also be a subjective element, especially when it comes to teams and team roles.

There is often little preparation among coaching staff for initiating and handling difficult conversations like those around deselection — a situation which will happen to almost every athlete at some stage in their career. There is a need for a system where mistakes (in how people deal with difficult times, their behaviours and manner and use of language) can be recognised and ‘owned’ because both coaches and athletes are likely to make those kinds of mistakes.

This is not solely a coach-athlete dynamics, however. These sorts of relationships manifest in all parts of an organisation, in all walks of life.

 

A ‘speak up’ system 

What is needed is a range of informal options for everyone within an organisation: athletes and coaches, all staff and volunteers. This should be proactively publicised and made familiar to all so that it feels like an everyday part of the offering rather than only necessary for the most serious issues and conflict. Moreover, this should be supported with clear leadership and advocacy from the top of the organisation.

There are a number of digital platforms that allow people to flag concerns as simply as using their smartphone. This makes it easy for athletes, coaches and employees to at least start a conversation, and for issues to be dealt with early, and only escalated if necessary. Critically though, it is still vitally important that users are able to ‘take ownership’ of their feelings and not simply assume that messaging and sharing via a digital platform is in itself a solution to more complicated issues within a relationship.

Mediation — the use of an independent third party to support people in finding agreement and reconciliation — is a fundamental offering in terms of reaching informal resolutions in a constructive way. Interactive mediation is based on the idea that people in conflict need to interact directly with one another in order to restore communication, rebuild relationships and resolve the issues that are in dispute. People are invited to say what they need from the other party, and are encouraged to really hear one another, rather than simply say what they think of each another.

 

A platform of trust

But making a speak-up offering work isn’t just about taking a hard line on cases of poor behaviours and merely advertising the practical channels through which to make reports. Again, it is about the culture of the organisation and working to improve feelings of trust and openness. Otherwise, people can feel even less likely to speak up — because the stakes have been raised, the repercussions of bullying, harassment or other negative behaviour have been emphasised. With the pressure on, rather than changing their behaviours, people can become more careful, perhaps more passive aggressive, in how they go about bullying, for example. Staff in people management roles need to be equipped with the conversation skills and wider soft skills that help them deal with ‘difficult’ conversations in constructive ways. 

Most of all, conflict should be seen within organisations as having the potential to be positive. It shouldn’t be denied, ignored or shut down without an effort to understand what the conflict is, the actual causes and consequences. Ultimately, conflict can often be the spur for change, a better way of doing things, a new collaboration, a fresh start.

A positive culture, it could be argued - where there’s a shared sense of trust and confidence in processes, and where everyone knows they will be respected and listened to – is more critical in sports than any other ‘workplace’, the source of a strong supply of the kinds of marginal gains that will always keep on making the difference between winning and losing.

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Sam Little is Head of New Business & Sports Services at workplace relationships specialists, CMP. She was formerly Head of Athlete Support at the British Athletes Commission and Workplace Grievance and Conflict Resolution Manager with the British Army.

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