#98: Ashana Crichton – The Potential for True Partnership if We Pay Attention to Power

Being made redundant 18 months after moving to America transformed Ashana Crichton’s life because, in her own words, when you take away the security blanket you have to leap into something new.

In this episode of The Coach’s Journey Podcast, Ashana fondly recalls having the rug pulled from under her feet, because it set her on the path to becoming a certified Master Executive Coach and the founder of Arc Growth, which cultivates spaces of shared belonging for influential leaders and under-represented mid-career professionals.

Having returned to her native London after five years abroad, Ashana issues a plea to remove the stigma around the term ‘life coaching’ in the UK, which she sees as a barrier to inclusivity and accessibility, and she shares reflections from her groundbreaking work with the Diverse Executive Coaches Network.

Ashana delivers coaching and consultancy to businesses wishing to progress diversity, equity and inclusion, and here she offers crucial insights on the way biases and power imbalances can impact coaching relationships, along with practical guidance on how to address them.

This episode is a manifesto for the power of working in true partnership with our clients, as Ashana illuminates the vast potential of knowledge, experience and inspiration that can be shared when we create the conditions for coaching’s unique value exchange.

In this episode, Ashana and host Alex Whitton also talk about:

• How to allow time for context to emerge before asking questions that can overwhelm our clients

• Unexpected responses and how to harness them in supervision

• The benefits of doing a lot of things and not expecting anything from them!

• Reverse-mentoring programmes, where leaders are signed up to be mentored by a team member with a different lived experience

Towards the end of this episode, Ashana shares the tools, skills and approaches she uses to continually further her personal and professional development, and expand her already broad horizons.

THINGS WE TALKED ABOUT THAT YOU MIGHT BE INTERESTED IN:

- The Association for Coaching https://www.associationforcoaching.com/

- Alex Whitton on the Coach’s Journey Podcast https://www.thecoachsjourney.com/podcast/episode-64-alex-whitton-balancing-the-being-and-the-doing

- The Bridging Project https://www.thebridgingproject.co.uk/

- The Diverse Executive coaches network https://diverseexecutivecoaches.co.uk/

- Hay, J (2007) Reflective Practice and Supervision for Coaches. Open University Press https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=lV-wefs6JoUC