The Universal Coach for the Universal Citizen with Osama Al Mosa

Hello, my name is Tracy Sinclair. Welcome to Coaching in Conversation. Coaching in Conversation is a chance to discuss and explore, not just how we can keep developing and evolving as coach practitioners, but also to consider how coaching is evolving and its future potential and place as a powerful vehicle for human development in today's and tomorrow's world. I'll be sharing some of my own thoughts on these topics. And we will also hear from some great guests from around the world who bring their unique experience and perspectives. This time I'm joined by a great colleague called Osama, who, apart from having a wonderful set of credentials, is also a marvelous human being. A summer apart from a very impressive academic background in business management, psychology, pharma sciences also has a very extensive professional background. He's a master certified coach with the ICF. He holds a team credential. He holds EMCC qualifications in coaching, and he also operates as an ICF mentor. An ICF assessor, he has an ICF accredited coach training school and has also had an extensive career in various industries and Fortune 100 businesses. What also really attracts me to Osama is actually him as a human being amidst all of his qualifications. Experience and credibility, which he absolutely has, and the reputation that comes with it. He's a very thoughtful, a very sensitive, a very intelligent and insightful man who is a deep thinker and is also very, very humble. And talking to him is always such a great pleasure to just get inside some of the thinking that he has. He's also. A lot of his time to supporting the development and the the growth of coaching in the MENA region, the Middle East, North Africa region. And has been a a president of the ICF chapter in Jordan and has spearheaded and is involved in many, many initiatives around being in service of, not just of coaching, but also of coaching in the Arab. And many other related initiatives. So Osama works tirelessly to really support not just his region, but this profession and also how that profession is being deployed and is evolving globally. So I've called this conversation with Osama, the Universal Coach for the Universal Citizen. I hope you enjoy. Well, Osama, thank you so much for joining me this evening. I'm conscious that it's further into your evening even than it is for mine. So I really appreciate you taking the time to have a conversation with me. I've always enjoyed the conversations we've had before, and I don't know as always where this conversation is going to go. I'm trusting it will go somewhere fruitful. I believe it will. But I'll start by asking you the question that I have asked everyone so far, which is not so much what got you into coaching, but what keeps you into coaching? What is it about coaching that that still compels you today? Thank you Tracy. I appreciate it. I also tell you whenever we had the chance to talk, I appreciate the insights you brought into conversation and thank you for the first year pouring in to help the community of coaching. Yeah, I can focus on this, but also it's nice to like, go into the, the roots of how did it happen? Yeah. It's funny, I like to share it and I was not that smart when I picked it up, to be honest. So, not that I was a visionary person who went on something because the future is there. No, the story is. Around the following, I used to work for fortune hundred. I used to be like businessman pushing for revenues and dollars, and, and that was for more or less 18 years. And then there was a moment during 2011 around shall I decide upon my party or my principal? And if I, if I was in the same situation maybe five, 10 years before that put in a different way, but in 2011, I decided to go with, with my principle. Yeah. Call it whether that was certain maturity level, certain fulfillment level, I'm not sure, but all in all, the decision at that moment to us to leave the corporation and then I started to search what should I. I jumped during those 18 years within different countries, leading teams. Again, pushing for revenues. I operated and covered countries within Africa, the Middle East, and then I thought of what to do. I'm back into my home country with Jordan. What came in mind is I needed to give back. I needed to give that experience back to leaders, to organizations, and all I knew at that time is about mentor mentorship. So I said, yes, let's go for it. I'll do like my own setup to do mentorship programs. And if you go back to look into the archive in the closet and of the company, then you see I started with two programs. One that I called Start Mentor. So I mentor who are to start their career and the other program was employment. Someone who's already employed who went into a shift. Career progress. Yeah. But then I started searching to how can I qualify myself further and mentor and mentoring competencies. So like be skillful. And there, during my search, I came across coaching. And for me before, coaching was like a skill. We used to do managers just to support employees development. Yeah. Never knew about coaching as a standalone and I got fascinated with to help someone without playing the role of that, you know, at all. That's nice. So I went there, I said, let me explore further. I got my training and that was frustrating for me. I said after all those years, and my background, my first degree was from the medical field and pharmaceutical health sciences. And so no, that is too non-scientific for. It's, it took about the other side of using the right brain. And no more into methodical thinking or No, no, no, no, no. So then I left. I said, no, this seems like something is for me. But then I cannot recall how it happened, but I came across a research around the brain function and neuroscience and I talked about coaching. I said, oh, it's different now. There is scientific days. So I went again and I did training again and said, oh, now it, I found, I found that I wanted and I realized I needed to work a lot on myself, a businessman who used to push. I wanted to like, Achieved the target two or three months before the end of the year, and now I need to, to do it without pushing. So I needed to, to work harder on myself. And I realize the less, the less I get and the, I mean, the less I do, the better it gets for me, the more I push myself to unlearn those things that I like being habitualize with the better I feel. And you ask me, what keeps you in this? Now we are coming to it, it's strength based. I can just look simply at coaching. It's a learning and development. Methodology. It's one of a long list of others. Yeah. But for me, by now, I have this split. I put all learning and development modalities in one basket. They're all deficiency list. They're all about quick fixing. They're all about telling what to be done, but not coaching. Coaching is a strength-based methodology, and this is the beauty of it. This is what keeps me there. I can see the growth in people, awareness in people education and people consciousness and people how do they relate through the exposure that we get from it? Mobile call it, name the reasons, and then it's not like before. So how can we use this wealth of knowledge that people have? And this is what keeps me in coaching. I can see, I can see the great potential of leaders my time with executives and leaders and leadership teams. So I can see it's much of the investment used to be in around need assessment to train people in points of de. how about to invest in utilizing people's strength more? And this is where I see, I see the beauty of coaching. I don't discount the importance and the impact of other methodologies and modalities, but this is a new ambition that's really fascinating. Fascinating. I also recall that the best impact and return on investment from training was 2%. And you, for sure, you came across that too. When they added coaching, it reached up to 88%, which something I see in my day-to-day practice. And the, that's it for me.. That's fantastic. And there's something really resonating with me your summer from what you just said, and it's this concept of unlearning, I'm learning the traditional ways of how we approach development, how we approach growth and learning, et cetera. And I was just thinking about, given where the world has been in the last two, you know, odd years on many levels, not just a pandemic, but many other disruptive or quite, you know, evolutionary or revolutionary changes that are happening in the world. It strikes me at least that our capacity for unlearning is more needed than ever before because we've realized. There is a naivety perhaps to think that the world would just go back to quote unquote normal, that we have to somehow create a new normal that we are provoked and evoked to, to create something new. And to do that, it presupposes a need to unlearn and let go of some of those traditional ways of thinking, being, doing, et cetera. What, what are your thoughts, therefore, on the opportunity for coaching, particularly now, given, given some of those complexities of where we are in the world? What is your perspective on that? Yeah, thank you for asking. This is a great question. And I see coaching is beyond just profession, beyond just of learning and development modality. I see it. It's like way of living. Yeah. When we talk about diversity, we cannot paint with one color. Any painting. There are more than one color. So how having, having a universal citizen, I think it's, An ambassador mission. Yeah. So then how can we like really not just tolerate, appreciate, accept, appreciate, respect, the differences, that's the coaching language. So though, if we're talking again beyond the proposition, it's a way of living. It's how, how should I communicate with you much of cultural differences fundamental differences in the value system of people that we also see every day in dealing with, with leaders from different cultures. Then coaching is a way to. Build that bonding between people and it's a way to how to find and complete each other's. Yeah, I see. Also coaching is way of living at home too. Raising up kids, the parents, how to do. Yeah. With this increasing level of awareness and enhanced human consciousness and then the, in the language of instruction is not going to work anymore. Kids are very much aware. Yeah. They, by two clicks, they can attend the best course at Coursera from Harvard and YouTube has a wealth of knowledge there. So that's I see coaching and the coaching conversation will have great deal of value in how to raise a kids. I see coaching in education as well. And do you want to teach anymore? Like before we just instruct with ready made curriculum? Yeah. And then if we go more specific, Tracy, in terms of. The profession now. I would see that. I see coaching is going to help in the context as well. The the not just the person or the individual, but it's about the context. It's about the team or the organization. We realize many times in leadership development focusing on the leader will. however, manually there's many employees within stems. Then context, they might not bring in their best. Hmm. So removing from focusing on the individual, enforcing, focusing on the whole context, it is the systemic. How to link at the ecosystem fully. How do individuals impact the context and how the context impact them? So the more we enhance that, the better we utilize the development of individuals too. As it team coaching is, is like an area of increasing demand. and I see the value of it too. It's, it's very powerful. We, we like, we like the plants. We need to have storage conditions. So what's the best storage conditions for the employees or individuals or leaders? If we enhance that, then we flourish. And this is where I see the beauty of team coaching. Yeah. This, this is mainly what comes in mind with this. Yeah. I'm really struck, you used two terms there that are really sitting with me, universal citizen and systemic work, systemic focus, and I'm thinking universal. Could mean so many things. It could mean universal as in the planet, you know, the globe. It could also mean universal, as in it's not just focused on the individual, it's focused on the team or the system, the organization, the industry. You know, those, those concentric circles of the possibility of the system start to ripple out. Don't. And how you've also described, which is an area very close to my heart as well, personally, around the introduction of coaching principles and skills and philosophies into education and into parenting. So there's something that's very different now, isn't there from a one-to-one engagement for the few to make them better leaders to a universal systemic way of working that is in service of everyone, in service of the community, the society at large. Yeah. And the more we go into that, we were into like investing on the strength, investing on the context. The less we need to invest on fixing and managing and solving problems and try to stretch people to be outta their comfort, to be outta who they are. Yeah, you know, much of the investment on needs. If I'm have a shortage in certain things, that might not be one day my mastery living. I might find difficulties to build mastery in, in areas where I'm having shortage. Yeah. But you can have better outcomes for me if you move from what's I'm good at or very good at, into the mastery level. Yeah. And similar, we invest on enhancing the, the climate organization, culture, team dynamics. Then we need to invest less on individual development. And I'm thinking whilst we're talking university universally, sorry, here. I'm also thinking that one of the first things that connected us was a more regional connection in that we connected when First connected, when I actually visited the Middle East. In fact, I know you couldn't be there at that time, so I never actually got to meet you. But we met afterwards. But I always, I always connect you with that experience very much when, when in the Middle East. Back in that time, at least from my perspective, my experience coaching was still very, very much an emerging concept. An emerging tool. And, and, and I feel that you were one of the, the protagonists and the pioneers to really help put coaching on the map along with a few other people in, in the Middle East. A lot has changed since then. I'm thinking even that was probably when, in 2018, so about four years ago. My hunch, my sense is a lot has changed since then for coaching in the region, what, what's your experience or your perspective on what's different now? Yeah, thank you. I do recall that when, when you came to Jordan, I was in Dubai, and then the opposite happened. That's right. You flew to Dubai. Indeed. How, how does it go within the Middle East where this like grew? Covid participated in this. You know, coaching is very able to adjust and benefit from the technology. So it had a lot and, and like moving to to coaching as well. And we see increased demand while at the same time we see there is a major, when it comes to the language and the content around coaching that has been done in Arabic. So, Many clients, they would ask for Arabic coaches. They would ask to have more information about coaching in Arabic to know. Yeah. And even coaches even qualified or credentialed coaches, someone who's a PCC' were and aim for MCC and their preference is to do an Arabic or to have some content for them to get trained more in Arabic. But there we have a major shortage and this is why with the support of ICF, we just started a language community that is going to support the use of Arabic language in coaching. So we're aiming to push forward and yeah. What we also aim to is to make sure of differentiating coaching you see in I know, and it's very clear that the professional or other professions within the learning and development professions, they have the interest and passion to help. And this is a drive that you might. Some of the offering in the market. It's not coaching the way we know it. It's outta interest outta being keen to help. Yeah. Yet because of the shortage in content. So the proper differentiation of proper coaching, that's evidence based, that is research based is still, is an area that needs to be developed survey. So we wanna work there, enhance the content, and enhance the evidence based content too. Thinking of research thinking. I myself thought of a research around what is the impact on coaching when we coach with Arabic, when it is the native language for the coach and the client. Because you see just the, the energy is very much different in the session, I'm sure. Yeah, so what's the impact on that? So that's also an area where I'm thinking to do something with. I'm much more as well, we're planning to have the first conference next in November. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I guess this applies to any language, doesn't it? We know that translation is not just, it's not just about translation of words. It's about effective translation of meaning and interpretation, isn't it? And one word in one language doesn't necessarily equate to the same meaning and connection as the literal translation in another language. So, you know, this, th this is if we're really going to work effectively with people, we've got to. On the same page, I guess from a communication perspective, from a context and an understanding perspective. So that's such important work. Yeah. Brilliant. Tracy, thank you as well for bringing this up. Five years ago we started the translation panel. It's part of ICF as well. The first thing, the first term to be translated was, and because of what you just mentioned, it's not just the meaning. Translation is not, we want to have like the proper meaning which reflects the proficient away from any misconception. Yeah. So and then we found that was Arabic, which means to walk in The Arab is like the.. So you walk beside someone in the dirt, that is the path for success. Which was highly unpopular. Right? So we thought, now if we do this way and we translated, and this is gonna be the official translation, then we might have a distant from coaching. And yeah. So then we said, no, no, no, no. For tactical purpose, keep it coaching. But we use the Arabic. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And the impact of the value system, the impact of the culture itself and the value systems and the mindset of people. I also did some like serving around the impact of the mid middle Eastern culture in coaching. Do we have a universal coach talking about it? Do we have a coach that fits all? Can I coach and have very impactful relationship of coaching relationship with anybody outta the eight? And and that was a question always in mind were, yes, coaching competencies might be universal, but the coaching relationship might not work in universal context. Yeah. No matter how we want to isolate our value system. As coaches, we are trained to do this, but there is a threshold level too. Yeah. And I knew I wrote like an article around that and I give an example of. We understand and do certain even competencies at work, like, like transparency. I'll give this example. We ask leaders to be transparent. Yeah. This transparency has same meaning in France and Saudi Arabia and Jordan and Egypt in us. Yeah. Does building courageous leadership has same behaviors within different cultures too. So no matter, and whenever I flew to airport, I used to have strikes Middle Eastern culture we respect authority. We respect elderly. Yeah, that's, this is our makeup.. So then, then similar for coaching, will they will be thinking U.S. And coaching someone in U.S. Will it be the same when we coach Mideastern? I can tell you I coach in US and West Europe and North America. The session is okay to be 30 minutes, which cannot happen within the Middle East, we need to have few minutes at the start and, and like to compliment and socialize more than when it, the culture is more practical. Yeah. And, I can give many other examples. So here we need to see as well what is the difference and how to take it to how we make sure that we coach and we use the tool that is non-directive, strength based, while understanding the different culture that we do. And first of all, start with understanding our own culture and how does it, how does it play it as coaches know? How does it play its role in that coaching relationship? So, It's interesting you are saying on the one hand, which I agree with you by the way, we have to be universal in a sense, in that we are, I guess if we're, if we're actually going to work in today's world, we've got to be inclusive. We've got to be I diverse. We've got to be able to work in different time zones with different people in different ways and that's part of our, our code of ethics. It's part of our core values, it's part of our competencies. And at the same time, there is a level of nuance and sensitivity and context to cultural differences. So we are kind of navigating, aren't we? Both of those ends of a spectrum in a way. So I love this idea of the universal coach. So what do you think then Osama are the characteristics of a great universal coach? Wow. Learning, learning, learning, learning. And. What we is talking about now we know and to be aware of where can we add value. Otherwise we step out the thinking that the coach is there to help anybody within any context. Might not have on under. It's not gonna be. It sounds judgmental, but it's not gonna be helpful. And then what is the balance between art and science? Is the coach supposed to be practitioner only? So when I finish my credentialing and will I be that competent? and here the question comes, how about the science? If I deal with an age group or category of people, which I'm not aware of, their context, which I'm not aware of, their interests, their makeup, like talking about teenagers, that was not an area of interesting knowledge and understanding for me. It won't be that competent, that high added value to position myself for this category of clients just by being an ACC who focused on mastering the competencies of coaching. Yeah, so how to combine both and how to make sure I can add value. For those who I feel, yes, I'm confident to add value for them. I have the knowledge, I have the skill, I have the, the language even. Yeah. During my first hundred hours to have my ACC I went for work contacts, to work on relationships and imagine it after 18 years of working in corporations. Yeah. I can tell you it was very tough. because my language doesn't fit with couples. My language more into business and leaders and professional. Yeah. And so similar if, if I'm someone who's from the education sector, I used to be a teacher, then it makes perfect sense to combine this with my coaching competencies to either students, teachers from the education sector until, unless I want to move into career transition, then that's great, but I cannot make it overnight. Hmm. Yeah. So the Universal coach, what else? Know your value system and part of. The trust building with others, with our clients is to know as well our threshold for the value system. We know it as well, as well for a fact. The more fundamental difference in the value system might strike one day. Yeah. So positioning or I mean the coach to position himself or herself. As a coach that fits for all needs to be further polished by knowing the means and position myself there, but not, I feel well not Mm-hmm. And I'm also thinking there are probably more coaches flooding into the marketplace now than never before. Coaching is quite a popular profess. Especially for people who are perhaps coming into coaching as a second, third, or even fourth career, and, and for some semi-retirement career, you know, or a post-traditional career option, having been immersed in this profession for the time that you have, what would be the best guidance that you could offer someone who is considering coming into that marketplace as a coach, what do they need to be aware of? Hmm? What brings you to coaching first? What do you want? Argument It is just because it's this second fastest growing profession. Then there might be , the unemployment rate's still not high. There are chances then this is not, I can like generate money and income somewhere else. So what do I really want outta it? And how much can I like live with it to be part of, I internalize it to be like part of my dna. Yeah. And then comes. To watch the overdoing. And I give some context here and then I will get back to this, which is in 1980s and nineties, if you visit any organization, then the most used word was work hard. Now what we hear is work-life balance. So the industry is correcting itself after it realized what's happening with the mental pressure on employees outta overdoing to work that hard. Yeah. And similar, there are things that we are doing now, even as coaches, which we might realize after 13. We inflated them, we're elevated and inflated expectations. Like the question of is anybody in need for a coach? Yes, I got it. I'm not sure. Yeah. Coaches are the catalysts of change. I'm also not sure, and I dunno who gave me the right to like put myself into a catalyst of change here if I keep pushing people to change. one day after 30 years, you might come and say, oh, we are overdoing it. We wanna push now people and stimulate them to stabilize a bit, because this is too, I dunno, I'm, I'm not saying this is right or wrong, yes or no, but I say we need to watch the overturn. What do we promise people with? Yeah. Coaching is very powerful. It's not the solution for. I'm really fascinated with the impact of coaching, and I see the great value of coaching, like what you said earlier and parenting, but still sometimes I need to be a father who might give peace of advice for my son. Yeah, so this is, this is. Yeah, we might have that pitfall into, over exaggerating. Then we say, oh, oh, now it went in a different direction that we didn't want to be at now. So we rather be aware of this now rather than we regretted after 30 of 30 users. So the overdoing what, what sort of. Inflated thinking or mindset I saw and I still see a session with a coach that might support you to accomplish your goal immediately. Session with this exaggeration is impacting coaching and coaching image. Over expectations, selling much of over expectations and, and again, I'm fascinated with coaching and at the same time the balance is needed. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Gosh, my mind is firing off with all sorts of different avenues that we could take there just on those last few really interesting perspectives or summer, and I'm. Mindful of our time. It's getting late into your evening, so we're probably maybe coming to a, to a pause for now, at least. Perhaps we'll do a part two to this at some point. But before we, before we come to a pause aam, is there anything else that you'd like to share with our listeners based on what we've talked about this evening that you feel would be useful and that you, you'd like to communicate? Thanks for being here. It's great pleasure, and thanks for hearing us watching us listening to this. The piece of advice, again, if, if I, like you said, if I continue with this, like the overdoing the inflation, I, we can go on that part perspective a lot. Be mindful about what do you do, what you want to do, how to do it work to go and build it up. Professionals keep developing similar that what we are telling all leaders and others about the unlearning, that's also is unable for coaches too. Yeah. So how to deal with that growth mindset, which is gonna help the coach to keep evolving, keep regenerating. Himself or her is, is, is a great thing to, to have. And again, science, I know there is great beauty of using art alone is not enough. So we want to keep the competence balanced by also looking into science, what's in there, in the research. So we, we facilitate and help others for. Excellent. And making sure that it's not based except on very strong foundation. Mm-hmm., thank you. Mm-hmm. Thank you. It's been a real pleasure as always to, to listen to your perspectives and what you have to say. I noticed I'm intrigued to, to hear more, so maybe we will re. Again, but for now, thank you so much and I wish you a great rest of your evening. Thank you. Thank you. Thanks lot. Take care. Thank you. You have been listening to Coaching In Conversation by Tracy Sinclair, a podcast aimed at exploring how coaching is a vehicle for human development in today's and tomorrow's world. You can learn more about coach training and development at tracysinclair.com and follow us on social. If you enjoyed this podcast, please leave a rating and review and also share it with your networks to help us expand our reach. Thank you for listening and see you next time.