Eminere founder Patrice Gordon told TTG’s Fairer Travel Diversity Forum staff too often raise issues only to be met with a wall of silence from a so-called "ask hole".
“They ask a ton of questions, then it’s like tumbleweed,” she said, adding the attitude to staff survey results was often one of shame and an unwillingness to change.
Gordon said it was for this reason she had become an advocate of reverse mentoring, whereby senior leaders are instructed and led on certain issues by their staff. “With reverse mentoring, it is really difficult for leaders to walk away,” she said.
She described the process as “a deep, intimate relationship with someone of difference”, one that “increases the level of understanding and empathy”.
Gordon advised mentors to put self-interest to one side, stating "it’s not a way to get promoted”, and to offer “some real poignant moments that leaders can fix on”.
“It requires leaders to sit face-to-face and not shirk responsibility to somebody else. It reduces the understanding gap and enlightens leaders to the depths and challenges.”
She added: “Think about the things you don’t know. You need to come to the table with a basic understanding and be in a position where you are happy to be corrected.”
Gordon said many at chief executive level had grown during a time or in an environment where they were not about to talk openly about these things. “Over the past three years, they have realised they need to talk about it.”
However, she said reverse mentoring was “not a silver bullet” and needed to be part of an overall plan. She urged travel brands to make changes: “People would rather you got it wrong with good intentions than you sitting on the fence and doing nothing.”
