Electronic Theses and Dissertations (Masters/MBA)

Permanent URI for this collectionhttps://hdl.handle.net/10539/37942

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    Coaching competencies in the CCMA conciliation process for senior and executive employees
    (2021) Soman, Mohini Devi
    The research focused on whether introducing coaching competencies within the CCMA section 135 conciliation process can assist the CCMA achieve its mandate of resolving disputes of senior and executive employees speedily and effectively. Senior and executive employee disputes are highly technical, legalistic and protracted disputes, placing a burden on the resources of the CCMA. The limitations of the conciliating commissioners‘ current conflict resolution and business executive skills when dealing with high-level business disputes add to the delay. Employing coaching techniques within the conciliation process is proposed as a means of enhancing the conciliating present skillset for speedy and effective resolutions of these disputes as coaching senior and executive employees and mediating disputes rely on strong and effective communication for positive outcomes. The discretion created in section 135 of the LRA and the CCMA‘s Imvuselelo Strategy allows for further innovative strategies to conciliate disputes. The phenomenological research design was chosen as introducing coaching competencies within a statutorily constituted conciliation process is a new concept. Senior and Level A commissioners from the CCMA Johannesburg and Benoni offices, with at least five years of mediating experience, were interviewed before and after the application of coaching competencies. The interviews were semi-structured and the data collected was analysed using thematic analysis. The key findings are that disputes of senior and executive employees are complex disputes that do not easily resolve at the conciliation process due to challenges and dynamics that do not respond to the current problem-solving approach adopted by CCMA conciliating commissioners. The facilitative approach to mediation, together with the application of executive and conflict coaching competencies achieved more effective outcomes: changed behaviours and attitudes, trust between the parties, parties taking ownership of the dispute and changing their perspective of the dispute. Further training of all commissioners on this model was supported as it was found to be innovative means of resolving disputes, thus meeting the aims of the Imvuselelo Strategy
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    Perceptions of disputants on the role of coaching to enhance workplace mediation in South Africa
    (2020) Gilbert, Charles
    The practice of conflict coaching has emerged in countries outside of SA, with a body of knowledge growing on the application of coaching to mediation. Yet in SA there appears to be limited application of coaching to mediation. The research purpose was to determine disputants’ perceptions of challenges experienced in the mediation of one-to-one disputes between professionals, and after exposure to coaching, to gain their perceptions on the potential role of coaching in enhancing workplace mediation in South Africa – towards developing guidelines on how coaching could be adopted in the mediation process. The study adopted a qualitative research approach, with data collection conducted through two sets of face-to-face semi-structured interviews with seven disputants (with fourteen interviews conducted) in a university, by an independent interviewer. The coaching of the disputants was facilitated by the researcher after the first set of interviews, and before the second set of interviews. The disputants were assigned codes by the interviewer, and after transcription of the interviews, the transcripts were submitted to the researcher for thematic analysis. While most disputants perceived their mediation processes to be effective, all of them had experienced certain challenges in the pre-mediation phase, during the actual mediation itself and/or post-mediation. After receiving coaching as part of the study, the disputants all acknowledged that there were benefits of coaching. Their positive experience of coaching therefore assisted them to articulate how coaching could play a role in the pre-mediation and post-mediation phases. In pre-mediation, coaching could assist with the proactive de-escalation of the conflict experienced among the two disputants and with the preparation of the disputants for the mediation process. In the post-mediation phase, coaching could be used to facilitate closure in relation to the emotional aftermath, and follow-up with implementation of aspects of the mediation agreement. Furthermore, guidelines are recommended to key stakeholders on how coaching could be adopted within the mediation process.