Identifying work partners in a team

One of the reflections I have made recently, following my coaching studies, that I believe can be an extraordinary tool for the success of cultural projects, is the concept of partnership. While this concept does not naturally belong to project management, it is one of the foundational tenets in coaching relationships. In coaching, the relationship is not hierarchical, but equal in value: each person brings competence, responsibility, and the capacity to choose, even within different roles.

In the cultural heritage sector this aspect is particularly delicate. Complex projects often involve very experienced professionals: senior researchers, field directors, restorers, technicians who in other contexts — or in earlier projects — have themselves been the leads or coordinators. These figures are not always available or motivated to be simply “directed.”

When the person leading a project is not equipped with adequate relational tools, the risk is that these people are unintentionally relegated to roles of pure subordination. For example, when decisions that have already been made are communicated without space for discussion, or when a senior person’s experience is heard only formally but not really integrated. The result is frustration, misalignment, and often the formation of informal subgroups that work “in parallel.”

This is where coaching can offer a specific and extraordinary contribution. Training a posture of partnership means, for example, knowing how to involve a senior figure by asking them how they would read a critical issue, instead of simply stating how it will be handled. Or openly recognizing someone’s experience before assigning them an operational role, clarifying expectations and the margins of autonomy.

Some of coaching’s competences help precisely with this transition: the capacity to recognize and manage biases (for example, mistaking a critical question for resistance), the use of a less prescriptive, more dialogic language, or attention to the emotional intelligence that runs through teams under pressure. Even a shared metaphor — “we are navigating choppy waters, not looking for blame” — can change the working climate more than many procedures.

Cultivating partnership does not mean giving up on leadership, nor confusing boundaries. On the contrary: it requires great clarity of role and responsibility. But it allows you to transform potentially critical senior figures into conscious allies, capable of supporting the project rather than enduring it.

In cultural heritage, where competence is high and complexity is the norm, knowing how to build partnership relationships can make the difference between a team that executes and a team that genuinely contributes. And coaching, in this sense, offers valuable tools for surfacing collective intelligence, not just control.