Dubai-based Life Coach Dares Corporations to Rehumanise the Workplace

Motivational speech revealed how improved human interactions promote creativity and productivity   

Dubai, UAE, 10 September, 2013 – Allowing a culture of failure and imperfection at work can actually prove positive for employees and their organisations, as it leads to renewed innovation and creativity, said a speaker at a motivational event last night.

Marwa Karoura, life coach and founder of KTalk, an organisation that focuses on improving the quality of human interactions, was giving a talk at Dubai International Financial Centre (DIFC)'s Capital Club, where she expounded on her ideas that discomfort and vulnerability need to be encouraged in order to achieve success. 

Titled: ‘Innovative Engagement: Daring to Re-Humanise the Workplace,' Karoura's speech - the latest in the series ‘Capital Talk' by Ktalk - examined how employees can permit themselves to “fail and learn without shame” to create a flourishing culture that will ultimately reap dividends for them and for their organisation.

“Fear is one of the causes of the stifling of success in professional life. It is a negative emotion that blocks innovation and creativity,” said Karoura, who has more than 15 years of experience in leadership, management, training, human resources and coaching in her portfolio. “Fear creates a shame-based workplace culture that favours gossip, favouritism, bullying and humiliation. These are not tools to achieve success and instead, can lead to a dehumanising of the workplace. My talk examines the qualities needed to promote workplace harmony and bringing positive attributes to the working environment, leading to success for all involved,” she added.

Among the other components addressed by Karoura during her seminar included ‘Flourished Engagement,' a concept which permits positive failing. Positive failing, said Karoura, is permission to fail and learn. She explained that when failing is accepted and taken as a lesson, it opens the door for allowing emotional exposure, uncertainty and risk to be the acceptable norms of interaction. These, in turn, she said, will lead to success by allowing more freedom to be human in the workplace.

“When blame is the way out and used as the core process when dealing with negative outcomes, de humanisation is inevitable,” said Karoura, ” The system is deemed to be more valuable than the human in that system. Covering up is another sign of de-humanisation when the reputation of the system is more important than the human in it. I hope that my presentation helped people to see how being human with all its attendant vulnerabilities as well as its strengths is something that is ultimately empowering and can lead to success,” she added

Founded by Karoura in 2011, KTalk is a leading coaching and consulting business aimed at increasing people's effectiveness, emotional intelligence and general well-being in their working and personal lives. Since its inception, the organisation has assisted individuals and groups, adults and youths through various forms of coaching that include Life and Business Coaching and Youth Empowerment.