As no one enters the field of mental health care as a blank slate (Welfel, 2016), every practitioner develops, because of his personal and professional experiences and curiosity, cultural background and overall career interactions, certain fields of preference regarding populations, topics and methods. It is part of the practitioner to always develop a self-awareness of when these experiences are becoming active biases that need to be put aside when caring about the patients; mentorship, supervision and consultancy with peers are key components in understanding and pinpointing those very same feelings and behaviors, even more when it comes to the multicultural aspect of a consultant’s tasks (Aoyagi et al., 2017).
Advocating for the cultural dynamic and issues that immigrant athletes face when joining an elite sports structure away from their original cultural and including the sheer elements of the multicultural differences when working with athletes, families and programs is the cornerstone of my practice, and probably because it is what I have been confronted with the most: my own multicultural background and story, education curriculum, life and work with populations from different ethnicity and socio-cultural backgrounds has been a continuous underlying dynamic that I had to permanently consider (Aoyagi et al., 2017). For instance despite SPP discipline being based on the very same theories and learning materials, the application and even teaching of it differs widely between the USA and Europe, which in my case is a constant re-assessment when I work with athletes here in Switzerland.
Indeed sharing the load of the acculturation and managing the diversity within a group is a collaborative fluid process (Shinke, et al., 2013 ; Godfrey et al., 2022) and requires all stakeholders to take an active part to it. One should understand through a specific training that the culturally different athletes have as many needs as one can have in term of mutual understanding and that performances are the product of a collaborative process needing a common build up of trust, mutual confidence and motivation, with a proven fact that the aggregate of multicultural personalities provides higher performance’s levels, as well as have a positive impact related to team’s and programs identities (Godfrey et al., 2022) . There is a need for “ local” or “socio-cultural majority” athletes, the new peers of the immigrants or “socio-cultural minority” and other program stakeholders, members and us as consultants to have the same level of understanding and availability, the key for me being a cultural sensitivity to be developed by the organizations and the consultants, as an example that will provide a theoretical and behavioral frame to the athletes. I always envision the possible referrals to more qualified culturally consultants than I would be to adequate the cultural needs of students and athletes, as well as promoting a permanent evaluation of ones own biases that could have a negative impact on an already stressful situation for any athlete not being recognized and validated culturally.
In full transparency, I experienced myself that complex situation of being a new comer / individual of a socio-cultural minority and having to deal with all the questioning and challenges that come along; however as a consultant I always keep in mind that this might provide me certain advantages in understanding the experience of a patient but his or her experience is unique and I cannot reapply any of my own solutions to his or her case (Aoyagi et al., 2017). However I use my experience in a limited and guided self-disclosure in order to create psychological safety and provide a place for the patient to speak his or her truth and to provide clarity on where we both stand on what could be seen as taboo (Aoyagi et al., 2017).
I believe it is important to keep in mind that in a globalized system of sport performance, different cultural approaches is what inspires our work and the development of methodologies. Acculturation vs. assimilation has proven to be more adaptive and beneficial as well as being humble in the understanding and recognition of biases (Aoyagi et al., 2017 ; Godfrey et al., 2022 ; Shinke, et al., 2013). This is a challenge for all stakeholders and consultancy too, but it is mostly a source of enrichment for all.
Being clear is being kind and caring, respectful and validating.
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