Trust, Truth & Tough Conversations: A Coaching Lens on Legacy by Dr. Uché Blackstock

What does it take to create a truly safe coaching space — one rooted in trust, context, and cultural awareness?

In this episode of The Coaching Book Club, hosts Christy Stuber and Ken McKellar unpack Legacy by Dr. Uché Blackstock — a deeply personal and powerful book about racism in healthcare, family lineage, and the urgent need to reimagine trust and equity in professional spaces.

Together, Christy and Ken explore how this memoir challenges coaches to reflect on their own identities, biases, and responsibilities when working with diverse clients — and why these conversations are essential to effective, ethical coaching.

Tune in to explore three key insights from the book, including:

✅ Why coaching isn’t just about skill — it’s also about the context we create for those skills to unfold
✅ The power of reflective practice to reveal personal bias, build trust, and strengthen client connection
✅ How collective healing, not just individual growth, shows up in coaching — and what that means for your sessions

Whether you’re cultivating safer spaces in one-on-one coaching or navigating trust in team and group settings, this episode will expand your lens and invite you into the ongoing work of coach development.

🎧 Listen now for a heartfelt and provocative conversation that proves: the way we coach is part of the legacy we leave.

Transcript

0:01

Welcome to the Coaching Book Club podcast, the show that empowers coaches through books. I'm Kristy Stuber here with my friend and co-host Ken McKeller. Today. We're talking about legacy by Dr. Uche Blackstock. A powerful exploration of how systemic racism and healthcare persists, and what it means to create truly equitable trust-based spaces. Here's what you can expect in this episode. First, we'll start with a quick overview of the book, what it's about, and why it matters to coaches like you. Next, we'll break down three key takeaways that stood out to us and share how you can apply these insights to your coaching practice. Finally we'll explore how these concepts connect to real world coaching challenges and help you build confidence, tackle imposter syndrome, and grow as a coach. Whether you've read this book before or are hearing about it for the first time, you'll leave with actionable tools to strengthen your skills. Let's get started. Hi, Ken. Hey, how you doing? Good to be here. Boy, we're talking. We're talking, and what's cool about this book is that it's not like a. Book. Right. So with this, there's a lot of meat on this phone, man. I'm curious, like my brother used to say, I'm wondering what I'm gonna say. I'm wondering what you're gonna say too. I. I love that we are reading books that are not coaching books. It reminds me of the conversations that you and I have been having for years about how coaching can be found everywhere. Reminders of how to be as coaches can be found in all parts of life. And this was a great book for me to have some great reminders and education and learning. So what was important about this book for you, Ken? Legacy, I mean, in this book. I mean, it talks about a lot of stuff in terms of being a black female physician, right in medicine and the impact of that. But what she also talked about is the relationship with her mom and how different things was passed to her through her mom. Whether it's through the love of reading. Whether it was through just the love of appreciation and openness to giving to other people, the love of continuing on like triumphing, like those things was passed down to her and many more from her mom to both her and her twin sister. It reminds me,'cause I, I'm, I, I'm from a big family. I have four brothers and a mom and a dad had one time. And I remember, you know, through reading this book, storytelling was passed down and the importance of storytelling. And before my dad passed away, he talked about, he said, tell your story. It's important so that the next generations remember. Who you are, and that is what this book brung up for me. Beautiful. It, it, it connects to what highlighted for me in this book was how Dr. Blackstock talked about her mother's medical practice and how she saw her mother's medical practice. As described by her mother telling her her stories, right? And she described it as, um, what we would call these days structurally competent and culturally responsive. Um, but the importance of knowing every element of a patient's life and considered in their treatment that really. Meant a lot to me, and I think about that. What I need to do as a coach to create trust is to explore the whole human, the full human in front of me, um, checking my conditional biases, condition, biases, and staying open to everything that I'm hearing. To me, this is just the core of coaching. Yeah. When you start talk about, we're getting into trust and safety. Also, we're getting into the history of trust and safety when we talk about medicine. Mm-hmm. Now I'm gonna put your big boot, put your big boy boots on, because I mean, the legacy, I mean, the core of the message is about racism and how it's deeply embedded in the structure of medicine. Stuff. Right. And the beauty of this book is it talks about it, it puts the conversation on the table so that we can start taking pieces of it and digesting it into perhaps a new way of thinking, perhaps is the big thing. Perhaps a new way of thinking. And I think where this fits into coaching, I. Is having those open spaces in order to talk about difficult conversations. Having those spaces to make mistakes, we pause with that.'cause we we're living in the world that if you say something wrong, you cancel right away. Boom. Mm-hmm. No. Mm-hmm. No of but no more. Right. What happens if we start to kind of explore that a little bit and go deeper? What did you mean by that? Mm-hmm. And then it allows us opportunity to get more into your lived experience, who you are, how you show up, and how you versus, and how you wanna show up. Mm-hmm. I'm gonna pause there. What, what, what's coming up? What's coming up for me is the awareness that I'm a white woman raised in the US and because of how I was raised, I've been conditioned to have certain beliefs and I feel like it's my job to understand. Those beliefs doesn't mean that I believe them. Maybe I need to to give a different word, but I've been conditioned to have certain ways of viewing the world maybe is a better way of saying it. And it's like my job is to look at that and say, wait, what's real about that? What's true about that? Um, so then I can update that narrative. Something that is more, more accurate instead of the legacy of what's been passed down. I'm thinking right now about Clint Smith's great book. How the Word Is Passed, you know, which is about what you were talking about in the beginning. The stories that get passed from generation to generation to generation that are not rooted in, probably never rooted in reality, often rooted in mistreatment and can be updated so that we can see people differently. I. In our world and we're fully, I like that updated because not only can we see people differently in our world, but it gives us an opportunity to see ourselves. Mm. I'm not forgetting about the past, but with this new version, this update, I can stand on a new reality about who I am. Who my kids have the opportunity to come, who their kids have the opportunity to become. Mm-hmm. I think part of that update doesn't happen by itself. Mm-hmm. And that moves me into one of my first takeaways from the book. Is it okay if I share that here? Yeah, sure. Go ahead. So thinking about, um. This commitment to ongoing learning, right? Core competency 2.2 and 2.4. So 2.2. Engaging in ongoing learning. 2.4 remains aware of and open to the influence of context and culture as a coach. And Dr. Blackstock says this in her book, that she was aware of many things that happen in medical communities and they weren't taught when she was in medical school. So medical education didn't teach the real story of how systemic racism impacted health incomes. So for me, this book was not just how do I wanna take what I'm learning in this book and apply it to my coaching practice directly, but it's how do I take what I'm learning in this book and update my knowledge in my own ongoing learning about myself? Um. So I feel like that's what you're saying is we need, I need to be able to, as a coach, acknowledge my gaps and then commit to filling it right. And being able to have trusted spaces where I can go, make mistakes, as you said, and continue learning more. What's, what's landing with you, as I'm saying all that? Think similar? Similar in terms of learning, um, about yourself, not about yourself, about art, myself. Having the opportunity to, Christie kind of doing what we're doing. Mm-hmm. I mean, we read a lot of books and we narrow it down to a book that we're gonna have opportunity to, to spend some time with. But it's those, it's, it's the collective of just going out and, and trying to get that other perspective. Open up space to have conversation, which I would like to do more of. Have conversations, particularly now, like there's a lot of stuff in the United States that's going on that's, are there spaces to kind of have conversations to say whatever it is that someone wants to say in a, in a way that they can be heard and they can hear themselves? Mm-hmm. I like what she said in the book. We cannot be what we cannot see and when we are absent from the room. So is our LI wisdom. Mm-hmm. So those are my takeaways. Yeah. Yeah. Another key takeaway I had was she talked about healing. Healing must be. Collective, not individual. I mean, I can do some healing, but that wound is scraped over again. When you know somebody that I don't know, you know, emotionally kicks me. But when we get together and we start to understand collectively from a coach's perspective, having conversations of what that looks like, what that feels like. Really sitting down, maybe not individually one-on-one, but maybe perhaps taking a peek at team coaching or group coaching. Now, if you want a great group coaching program, 13 seconds for Advertisement group Coaching hq. Check'em out, talk to'em. Now, back to our regular schedule program. Well, I mean, getting diverse thinking people. Having conversations. That's how we grow to understand, grow, to learn, grow, to start experiencing differences. It's kind of like going away to college. You go away to college, you experience a, a lot of, a lot of different people. And when you come back to your, your small town, Princeton, New Jersey town, people sound different. Mm. They sound the same. You just have experienced a different perspectives. That's. Bigger than your small town. I, I, I just wanna say another quote that she said in here that I really like. Um, my survival was never mine alone. It was stitched together by women who came before me and communities that carried me. And carried with trust and safety. So my, what I would tie into what you said was, um, in thinking about it in a coaching construct is like, coaching can also be a healing space, one-on-one teams, groups, however, um, especially when at the coach we're able to. Remember that client context isn't what's happening in the background. It's central to the work we do, right? So a client's beliefs, experiences, all the things that make them them. I know sometimes I'm in a coaching situation, I always feel bad about like maybe asking, oh, you know, what part of the world are you in? But that's context, right? And maybe it means something, maybe it doesn't. But just even asking the question when I'm first meeting somebody, um, to me can feel like small talk and unnecessary. It also could be really important to the person, depending on, on their context, and I won't know unless I ask the question. I really like that. I won't know until I ask the question because. There are a lot of questions that are being answered that was never asked what this book. Can you say more about what you said about, there's a lot of, uh, questions being answered that weren't even asked. Yeah. What this book brings to me is. The assumptions that we go around having about ourselves, about other people, about situations, and we may have an assumption about a person that's sitting right next to us and never ask. We just walk around with that assumption. Who may be right, who may be wrong, but either way, we're doing ourselves and that person a disservice. If I'm not checking in, you know, I like this thinking that when you have assumptions, it limits how far you can travel on that thinking versus when you have hypothesis. Is endless.'cause with the hypothesis, you're asking a question, you're making an educated guess, and then you're checking in, was it right, was it wrong? How close am I? And you're getting that feedback and then you ask questions based off of the feedback and that momentum keeps on going and growing. It's like planting a seed of opportunity to the stone house of truth. Don't quote me on this, but I think maybe that the comment you just made that you were referencing about assumption and hypothesis came from, um, never split the difference that we read. And I was thinking as you were talking about how having an assumption about a person sitting next to you. The loss of that for you to not learn more. The loss of that for that person to be maybe unknowingly judged. Also, the, the loss of that potential relationship and connection, forget relationship connection, which is, we're missing so much more of that in our, I feel like in our country right now, is just that connection because there's so much fear of like, is it okay to reach out? Should I not reach out? What are they gonna think? Are they not gonna think? And so then we just stay close and we need more connections. So we can have conversations like this so we can not be so lonely. Yeah. I mean, and Dr. Blackstone points out in her group, in her book where she says, healing demands, truth telling even, and especially when the truth is hard to hear, which puts responsibility on the. To be okay with checking my, so you're giving me feedback about something that'd be hard for me to hear. I need to be okay hearing that I need to be okay. Letting go of my attachment to whatever that thought or belief was. Questioning it, challenging it, and being kind, also being kind to yourself. I hear you. I also think it, it puts responsibility on that relationship in the moment. Because as a listener, how are you listening? And as the sender, how are you saying it? And as a listener, you need a little bit more information. You need a little more context. Do you need, do, do you need, um, to ask more questions as a sender, you know, how am I sending it? Know, am I saying everything I wanna say? Am I taking my time? Or what assumptions do I am I making by sending this message? I mean, so. Yeah. That responsibility is, is on us to get it right and you are important enough to me to get it right and that you could be anybody that you, from, somebody you just meet in the store that you from, uh, uh, uh, in-law, your partner, your kids, and, and it, so it really comes down again to that relationship. And what can that relationship. Withstand based on how it was built with trust and safety or not. And with more trust and safety, it can withstand more, more challenge. Yeah. Think about Blakey days, you know, work around challenging conversations and coaching. I think that. My takeaway overall. Yeah. Yeah. What, how are you gonna apply this to your coaching? Well, I mean, just, I mean, just remember that this has an opportunity to be a space for truth, for honesty, for reflection. For growth, for planting the seeds of difference and not only planting the seed, but I mean, you know, fertilizing it. That means you gotta deal with the poo as it grows so that your individual harvest of who you want to be, what you wanna look like, right, can grow and you can feed off of that. It's kind of tough to feed off of that if you don't have the space to plant. It's kind of tough to feed off of that if you don't have the place or the space to nurture, to reflect. Yeah. So I'm referencing, um, this line that I really love says, legacy reminds us that we are responsible not just for our skills, but for the context we create for those skills to unfold. So we're not just responsible for that seed that we put in the ground. Use your metaphor. We're also responsible for the ground around the seed and what we give that seed to grow. And to me, that's about my accountability as a coach. Like what is, what am I, what context am I creating? What skills am I using to create a space that is full of trust? Be even more intentional. And for me that also really means slowing down a lot more than I probably do when I wanna just like dive right into coaching. Probably more slowing down, more agreements, more partner partnering that I need to think about. What about you? Me, in the coaching session? What about you? It is about you. What else? And just creating a space, echoing exactly what you said. That stuff can happen here. Stuff being, we can get Renee Brown or vulnerable, right? We can get. In the space where we're feeling like I am, in fact my best thing, Ana Burke, and the consistent space that allows whatever that, I think I'm mixing metaphors here now, but whatever that plant is that I'm cultivating to grow, right? So. I might meet a client and they might not be ready to trust and open up to me right away. It might take three or four sessions and that's okay. My job is to stay consistently open and curious and partnering so that when they're ready, they will, they will open up and share. I, I like that because I, I just want, my last comment here is I remember I used to, I used to hear all the time, well, you can lead the, you can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink. And uh, I said that to my dad. I was like, what Dad? You can lead a horse water, but you can't make him drink. Probably talking one of my kids. My dad said, fool, just because they don't drink now don't mean you take away the water. They be thirsty. Later they come, they away taking away those people's food. Dad is a wise man. Well, thanks for your time today, Ken. Always a good conversation. There's so much more about this book. I mean, we just, just looking at it through the coaching lens is only one piece of the message that people can get outta this book, so I really highly recommend it for anybody, especially if you wanna learn more about lived experience of an African American woman in medicine. Um. That to me was a really important story for me to read as well. And listeners, if you enjoyed today's episode, make sure to subscribe to the Coaching Book Club on your favorite podcast platform so you never miss an episode. We'd also love to connect with you on LinkedIn, follow us for even more coaching insights and updates about upcoming episodes. And we're always on the lookout for new books to review. So if you have a favorite coaching book that's made an impact on you, let us know. It might be featured in a future episode. Thanks for being part of this community with us, and until next time, happy coaching.