|
“My Vision Come True”
In a 2007 profile, Eva Wong was described as a woman at the top of her game—her book, The Power of Ren: China’s Coaching Phenomenon had just been published, and her company, Top Human, boasted a following of over 100,000 Chinese business people.
A reporter who met with Wong in the “rarified atmosphere” of her “plush” office on the 58th floor of an elegant Shanghai skyscraper, described Wong as having “the air of someone who has just enjoyed a good joke.”
At the time of that interview in February 2007, Top Human was one of the largest coaching companies in the world and by far the most successful in China.
Top Human clients were reportedly paying as much as 2,000 USD an hour for sessions with senior Top Human coaches. “Chinese executives are very willing to spend money on improving themselves,” Wong told China Today that same year.
“I’ve been making my vision come true—of Top Human and of teaching people how to live their dreams and live their lives,” Wong told Recruiting in China.
By one estimate, the company had sales in excess of five million dollars (USD) a year.
Wong was seen by many coaches and coaching groups as the person “who was going to be opening up China to coaching,” said Bronwyn Bowery-Ireland, CEO of the International Coach Academy (ICA), which is training coaches in China.
Her image as a worldwide leader in coaching was on the rise. Dr. Ronald Heifetz, the founder of the Center for Public Leadership at Harvard’s Kennedy School describes Wong as “an amazing, creative, entrepreneurial and service oriented person. Impressive as can be.”
“She is a very smart, very ambitious person,” said Angela Spaxman, the Hong Kong-based president of the International Association of Coaching. “And she created a company that for many years had a very big impact.”
Wong had targeted 2008 for taking Top Human public, but the initial public offering never happened—instead, the phenomenon that was Top Human simply evaporated.
Eva Wong was arrested and imprisoned by Chinese authorities, and Top Human—with its ten offices across mainland China and 500 staffers—ceased to exist.
Wong’s book continues to be sold on sites like Amazon.com, but a search for “Top Human” online returns nothing—even the company’s website is empty.
The woman whose book jacket bio describes her as a pioneer (“Eva is the first Chinese-credentialed MCC coach, as well as a member of the Board of the International Coach Federation (ICF). Currently, she is the President of China Coach Association (CCA). She is also the Life Member in the World Outstanding Chinese Foundation and has been elected as one of China’s 100 Outstanding Women Entrepreneurs by the China Women’s Federation and China Alliance of Women Entrepreneurs.”) has—in one friend’s word—been “silenced,” and her shooting star image has lost its luster.
“Her reputation in the coaching world, outside of China, is that she’s done great stuff,” said Bronwyn Bowery-Ireland from her home in Shanghai. “Her reputation on a ground level here, by other coaches…is pretty bad.”
What brought down Eva Wong and her coaching empire? And does Wong’s dramatic rise and fall carry a warning to other coaches who have an interest in bringing Western-style coaching to the huge—and hungry—pool of potential clients in China, the world’s third-largest and fastest growing economy?
The story of Eva Wong and Top Human has been, until now, a largely unfinished one; a story of one woman’s rise to the top, without mention of the imprisonment that followed.
“People are afraid to talk in China,” said Angela Spaxman. “They’re afraid it’ll make the issue worse for Eva.”
But Spaxman believes it’s time to break that silence—and set the record straight. “I’ve heard coaches in the U.S. tell me it’s not safe to coach in China, and I don’t think that’s true at all.”
A “Religious Movement”
Wong, a native of Hong Kong, founded Top Human in Canada in 1995 with a motto of “re-engineering the talent of people.”
Sensing a huge untapped market, Wong moved into China and dazzled some with her program—and her personality. “There’s something about Wong that’s hard to fathom,” wrote Recruiting in China. “Captains of Chinese industry, a demanding lot to be sure, pay handsomely for Wong and her colleagues to tell them how to improve their businesses.”
Bowery-Ireland said despite Top Human’s glowing press in 2007 as the high-priced coaches to China’s corporate elite, the real bulk of the company’s clients were middle management. “It was local people, mostly who were sold a concept.”
“It felt more like a religious movement”
One of the great claims of Top Human was its huge numbers: 500 coaches, and a reported 100,000 executives signed up as coaching clients, or attending Top Human workshops.
Bowery-Ireland says the vast scale of China puts those numbers in perspective. “It’s very easy in a population of 1.2 billion to seem as though you’re impacting when you go back to the ICF and say you’ve got 500 coaches.”
Beyond the numbers, some insist, the flaw in Top Human’s model was its message, particularly a “coaching” program led by Eva Wong herself.
Charlie Lang, managing partner, executive coach and trainer at Progress U in Hong Kong, met Eva Wong shortly before her arrest, and has spoken extensively with coaches who were part of Top Human. He says the company’s rapid success in China in the 1990’s ultimately produced a series of complaints about the company’s brand of “coaching.”
“This process can be damaging,” said Lang. “If you get some participants who are rather weak to begin with, in terms of mental constitution, then this kind of program can break them even more, and it’s not guaranteed they can get back together again.”
Bronwyn Bowery-Ireland says a former top deputy to Eva Wong described the program in early 2008 during a job interview with Bowery-Ireland’s company after the collapse of Top Human.
“The description this man gave me was that…you come to this weekend workshop, and in this weekend workshop, the doors are locked and no one’s allowed to leave and the aim is to crush the spirit and to completely transform the person using the philosophy of Eva.”
“It was sold as coaching,” said Bowery-Ireland, but it was seen by the Chinese government as “total brainwashing.”
“From what I understand, you basically break down all barriers of a person, showing them all their weaknesses, then say, ‘ok, put this all aside and work on being the person you want to be,’ but for some people they don’t get back together,” said Progress U’s Charlie Lang.
Wong’s arrest, according to several sources, was officially unrelated to coaching and described as a violation of tax law, though the investigation may have been driven by a desire to shut down the company—and its unique brand of coaching.
“China is very complicated,” said Lang. “It’s almost impossible to do things by the book, because the book is so confusing. If you ask several people what it means, you get several answers…so, as a result, if someone wants to ‘get you,’ they can almost always find a way.”
“I would give her the benefit of the doubt here,” said Lang, who described Wong’s arrest and the sudden and total shut down of Top Human as excessive for a tax complaint.
“It was closed down overnight,” said Lang. “It was amazing.”
A journalist inside China, writing on her personal blog, described the fall of Top Human as the Chinese government cracking down on an “outside influence.”
“The company looks like a religious institution which makes people crazy,” wrote the reporter, according to Marc Handler, an author who’s written about China and who translated from Mandarin, but did not identify the journalist.
“Someone says the company wash people’s brain and heart. The company is closed, but it has no official statement.”
“It sounds like the Chinese may have—rightly or wrongly—thrown ‘Top Human’ into the category of Falun Gong or some kind of inappropriate Western intrusion,” said Handler.
“(Wong) was having a very big impact on personal coaching in China,” said Angela Spaxman. “A lot of people were realizing you could make a career of helping people using the coaching model. And I’m sure there must be many, many coaches in China whose hopes have been dashed.”
“I think the only person who knows the truth is Eva Wong,” said Bowery-Ireland.
“It’s Safe Enough”
Coaches working in China today describe the concerned questions they get from coaches in other countries, in part due to fear directly connected to the arrest of Eva Wong.
“When I said I do business in China, (a colleague) said I’m very courageous,” said Charlie Lang. “So he was obviously referring to what happened to Eva.”
What about fear of arrest? “In China, if you don’t upset anyone, the chances of anything happening are pretty low,” said Lang.
Bronwyn Bowery-Ireland says coaching colleagues around the world often ask her how “silenced” she is, living and working in a Communist country.
“I explain that I’ve never before lived in a country where I’ve felt so free and safe,” she said, describing her Chinese hometown of Shanghai as a dynamic, energetic boomtown, filled with bullet trains and brand new buildings. “It’s like a futuristic city.”
Bowery-Ireland, a master certified coach, runs China’s only ICF-accredited Chinese coaching program. The Chinese language program has fifty students, and new applicants every week.
“I would encourage anyone, particularly if they’re bilingual to coach in China,” said Bowery-Ireland. “There’s a big need. There’s a huge gap in the market” for Chinese-speaking, certified coaches.
“Despite the size of Top Human, and having them disappear so quickly, it doesn’t seem to have really stopped the inertia of coaching growing,” said IAC’s Angela Spaxman. “I think it’s just such a big place, and there is so much willingness—and need.”
Bowery-Ireland predicts coaching will sweep China, as the change that is spreading across the country produces an intense hunger for the kind of learning coaching brings. “We’ll see an enormous number of coaches here,” said Bowery-Ireland, who anticipates China soon rivaling if not exceeding North America as coaching’s largest market.
Charlie Lang is hopeful Progress U will soon have a trained executive coach in Beijing, but so far, he hasn’t found anyone that fits his requirements: experience in China and an ability to speak the language, but also solid coaching and corporate criteria.
“We want to achieve regional coverage in the next three years,” said Lang, whose coaching business is already active in Shanghai, Hong Kong, Tokyo and Singapore.
“(China) has massive potential,” said Bowery-Ireland. “Every time I meet someone who runs a consulting business, they said ‘do you know of any coaches, I’m desperate.’”
“I have no fear of competitors. The market is that huge.”
As for the fear of “upsetting” a client and risking arrest, Lang says he and his coaches use caution to identify problems. “We take immediate action about it and see ways we can make up for it. That is not a total guarantee, I know that, but there is also no guarantee tomorrow that I don’t fall from the sky and the plane crashes.”
Is it safe? “I would say it’s safe enough.”
“The only danger is if you’re doing something very big, and cult-like,” said Angela Spaxman. “And that’s what Eva Wong was doing.”
Tweet This
Email to a friend
There are 16 Responses so far...
This is a very serious situation and quite distressing that Eva Wong has been jailed for her coaching work. What is being done by the government of Canada (if she is a Canadian) and what is being done by the ICF (if she was/is a Board member of the ICF) to secure her release?
Wow Mark. Great reporting. I’d only heard positive reports of Eva Wong and Top Human in China and yes, I’d been dazzled by the numbers of coaches/clients. For me, Top Human was an example of the amazing potential of coaching to radically transform people’s lives. (Perhaps too radically?) I wasn’t aware of the lock-down/break-down techniques – which always sets off the coach-spidey senses. But I wonder how that would have fit with the culture? Actually my head is still trying to get around the cultural terrain that would be involved in taking a very western, individual approach to change and personal responsibility (such as coaching) into a collective culture. Always learning… Good stuff Mark. Thanks again.
The “lock-down/break-down techniques” described don’t sound all that different from the approach taken by many mainstream North American large group format trainings such as Landmark Education.
I agree with Barbra that the coaching techniques used are very similar to if not identical with techniques that have become quite common in North America.
And Vicki Brock’s dissertation chronicled how the creators of such techniques set the stage for present day coaching. Thomas Leonard, for example, worked for one of the organizations that pioneered the large group coaching in a contained space. What he learned helped him to develop the coaching movement that he is so dearly connected with.
I wouldn’t minimize Trish’s comment about the cultural terrain. I don’t think we can over estimate the clash between what Top Human was hoping to do in China and what the cultural climate in China could tolerate.
Let’s hope that our own viewpoints or emotions about what has happened do not contribute to making the situation worse for our compatriots in China.
Mark, Thank you for the report. I have been searching for news as to what happened to Eva and Top Human for months and only had unconfirmed news. It is sad and unfair for Eva; I hope you will follow up with updates as to what is happening to her. Thank you again.
Ken,
Thanks for your comment…and you bet we will be following up on the story.
Mark
With seven years under my belt in Asia, my observation is that westerners simply do not get the very different cultural frame without a lot of direct experience. And, even then, there are frames within frames. It is some years since executive coach work took centre stage in my business, but my consulting practice in knowledge resource management is heavily influenced by a person-centred philosophy in which capacity building is at the core.
In Asia, the range of coaching approach and capacity is significant, with charges often reflecting the client’s rank and position more than the coach’s business case (or rather, for some, that is the coach’s business model). It sounds as if Eva Wong was successful in building a fairly typical Chinese private company. Personally, I cannot accept the “marine” style break down and build-up philosophy of “coaching”. Helping people see reality does not require sacrifice of the self to the extent that a new self is built according to someone else’s map. If this is what Top Human was based upon, then it is indeed reflective of a culture in which sacrifice of self, appearance of conformity, compliance with “the way” are key indicators for success.
In my admittedly ignorant view (only seven years after all) the need in China is for learning about ways of seeing, developing critical thinking to inform the understanding of reality, rather than adopting a new reality. Once one is empowered to see, one can make choices.
Does anyone know how Top Human empowered the individual (as opposed to how it grew an excelled as a corporate entity)?
What this story doesn’t capture is the magic of Eva Wong. I was fortunate to meet her at the Executive Coaching Summit years ago, and served with her on the editorial board of the International Journal of Coaching in Organizations (IJCO), and Eva is, what we call in the US, a “rock star”. Tall and elegant, she carried herself and spoke with confidence and power…perhaps that was threatening some in China? Her personality, charisma, and brand would have taken her to the top here in the US, and I wonder about what we don’t know about why China had to stop her. I can be patient while I wait for Eva’s release and eventual ability to tell her story. I’m sure it’s a doozy.
What comes through strongly here for me is that Eva was an amazingly charismatic personality, and that from reports above, her methodology followed Large Group Awareness Training (LGAT). Barbara and Rey have already commented on this (below). As I review what is happening currently with a large organization here on the West Coast following that same model, the weekend LGAT format can be a breakthrough for many, and horrible breakdown for others. In addition, the support network formed and encouraged around these weekends has become somewhat cultish and encouraging “groupthink” rather than authentic individuality and its growth.
I don’t negate the value of group coaching, but continue to see negative effects with the model subscribed to by many colleagues who have attended one of Landmark’s offshoots here in California. What I see described in the report above and comments following indicate that Eva’s methodology included days with locked doors, and I can’t help but wonder if this same “cultish” feel and isolation from “non-workshop attendees” I have witnessed here in California, was one of the outcomes there.
If so, isn’t this the very antithesis of what coaching should be all about? Creating safe evironment and boundaries, careful listening to “hear” the individuality of the client, and to match pace carefully to the client’s well-being, bringing client to greater self-awareness and enhanced life?
Ditto on what a great job you are doing Mark! Keep it up and a BIG thank you to Ruth Ann and the Coaching Commons for being the presence it is. A HUGE contribution to the coaching profession and coaching “movement”.
Tom
Wow…I am glad to finally hear more details about EVA. I do not know the real truth here, but I am (apparently in the minority). I had suspicions from the beginning. She got approved too quickly as an ACTP; what my colleagues in China told me it was “smoke and mirrors,” and it looked just like an EST weekend. The number of “trained coaches ” was exaggerated and the book (REN) was rife with inconsistencies. My experience with EVA on the ICF board was one of a personal agenda, not an agenda for coaching. But those are just my impressions and opinions, and I, like all of you, hope she gets released and can tell her story someday.
Hi, I think that there’s a whole other boat sailing here. She presented Dao/Tao material in China. As in “The Art of War” or “The Tao of Physics” That rings a cultural bell into the culture. You don’t need ‘marine training’ to get a large reaction from Confucian PRC Chinese encountering Daoist ideas. Whole implicit aspects of their culture reframe themselves in the new explicit light. Some people ‘see’ this and others ignore/displace/miss it.
It’s akin to The Three Kingdoms being compared to Western ethics teaching. They learn-acquire ethics and become involved in The Three Kingdoms, with very Chinese results.
Thanks for your great work.
I-m considering to create my own LGAT company in China, and as I notice in this article, maybe, this is not the best place…
But we need more information, please keep us informed.
Regarding – create my own LGAT company in China
You can do that. Yes the Chinese take hostages, the ongoing Rio Tinto affair is the hot button right now. It’s much easier if you ensure that you have a good Chinese partner, one linked so Western staff can get proper visas. A foreign-born or foreign-passport ethnic Chinese can go somewhat ‘in-between’ and risks personal ‘hostaging’ if things go bad.
Success patterns to study are the
1) GAC schools (GAC is an ACT Intl program for pre-uni study). Most are tethered inside secondary Chinese universities, watched within and without, and their materials are altered by monitors. Enormously popular (the rich want their kids in USA university) and under firm control. Various ones have additional group programs.
The PGA GAC program in Northern China integrates into Chinese high schools, under their control-wings with less onerous control.
Good partnering means more flexible and adept controls. This matches the success pattern for companies like Web International in China.
2) Team building companies. Many or most are ropes courses type companies, and some do real building, and can be toward LGAT. The multi-site ones find a series of local-dominant-well-connected partners. Those local partners provide the protective control-wings.
In some ways it’s better to consider China to be an Empire, with a bunch of countries/provinces within it. It’s a boiling pot of differing people in charge who personalize ‘rules’. People rule in China, not law.
In all cases where you have multi-site activity you need to be able to prune off a damaged site.
I was with an outfit that expanded into some provinces from a Chongqing base. It moved its head office to Shenzhen, but didn’t find good Shenzhen partners. It thought it had good “wide-area” connections, showed it had money, and issued Chongqing visas to Western staff in all the provinces (a bit arrogant).
Problems developed in Shenzhen and all the Western staff were evicted/visa revoked/disappeared. I hid in Guangzhou. That company later rebuilt operations in Shenzhen but had, and has, enormous problems getting and keeping replacement Western staff.
This has been a very sensitive situation and remains so. However thanks Mark for your work.
I have had the pleasure to work and meet with Eva on several occasions. I have met many of the staff and coachees of the former Top Human organisation. I must say all the implied and direct criticism of her work above is inconsistent with what I have seen of her in Australia, China and the USA.
Just to set the record straight. Brownwyn Bowery-Ireland does not have the ONLY coaching school in China. Institute for Life Coach Training has trained over 90 occupational therapists with the Hong Kong Hospital district in coaching and has taken over 40 to the level of ACC. We have a trainer in China who speaks English and Mandarin and the course is culturally adopted. We plan to expand the course to mainland China in 2010. It has been very gratifying to see these professionals take to coaching so vibrantly and to use it in such a unique setting as a “life style redesign coaching” for people who had had illness, accident, or other afflictions that sent them tot he hospital services. Coaching helps them redesign their life with the reality of their challenges.